OSX on a hyperthreaded P4, is it possible??
 

Hi people, lately I've heard something about Intel Macs, but I'm not sure what's all this about; so, since I've tried windows, linux, free-BSD, etc, I'm thinking it would be cool to try out OSX just to see what's this OS about (I've heard and read it's astonishing, so I'd like to try it out). So, my questions are:

1.- Is there a specific version of OSX for the Intel architecture?

2.- In case the answer to the above question is affirmative, will it run on a hyperthreaded Pentium 4 machine? (hyperthreading technology, afaik, emulates two processors on a single one). My specs are the following:

P4 64 bits with hyperthreaded technology, as a said before (3.0 Ghz)
1 GB of ram
VIA motherboard

(I can't give you the specific hardware details right now like models, etc., because I'm at work, so I have to wait to get home in order to check these details, but if it's necessary, just tell me and I will as soon as I get home).

Thanks in advance for your answers, and excuse me for my ignorance regarding Macs and OSX (I've never put my hands on a Mac, so I'm completely ignorant about it).

EDIT: Well, I just saw this: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=560994 , so I guess it's not "legal" to install it on a P4??

Nope, not legal. The "intel Macs" are computers that apple sells that are technically x86. However, they maintain enough of their own architectural quirks to prevent full compatibility.

Regarding the other thread: LQ won't let you *talk* about illegal actions? Since when? Better take down the hundreds of win32 codec posts. Was his mistake in listing a country? Do we normally get away with it by using the "we might be in a country without copyright laws" line?

I find it slightly ironic that we get away with talking about violating the rights of a company widely considered to be an enemy of free software selling a DOS-based system, but they shut down a thread talking about violating the rights of a company who built its OS atop free software and sells a *NIX system.

Hi PatrickNew, thanks for your answer... yeah, I realized it wasn't "legal" after posting and reading some stuff on internet. As for your point about what might be considered "legal" or "illegal" regarding to software, I agree with you; I mean, linux (the linux kernel) wouldn't be what it is today if the creators of it wouldn't have hacked closed source drivers in order to build a kernel (and when I use the word 'hack' it's totally different to 'crack', break into other people computers, etc.; something I'm totally against to). And please LQ folks don't misunderstand me, I'm not inciting to do "illegal" actions (or, on other words, actions that for stupid reasons (mainly for the interests of the big companies and business) might be illegal in some countries).

Greetings.

At any rate, I'm not sure you would want to put OSX on a hyperthreaded P4. If it's a non-native platform, I doubt that you'd get any performance boost - the hyperthreading would probably go unused. I'd just get an smp-enabled linux kernel if I were you. ;-)

Hi again, I have smp kernels on ubuntu and debian and they work like a charm, I even installed ubuntu 64 bits to test its performance and it's cool. As for OSX, I have Elive installed on my machine and it's astonishing (for the screenshots I've seen of OSX, Elive resembles it a lot, so I stick with Elive :D ;) )

Greetings, and thanks again for your answer.