[new newton]

Just a hint for ya, but MS doesn't care who makes the system that their OS runs on. All they care about is that the OS has been paid for. You may have noticed that.

Hardware generally isn't damaged when there isn't an appropriate driver for it. It just doesn't work. Most folks that have a bit of experience working under the hood can tell you about that. There's no mystery to it.

[rhombus]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

And your point is? Why should I pay plenty of money for a new mac then, while I could have a top of the line PC for a bit more money then an iMac? If you talk about dual booting, it can't be to hard to install OS X on a PC then can it? Or are prices for macs going to drop to the same level as PC's? I don't really see that happening. Thats really my opinion.

Why did you buy a Mac in the first place then? PCs have been faster than Macs for 6-7 years now. I bought a Mac for the all round user experience.

[HiDDeN]

Originally Posted by rhombus

Why did you buy a Mac in the first place then? PCs have been faster than Macs for 6-7 years now. I bought a Mac for the all round user experience.

I also bought a mac for the user experience. I also want the mac to remain a mac, I don't want see it turned in some semi wintel box. Yep, PC's have indeed been faster for about 7 years. I still remember it the other way around dough. Macs used to be about performing, and yes G4 and 5 processors ain't the way to keep going. I just got a feeling that AMD would have been a better choice. A lot of work needs to be done on the platform, because ease of use just ain't gonna be enough to make people buy a Mac with intel chip or a PC with OS X fot that matter. Everything a mac can do a Windows box can do to.

[new newton]

That didn't make much sense. The computer is inherently different in terms of user experience because of the switch from PPC to Intel? Uh, ok.

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Ow, how stupid of me. So I'm going to fry my unsupported PC hardware using OS X, but all you dual booting types don't think that could happen to your Macintels using Windows? Maybe the guys at M$ wil laugh with some of you frying your fancy macintels?

Quite possibly...somethings such as fan control on G5 Macs are software-controlled and not firmware-controlled. If it was theoretically possible to install Windows on them, you'd have no fan control at all under Windows. I believe this is (was?) the case with PPC Linux flavors installed on a G5. I wouldn't recommend anyone to dual-boot their Macintel.

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by new newton

Hardware generally isn't damaged when there isn't an appropriate driver for it. It just doesn't work. Most folks that have a bit of experience working under the hood can tell you about that. There's no mystery to it.

This would be true in certain cases. Not true in others (as I've explained in my previous post.) And partial driver support can be dangerous.

[HiDDeN]

Originally Posted by new newton

That didn't make much sense. The computer is inherently different in terms of user experience because of the switch from PPC to Intel? Uh, ok.

Yes it is a bit different. If macs want the attention of the general public, it's going to take more than good looks and ease of use. MS Vista promises the same ease of use. (took them long enough to) A pro also has no need for a mac, because like I said, there isn't a single thing a mac can do more then a PC running Windows, not to speak about the plenty of soft ware to do it with on a PC. Thats what I mean with lots of work.

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Yes it is a bit different. If macs want the attention of the general public, it's going to take more than good looks and ease of use. MS Vista promises the same ease of use. (took them long enough to) A pro also has no need for a mac, because like I said, there isn't a single thing a mac can do more then a PC running Windows, not to speak about the plenty of soft ware to do it with on a PC. Thats what I mean with lots of work.

What about a virus and spyware-free environment? Do people want that? Or do they just don't care?

[new newton]

I think I'll stick to the more substantive forums. It's like amateur hour in here!

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by new newton

I think I'll stick to the more substantive forums. It's like amateur hour in here!

Don't spread the amateurism to too many threads, though.

[HiDDeN]

Originally Posted by Horsepoo!!!

What about a virus and spyware-free environment? Do people want that? Or do they just don't care?

Last post about the topic from me. Don't wan't you guys hurting your brains with the amaturism. Anyway Horsepoo, how long do you think it wil last a spyware and virus free enviroment if OS X where to expand their marketshare? If you have a 95% worldwide markedshare like M$, your a pretty big target for those things.

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Last post about the topic from me. Don't wan't you guys hurting your brains with the amaturism. Anyway Horsepoo, how long do you think it wil last a spyware and virus free enviroment if OS X where to expand their marketshare? If you have a 95% worldwide markedshare like M$, your a pretty big target for those things.

Way to not answer my question. *clap* *clap* *clap* Want to try again? Or do you want to continue shifting goalposts.

[HiDDeN]

Originally Posted by Horsepoo!!!

Way to not answer my question. *clap* *clap* *clap* Want to try again? Or do you want to continue shifting goalposts.

Please don't get mad O great sarcastic leader man who is used to people blindly agreeing with him. Here is what I hope to be an answer to your question in case you did not get it! People don't want spyware and viruses and yes I guess they do care. Yes OS X has a minimal on spyware and viruses. But let me drag you out your fantasy world and let me keep it simple for you. OS X grow bigger marketshare, OS X be bigger target and also get plenty virus and spyware.

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Please don't get mad O great sarcastic leader man who is used to people blindly agreeing with him. Here is what I hope to be an answer to your question in case you did not get it! People don't want spyware and viruses and yes I guess they do care. Yes OS X has a minimal on spyware and viruses. But let me drag you out your fantasy world and let me keep it simple for you. OS X grow bigger marketshare, OS X be bigger target and also get plenty virus and spyware.

Thanks for answering the question...

My next question (since you're so eager to talk about it)...how much market share do you suppose Apple will gain with OS X in the next few years? You obviously think they'll grab a large part if they are to be the target of viruses and spyware. That's a pretty big change from just a few posts ago where you were saying Apple was ultimately doomed.

You don't actually need to answer that, BTW. You asked what the benefits of OS X was over Windows. You ruled out ease-of-use and apps because apparently Windows has these. So what's left? Virus and spyware. The current benefit of OS X (if we follow your constraints on what should be considered as a benefit of an OS over another) is that it has no viruses or spyware.

This benefit should allow Apple to increase its market share. Whatever happens in the future is irrelevant to the situation right now.

[HiDDeN]

Originally Posted by Horsepoo!!!

Thanks for answering the question...

My next question (since you're so eager to talk about it)...how much market share do you suppose Apple will gain with OS X in the next few years? You obviously think they'll grab a large part if they are to be the target of viruses and spyware. That's a pretty big change from just a few posts ago where you were saying Apple was ultimately doomed.

You don't actually need to answer that, BTW. You asked what the benefits of OS X was over Windows. You ruled out ease-of-use and apps because apparently Windows has these. So what's left? Virus and spyware. The current benefit of OS X (if we follow your constraints on what should be considered as a benefit of an OS over another) is that it has no viruses or spyware.

This benefit should allow Apple to increase its market share. Whatever happens in the future is irrelevant to the situation right now.

Thats where your wrong. The future is everything! People (the general consumer) has a very simple way of thinking. They see 2 machienes, one a 2000$ mac the other a 1200$ PC. The mac has one advantage, minimal spyware and almost no viruses. For 800 bucks cheaper, outperforming the mac (maybe not outperforming anymore with the macintel?) and all the apps you can dream, 95% of them just made an easy choice.
Now, excuse me for my rudeness earlier, but are you starting to see my point of view?

[Horsepoo!!!]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Thats where your wrong. The future is everything! People (the general consumer) has a very simple way of thinking. They see 2 machienes, one a 2000$ mac the other a 1200$ PC. The mac has one advantage, minimal spyware and almost no viruses. For 800 bucks cheaper, outperforming the mac (maybe not outperforming anymore with the macintel?) and all the apps you can dream, 95% of them just made an easy choice.
Now, excuse me for my rudeness earlier, but are you starting to see my point of view?

You're unfortunately mixing a possible future with the now to predict the future. That just doesn't work, dude. You can't say the Mac is dying because in the future it will have the market share to attract virus and spyware authors and thus ultimately kill off (what you may consider) the Mac's only attractive feature...because that would imply that the Mac isn't dying since it would have to reach a market share that would support virus and spyware authors.

So the Mac market share would have to grow for it to start dying.

Right now there are no virus and spyware apps on the Mac...so *right now* the Mac has a big advantage over PCs.

And like you said, with the Macintels, the performance to price ratio should become more tolerable. The premium on Macs will be justified by the fact that OS X is currently a virus and spyware free environment and that it can run any x86 OS if the need arises (but if we do not limit ourselves to your constraints, I'd say ease-of-use was another justification for the premium...I don't think Vista will be any easier than XP to use.)

[torifile]

Originally Posted by HiDDeN

Please don't get mad O great sarcastic leader man who is used to people blindly agreeing with him. Here is what I hope to be an answer to your question in case you did not get it! People don't want spyware and viruses and yes I guess they do care. Yes OS X has a minimal on spyware and viruses. But let me drag you out your fantasy world and let me keep it simple for you. OS X grow bigger marketshare, OS X be bigger target and also get plenty virus and spyware.

HiDDen, it's not just security through obscurity for OS X. It's a much better system, from the ground up. Windows is just designed wrong. From the ground up, it's screwed. Here's an admittedly old article talking about security in XP. That's the problem, not their marketshare.

Here's something I read (again, a while back, but the "Windows is insecure" shtick is no longer news - everyone knows it).

I'll address several issues here. I'm a programmer by trade, and have been creating UNIX programs, filters, and drivers since '82. My name is in the '94 and '94 Yggdrasil Linux "Plug-and-Play" books, so I've obviously been a Linux hack since '92. I also write Windows programs using Visual Studio, and have been porting my tools from Linux to OS X since the beta. So, I think I *might* be qualified to say what I'm about to say.

Remember: a "virus" is a set of invasive routines which have been attached to a legitimate program. A "worm" is, in essence, a detached background process.

Creating a UNIX "virus" would require the writer to muck with program text and data segment pointers, and change the program initialization pointer from the "crt0.o" equivalent to something else. The degree of difficulty here is at least 9.5 on a scale of 1-10... even if you *do* have the source to the runtime invocation routines. Then, to screw up the system, you have to attain root privileges from within the attached routines in that user-privileged program, which is indeed quite a bit harder. It's not impossible with the default OS X install, but it ain't easy. The easiest way to defeat this is to create a root account with a scrambled password on *EVERY* *NIX system you use, and that includes OS X.

Writing a UNIX "worm" is easier. Any program can create a detached process. BUT, the same issues with user-level vs. root permissions exist. Worms will run on properly protected systems, but they may never be able to attain the privileges necessary to do significant damage.

Now, these are not easy tasks. It's *much* easier to write a simple script that fools Windows into thinking that an offending program is actually something the user *wants* to run. Windows does *NOT* have user-level protections - and that's why viruses and worms are so easy to invoke on Windows.

Lastly: each task on a *NIX program runs in its own virtual memory space. Programs running within these virtual spaces are not allowed to "touch" devices or other system resources. Instead, programs make requests to the system for system resources. Even the graphics subsystem runs as a task under OS X. Hence, a "buffer overflow" within the OS X desktop would cause the desktop to crash and restart, but shouldn't cause any other problems.

Windows has incorporated graphics routines into its kernel. Hence, a "buffer overflow" in one of the graphics routines causes the kernel to respond with a handler. If you write your virus properly, the handler will execute *virus code* as the handler... and the virus has now attained system-level capabilities. The Windows kernel thinks it is running legitimate code, but it is running the virus' code -- which just happens to now be running as the system-level error handler. And, without user-level privilege protections, you can do.... anything.

That's how it's done, folks.

Sure, everyone's an expert on the intarweb, but this guy seemed to know what he was talking about and I haven't read anything to dispute his assertions.

There are NUMEROUS other articles that go into more detail. Suffice it to say, that small marketshare isn't the (sole) reason OS X's completely virus free. And this won't change with a switch in architecture. Nor will it likely change with increased marketshare.

Tell me, though, if you continue to believe that marketshare is the sole reason for MS's problems, why IIS and MSSQL are hit with worms and viruses many more times than, say Apache or mySQL or Oracle? You realize that MS' products in these domains aren't the market leaders (by any stretch of the imagination), don't you? Could it be because of inherent security flaws? Nah. Couldn't be...

Please come up with another argument. Yours is stale.

[HiDDeN]

Listen, it's not that I wish Apple or OS X dead. Don't get me wrong here. No more comment from me, don't want this getting out of hand. Maybe I'm a bit of a doom thinker. I just hope you guys got it right.

[Horsepoo!!!]

OT:
The forums are really whack these days...HiDDeN's last post registered as a post by a member called 'littlegreenspud' about an hour ago.

[- - e r i k - -]

"Security through obscurity" is a card played by people who have little knowledge of real security.

[Horsepoo!!!]

...was gonna write something but changed my mind.

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Delabio

I have also been looking for interesting adventrure game that isn't text-based or requires Classic to run

www.nethack.org

Text based adventure... for your OS X machine!

[NateEssex]

Well, I was one of those "hard core gamers" who bought a PC just to do gaming, but still use my Mac for everything else. I played EQ for over 4 years with friends and that just wasn't possible on a Mac. At least now, there has been some progress with WoW and at least a meager acknowledgement by Sony with the port of the original EQ to the Mac.

I don't really use my PC much anymore. I don't game all the time. But there's no way I would go to a PC machine over a Mac. And, it's not because of the safe Mac environment with very few viruses and no spyware. I love the iApps which are free on the Mac. I do a lot of iPhoto, iMovie, iDvD; use iCal to organize and coordinate with my wife. I've had a number of friends and family who have switched from the PC to the Mac for the very same reasons I continue to use my Mac.

How will this play out with the new Macintel machines? I'm not sure. Who can know? Will I install XP or whatever crap Windoze system is out if I want to play a PC only game? Maybe. But I certainly won't want to give up on the Mac OS nor it's apps.

That's just my 2 cents.

[Scooterboy]

Wouldn't be almost fair to ask, "Is PC gaming dying?" What with everything going console, and games getting dumbed down for the console market, and many PC games will be ports of console games, is there any future in PC (and by PC I mean Mac and PC) gaming?

[genesisdan]

Originally Posted by NateEssex

... and at least a meager acknowledgement by Sony with the port of the original EQ to the Mac.

I was surprised tofind out that when Sony bought EQ to the mac side, that its only on specific servers, not all servers. I played EQ for about 2 years hardcore raising up a beastlord account to level 70 with 11k hp unbuffed as an officer on one of the top guilds on my server (on the PC side) and now that I moved to Mac, i cant join them again. Oh well, time to sell the account on PlayerAuctions since I had stopped playing a while now. At least with WoW, pc and mac gamers can play on the same servers, no difference. Shrug, I might move to WoW cause i get bored sometimes.

[NateEssex]

Originally Posted by genesisdan

I was surprised tofind out that when Sony bought EQ to the mac side, that its only on specific servers, not all servers. I played EQ for about 2 years hardcore raising up a beastlord account to level 70 with 11k hp unbuffed as an officer on one of the top guilds on my server (on the PC side) and now that I moved to Mac, i cant join them again. Oh well, time to sell the account on PlayerAuctions since I had stopped playing a while now. At least with WoW, pc and mac gamers can play on the same servers, no difference. Shrug, I might move to WoW cause i get bored sometimes.

That is one of the biggest killers for me too. If I could use my 67 Enchanter, I might still play today. There was no way I was going to start all over after all I had done without all of the friends I had made, in addition to my RL friends who still play on PC servers. Sony should take a page from WoW and get with the Mac & PC servers.

[DekuDekuplex]

Originally Posted by Delabio

I have also been looking for interesting adventrure game that isn't text-based or requires Classic to run

Try Dofus. It's an epic Flash-based bona fide tactical MMORPG/interactive cartoon, not just some FPS, and it runs in Mac OS X, Linux, and even Windows. It's been taking over my gaming life since October of 2005.

If you liked Final Fantasy Tactics™ on the PlayStation®, you'll love Dofus. The characters are cute, the music is fantasy-like, and the game is addictive. I dumped Vendetta Online™ as soon as I saw it, and have never gone back.

-- DekuDekuplex