What makes a Mac a Mac | Hacker News Reader

What makes a Mac a Mac

512pixels.net

49 pointsadamnemecek62 comments

What makes a Mac a Mac, to me, having grown up with a 512K and then some subsequent, high tier machines by the same company, there are two things that make a Mac a Mac:

1) It is the most appealing user experience and immediately gratifying "THIS IS WHAT I WANT TO DO" computing platform for normal people, and especially creative types, and

2) There are frustratingly idealistic components or limitations on the hardware/software that make the experience one of perpetually having to think creatively so the flaws don't kill the functionality.

What this really boils down to is a love-hate relationship with the platform. Love being able to do creative stuff? Great! Make sure to back up your work on a JAZZ drive. Like FPS games? Great! Play Marathon and then realize none of your friends IRL can play with you. Let's build a whole professional video editing studio around Final Cut Pro! Oh shit wait you're going FPX and abandoning the suite? WHARRGARBL.

These days, the functional, structural-identity definition of "a Mac" is that it's a computer where:

1. the OSX base-image includes drivers for all the components; and

2. the ACPI BIOS has an SMBIOS table, which can be probed for strongly-typed fields, where:

2.1. the SMBIOS BoardType and ChassisType fields are known valid enum-values that OSX has in its model database; and

2.2 the SMBIOS SerialNumber and BoardSerialNumber fields are present and have valid checksum bits according to whatever algorithm the OSX kernel uses. (Further properties about the system are also embedded into these, so those slices of the string must also decode to known-to-OSX enum values.)

3. Finally, the ACPI device tree must have a virtual device, basically a hardware dongle, located "inside" the keyboard in the device tree, that responds to a probe with a static 64-byte string—basically a shared secret. (It's actually an ASCII-readable string; it contains, in part, the literal text "pleasedontsteal".)

I really wish that Apple would release a pci card for hackintoshes, so you could just do a direct install... said PCI card would be for the sole purpose of qualifying as a licensed, but unsupported mac clone.

Have a limited number of supported chipsets, and if people want to do their own beyond that, so be it.

I'd happily pay $200-300 to be able to run macOS on generic hardware... My home desktop (windows 10) is far more powerful than any mini, I don't like the iMac's use of an integrated display, and the Mac pro is just too overpriced.

Having to do a manual upgrade cycle about once a year or so, and limited support for new hardware really removes a lot of the appeal. Apple makes a lot of money on their other hardware, which requires OSX to develop for... and I don't know how many people are buying their desktop/laptop gear. Not sure if they could do a better job than their last generation of sanctioned clones though. But a hardware tether device pci or usb for legit clones would go a long way, even if a minimal thing.

Hackintosh legitimacy would make me, and a lot of others very happy.

What is in this for Apple? I'm not sure they care about $200-300.

It's mainly for a licensed user... to get more people running OSX.. more OSX users, more people buying mac laptops... main reason it might be better to only offer a PCIe card, that way it can't be used for mac laptops.

They don't want more OS X users, they want more iOS users.

The two do feed into each other. If you use OSX, there's a huge benefit to getting an iPhone or iPad as Apple software will mesh across those platforms.

If you don't use OSX though... then you may think Android is a good bet instead.

I disagree - they want both.

But why? It's just not that hard to make a Hackintosh, and you can buy support from a non Apple company. There are YouTube videos about thrashing the price/performance you can get from Apple with an awesome Hackintosh.

Also, think about it, the cost of developing the PCI card you mention would be more than the cost of developing a model of Mac hardware. You couldn't price such a device competitively.

it would be totally generic hardware... a simple PCI, or USB dongle device internally would only be for a license checker in the OS.

The point would be so that you can get supported third party platforms, and run software updates with less fear of bricking your install.

You're missing the point. If they did that, then Apple would still be stuck with the cost of supporting a much larger range of hardware -- so right there, a big competitive advantage they have over Windows disappears. They probably couldn't charge enough to make it worth their while, otherwise, they would probably have done so already.

One extra board with less components than most? That's not a lot of support.

If Apple were to certify a range of equipment all of the other hardware that could possibly be also installed in your PC, then Apple would have to test against all of those components as well.

So to eliminate the extra support, they could only support the hardware they have already tested against. For one thing, this wouldn't include the extra work to certify against the different combinations of hardware. But even if we ignore that, if Apple were to only support the hardware components they were using in other models anyway, then they would simply be undercutting their own hardware sales.

The suggestion simply doesn't make sense.

I'm saying one, good board they might even make money on. One set of components. With or without PCI part. Take it or leave it deal. It can't be a high support cost given all the small firms doing many boards with few employees.

"then they would simply be undercutting their own hardware sales."

There's truth in that. Of course, Hackintosh and non-Mac people aren't buying their stuff anyway. They want the OS but not the hardware. So, hard to see big losses from this.

> I don't like the iMac's use of an integrated display ...

I thought the same thing back when I was Mac shopping some time ago. And I'm not saying that this should convince you or anyone else, but, now that I have one of those large Mac displays, I like it a lot. It raised my productivity.

But, yes, I do agree with your general theme about overpriced macs which don't offer enough flexibility in the available configurations and so on.

Having an integrated monitor raised your productivity more than a regular monitor of the same size would have?

Ok. That's a valid point.

It's just that I'm the kind of consumer who never would've sprung for such a large monitor without being forced to. I know this kind of sounds lame, but, in my case, it's like "Apple knew best." They made me buy that honkin' monitor and it's worked out well in my case.

I don't know if that sort of thinking would apply to many other people.

I don't know if it's still the case, but for a while, buying an iMac with a 5K monitor was cheaper than buying the equivalent 5K monitor by itself from Dell.

And who would write the drivers for the ocean of hardware options out there?

The vendors... same as they do for windows, for the oceans of hardware... Although ports of floss drivers may work out for a lot of devices.

For the most part the limitations are limited options for support... Right now operating a hackintosh is a really hard thing to do. With a blessed option from Apple, things would probably be come as, or perhaps better supported than with Linux. As it is, a lot of developers targeting Linux deployments are using Apple laptops.

I have run hackintoshes for years, produced music on them, run them as servers hosting applications, used them for software development. They have been perfectly stable with months of uptime, and flawless execution of music production (given licensed software is used, which it is! :) )

Seem good enough to be called a mac for me! :) except can't update osx. would recommend though if you're savvy w/ linux and on a budget apart from the fact that you have no way to license it really. but it's a free legit download anyway if you own a macbook or anything (which I do).

> except can't update osx

you mean you can't update from the app store or something? or just in general?

Well, you can, it's just a scary process sometimes depending on your hardware.

My Hackintosh updated to El Capitan just fine, but some others have had some pretty difficult times adjusting to OSX's updates.

Generally, the closer you stick to recommended hardware (Nvidia cards and Gigabyte motherboards), the less likely you'll run into trouble upgrading.

Absolutely. I install every maintenance point release(10.0.x) through the App Store and it works fine. The only ones that I download the full manual install for are full version(10.x.0) release. Not necessarily because I believe it will screw up because of the hardware, but because of software conflicts.

Can you develop IOS apps on a hackintosh? Can you get into the developer program from one?

Yes

Why'd you choose to build a Hackintosh rather than just going Linux and/or Windows?

Most good audio software is for Mac. Maybe Windows, but then Windows.

I'm not running a Hackintosh, but here's why I'd do it if Apple doesn't come out with reasonable hardware soon:

* Lots of professional userland software that you don't get on Linux.

* Has a POSIX compatible terminal, package manager and fully integrated keychain built in (compared to Windows). Ever tried to get a reasonable setup for git, python, perl, ssh with PKE etc. going on Windows without pulling your hair out? With a Mac I'm productive within 1h (especially thanks to migration assistant), with Windows it takes at least a week and it's still not satisfying. In that time I'd rather setup a Hackintosh properly.

* hands down better configuration system than Windows (defaults system >>>> registry).

Here's why I wouldn't: who wrote the drivers that let you run that OSX on that PC? Were the drivers audited? How do you know you're not root kitted from the start? If I have money, I'll have a Mac. If I don't, there's Fedora.

FakeSMC, the only driver you truly need, is short and easy to build yourself after a look over.

If you're determined to avoid other third party drivers, you can be sure to use only natively supported networking and sound devices.

That only leaves the Clover bootloader, and it's certainly true that this hasn't had an audit/is large enough that performing one would be quite a project. However, it's fully open source and receives quite a bit of interest from across the hackintosh community.

Hackintosh users are also rather small in number and mostly technically knowledgeable; there are far larger and easier userbases to target rootkits at.

Therefore, although I understand your concerns, I am not worried at all about the security of my hackintosh.

>Fedora

Desktop Linux (any variety) is in no way comparable to the usability of OS X. I say this as someone who ran desktop Linux exclusively for years.

ya it's all out of the box. I literally install osx and that's it. nVidia drivers are from nVidia. All of the components I have use supported chipsets. I just can't put it to sleep w/o adding some other kexts. I usually just leave it stock.

It's not so much of a problem with LXSS on the horizon, but I really wanted to have both Adobe software and a Unix terminal.

Although now I'm just spoiled by small behaviors of OS X that I really like.

Windows still isn't fully posix compatible though is it? (re: lxss)

so I can write music w/ bitwig, ableton live etc. windows isn't/wasn't stable w/ many of the tools and linux doesn't have the software.

That is quite interesting. I built a hackintosh in 2011 after a lot of research (hoping to use it to produce music if possible) and the only thing that gave me significant trouble was the audio. Would you care to share your setup?

Even if you have trouble with audio, you can typically use firewire or USB audio interfaces with no issues. If you're doing semi-pro or professional audio production, chances are you want to use a USB audio interface anyway...

A lot of the realtek chipsets used in motherboards either aren't, or are poorly supported... there are many USB devices that are supported though. That's about my only experience there... same goes for wifi/bluetooth and ethernet adapters.

I just use an external soundcard(s). I have serato SL1 which I use for djing w/ timecoded vinyl and I have an old mAudio usb card I use for everything else. I recently got a Pioneer DDJ-SX2 which has replaced the turntables and soundcards - I just use it for everything now.

I have a ThinkPad T420 specifically picked for its OS X compatibility. It started its life as a cheap machine for me to mess with iOS but ended up being my primary device... Oops.

Also I actually updated it to El Capitan before, the only thing that broke was my screen color profile getting reset.

I literally fail to grasp the point of the article.

Looks like he just got tired of typing before getting to the point. Done is better than perfect, I guess!

It's just a funny title for someone bitching about a particular model of Power Mac.

The mid-90s was a terrible time for Apple machines. The first few generations of PowerPC machines were awful, especially with the "OS" (if you can call classic MacOS one, with its lack of memory protection, crappy memory allocation in general, cooperative multitasking, etc.) being a mix of native PowerPC and emulated 68k code. I remember having to help administrate an office full of System 7 running machines that would crash (and by crash I mean whole system freeze up) if you tried to run FileMaker and Netscape at the same time.

And they were expensive machines. And their internals really not that great.

Yeah I didn't really get "what makes a Mac a Mac" either. I scrolled looking for a part 2 or something.

> "Not meant to be upgraded, the Power Macintosh 4400’s 160/200 MHz CPU was soldered to the motherboard."

... that does kinda sound like a Mac

Except that it looks like an ordinary person could crack the case with a screwdriver they actually have.

Ha! Good point.

The 17 1/2 sided appeositetrongic screwdriver which was designed specifically for foiling safe deposit box thieves in Upper Volta was not required to disassemble the thing.

If we leave the OS discussion and focus only on the Hardware. I think Apple has already made the sweet spot in PC for most users with iMac and Macbook. While it was easy to dismiss its Server product range. Apple is neglecting its power user. There were little to zero loyal Apple Server hardware users. ( Again OS / Software is different story ). But there are LOTS of Professional and Enthusiast Apple Mac users.

They are small in numbers. Small in terms of iPhone users, small in Mac user base as well. By all business decision and cases Apple should have disregard them and focus on other areas.

But to me they are the bread and butter. They bleed Apple. Not a lot of youngster these days could say the same. They buy Apple's product when it was near bankrupt. They fuel Apple with cash for R&D when Jobs came back. They are, by historic account, as important as Bill Gates investment into Apple. They are the reason we have iPod. They are the reason we have iPhone, and iPad. They are the reason we even have Apple today. They were the reason some business had to be forced to make a OSX version of their Professional Apps.

So Apple, rather then handing out cash to buy back stock, I would have rather you invest those into paying back some dividend to those very old loyal users. A proper Mac Pro, just to put a smile on their face.

"The Power Macintosh 4400 required expensive 3.3 V EDO memory, back when every other Apple computer worked with cheaper 5 V DIMMs."

The fun thing is that most 64Mbit DRAM chips was 3.3V, yet the 4400 did not have support for most of them.

I think it was partly arguments over Mac clones that forced Gil Amelio out. I was wondering what would happen if CHRP and Mac clones actually happened, with Ellen Hancock eventually becoming CEO. This reminds me of the "xMac" arguments. This also reminds me that Apple tried to bring PC style floppy drives to the Mac twice (the LPX-40 was part of the second attempt).

I wouldn't mind seeing something much closer to a semi-generic micro-atx based "Macintosh" with standard components, aside from a simple license device attached inside, maybe in a pci slot or internal usb header. The Mac Pro is just too much cost for the value, and the mini isn't enough performance.

Yeah, My first 'mac' was a clone machine in the mid 90s. A "Tower Power Pro" by the now defunct "power computing". They were better made and slightly cheaper than macs at the time (Not cheap though). Ran MacOS officially. Very reliable machine and pretty fast machine (for the time). Kept it for a while, upgrading ram, drives and the processor.

Specs here: (I don't think the prices listed where right though)

http://www.everymac.com/systems/powercc/powertower_pro/power...

Millions of years ago, when I was in high school, and the alternative to a Power Mac was a Gateway 2000 that could never ever hope to run Adobe Photshop on Windows 95, the article's Mac was assuredly a Mac.

Clunky, stamped die-cast metal crap, and grey-turned-beige-turned-sun-burnt-poo-brown colors aside, when compared to contemporaries, it was memorably more interesting to scribble with a mouse on a Mac, and not browse garbage on AOL with a PC clone back then.

> It wasn’t a Mac, it was a Macintosh clone made by Apple.

True. Contrary to most macs, that one actually looks like it would at least function as a brick.

I don't know what makes a Mac a Mac, but right now I'm running Windows on mine.

When I got my first ThinkPad in 1998, I fell in love with it - the way people fall in love with their Apple devices! - and swore I'd never buy another brand of computer.

Of course, later I got into cross-platform web development and needed a Mac, so I bought the cheapest Mac Mini I could find and upgraded it to a decent amount of RAM - a whopping 2GB!

Had to get special tools to take it apart - a pair of putty knives! - and unbend the bendy circuit board to get the RAM in, but it worked. I could still develop on the ThinkPad and test websites for Mac compatibility on the Mini.

I stuck with ThinkPads for some time, ending up with a W520, while keeping the old Mini around for testing.

Finally this got a little long in the tooth: the 32-bit Mini wouldn't run any recent version of Chrome any more. And after Lenovo bought the ThinkPad line, they decided not to make real ThinkPads any more. Instead it seemed they wanted to make MacBooks dressed in ThinkPad garb.

So for my next upgrade I bought a maxed-out MacBook Pro, installed Parallels and a Windows virtual machine. This was great! Now I had both OSX and Windows at my fingertips on one machine. Anyone who asked, I told them that a Parallels VM was a much better setup than Boot Camp.

Then I started doing VR development, mostly on Windows, so I ended up doing that on the W520 and other stuff on the Mac.

Of course, eventually Oculus stopped supporting the Optimus GPU switching on the W520 (even if you disable it!), and I started booting the Mac into a Windows 8.1 (and later Windows 10) Boot Camp partition. It's not the optimum VR machine, but for the particular part of VR I work on - not the fancy 3D graphics but more of the systems-level integration - it works fine.

And now the funny thing is that I noticed I haven't booted into OSX in a couple of weeks. Been pretty much using the Mac as a Windows machine. Even when I'm working on stuff where that beautiful combined OSX+Windows VM setup would let me use both OSes simultaneously.

That's because something has gone very sour in my OSX installation. I think it may be largely a Chrome problem, but I'm not sure. If I run Chrome and my Windows VM at the same time, things can get very slow. Often everything slows down by a factor of 10! Even if I just run one or the other of those.

So I don't know what's wrong. It's a lot like the thing people used to complain about with Windows - "you'd better plan on doing a clean install every few months so your system doesn't slow down to a crawl."

Meanwhile, my Boot Camp Windows 10 partition is running hummingly. And I can do native Windows VR development.

Now here's what pisses me off. (I'm not one to swear, so that is strong language for me.) I've got this nice running Windows 10 installation, and I would love to be able to run OSX side-by-side with it in a VM.

But Apple doesn't let you do that. OSX is so precious that you can only run it on the bare hardware, or in a VM that runs under an OSX physical boot. You can't run an OSX VM under a physical Windows 10 boot.

And for a VR developer like me, that really sucks.

Maybe I'll go back to a ThinkPad and see if there's a current Hackintosh build that runs in a VM.

Actually, it's quite easy to run OS X in VMWare under Windows. Not supported, but Hackintosh aren't either.

What makes a Mac a Mac is when you cannot hide files on your desktop by a simple toggle.

Or scroll to a specific location in a large page.

You mean like option-clicking on the scroll bar?

Exactly like that. I should've looked up how to do this.

People give Gnome 3 a lot of flak, but thats one of the most appreciated features in nautilus.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com