Forums | MacLife

Apple will stop this somehow. Easily. You'll see!

Hmmm, interesting, I wonder what effect this will have on my Apple stocks

Little bit more info: http://www.slashgear.com/efix-os-x-hack … 312040.php

Looks interesting.

There's no patched kernels or other hacks.  Even PC EFI can load an unpatched kernel, and run almost all of Apple's kernel extensions without patching.  The only problem with PC EFI is that it's incomplete, so it can't yet load Apple's dsmos and power management kexts, and it can't self-generate gfx and audio strings.  On the other hand, a complete implementation would be able to boot a virgin OS DVD without a hitch.

The best way to think of it is like this.  EFI (whether it be Apple's or someone else's) is just software that puts the machine into a certain state prior to booting the OS.  The challenge is to design an EFI shell that puts the machine into an equivalent state to Apple's EFI -- then the OS will load normally without hacks.  PC EFI is good, but just shy of perfection; EFiX nails it. (so the slashgear article merely echoes a popular misconception about efi.  If EFiX is what it claims to be, there are ZERO patches).

Last edited by Mr. T (2008-06-13 2:38 pm)

Haven't they hacked DX10 for XP yet?

Metacell wrote:

Haven't they hacked DX10 for XP yet?

No, and it's likely unpossible. The driver model, audio stack and more are completely different, to the point that Vista uses an API called DX9.0L for DX9 and earlier apps. Also SP1 brings Vista up to 10.1; Assassin's Creed ran ~20% faster on ATi 10.1 cards, until Ubi patched out the 10.1 support. (NVidia, whose products don't and won't support 10.1 for some time yet, seems to be the villain behind that. Ubi's part of NV's TWIMTBP dev-assist program). 10.1 allowed fewer rendering passes.

CrashingtehWarehouse wrote:

In other news, I have no idea what half of this thread is about.

That's news?

Mr. T wrote:

Bat wrote:

Don't know, but...

NightCougar_37 wrote:

YAY!!

Still better than spending that $$$ on Vista .

...you'll still be stuck at DX9. Maybe a triple-boot?

I tripple-boot, but in all honesty, there's (currently) little to no perceivable difference in image quality between DX9/10, yet the performance penalty of DX10/Vista is quite significant.

Still I wouldn't mind it. But for the price and headache of Vista...still holds me back. Maybe if I head back to college this year i'll find some freebie program for students. Really don't want to dump the $$ on something i'd probably remove and install XP over again. Only have a DX9 card anyways atm so, not like getting Vista would do much for me.

I thought it's worth mentioning that netkas tested a retail copy of OS X (previously he only had access to a MacBook restore disc).  With the dongle inserted, everything worked just like a real Mac.  He booted from the DVD, installed the OS, and updated to 10.5.3 -- everything worked WITHOUT ANY PATCHING whatsoever.

And that's it.  If you have any unsupported hardware, you'll obviously need to install the appropriate drivers -- of course the same applies to real Macs (the expandable ones that is).

This is the real deal, folks.

Last edited by Mr. T (2008-06-15 5:15 pm)

Bat wrote:

Metacell wrote:

Haven't they hacked DX10 for XP yet?

No, and it's likely unpossible. The driver model, audio stack and more are completely different, to the point that Vista uses an API called DX9.0L for DX9 and earlier apps. Also SP1 brings Vista up to 10.1; Assassin's Creed ran ~20% faster on ATi 10.1 cards, until Ubi patched out the 10.1 support. (NVidia, whose products don't and won't support 10.1 for some time yet, seems to be the villain behind that. Ubi's part of NV's TWIMTBP dev-assist program). 10.1 allowed fewer rendering passes.

Oh?

Microsoft says one thing, the internet says quite another

Fried Chicken wrote:

Oh?

Microsoft says one thing, the internet says quite another

And anything you read on the intarweb is true.

ukimalefu wrote:

vapor

Likely, at this point. FC reminds me that I covered this several times in Gaming so long ago that I'd forgotten about it. It was already promised for last summer, and I've seen nothing since. If it's progressing, it should've gone beyond the alpha it's mentioned at now.

'The internet' tells me two more things, on the same page you link: there's a strikethru on the Falling Leaf Forums, and the last of 282 comments is from 4/30/07. The page itself seems undated.

pirloui wrote:

Bat wrote:

Fried Chicken wrote:

Oh?

Microsoft says one thing, the internet says quite another

And anything you read on the intarweb is true.

And anything Microsoft says is true..

Since they're apparently the only ones who could, and doing so would remove a considerable amount of whatever incentive there is to use Vista, and retail sales of same have yet to set the world on fire... I believe them.