For as long as Mac devotees have been flaunting desktop superiority over their Windows counterparts, users on both sides of the fence have clamored for a way to install Mac OS X on a PC. On Monday, the wait may be over.

 

Dubbed “the best solution for running Mac OS X on PCs” and consisting of a device that is “neither a memory stick nor a thumb drive,” EFiX allows non-Mac users “to install Mac OS X straight from the original DVD without having to worry about patches, replacing files and anything like that” is poised to free the PC world from the shackles of Vista.

 

Unfortunately, you won’t find one in any U.S. store. But the idea is intriguing nonetheless.

 

For those still drooling over the convenience of Time Machine and Stacks, but saddled with a Dell Inspiron, EFiX, “a completely unique device with very intricate protection above and beyond your wildest imagination,” is certainly a dream come true. Working with desktops and notebooks (but not AMD processors), available as either a USB dongle, PCI card or integrated circuit for motherboards, and featuring a a built-in update system that allows developers to “modify, update and perfect” the technology, EFiX comes awfully close to its bombastic descriptions.

 

To understand EFiX, however, is to understand a simple adage, upon which its development was based: Don’t treat people like idiots, and they will stop believing you are one.

 

Or, to put it another way: If you build it, they will come.

 

“EFiX is something that people have needed for quite a long while,” said Wilhelm von Vnukov, CEO and lead engineer of the EFiX team. “Right now, there is not any simple and easy way to run Mac OS X on a PC. The idea behind EFiX is to give people around the world the ability to experience an original installation and usage of unmodified Mac OS X DVDs.”

 

Von Vnukov’s vision is less about stepping on Apple’s sales than about bringing Leopard’s ease of use to an untapped segment of the populace. While he wouldn’t divulge the inner workings of EFiX ahead of its launch, he sees it as a bridge for frustrated Windows users who are hesitant to make the plunge to a foreign OS “without fear of overspending.”

 

Using EFiX to run OS X, he said, “works stable and secure enough that people can really judge the OS. ... People are afraid to be guinea pigs --- to spend several thousand of dollars on Apple hardware to try out a new OS.”

 

Von Vnukov, who’s been running EFiX for six months with nary a crash nor freeze, feels his device will usher in a new era of computing that puts an “old, outdated and tired” approach to rest.

 

And he’s not the least bit afraid of Apple’s end-user licensing agreement, which states, in part, “You agree not to install, use or run the Apple Software on any non-Apple-labeled computer, or to enable others to do so.”

 

For one, EFiX doesn’t actually alter OS X, like so many attempts that came before. (Back in 2006, Apple sunk its legal teeth into the OSx86 project for supplying links to software patches that provided instructions for how to hack OS X for use on PCs.) For another, von Vnukov plans to put the stickers that accompany all of Apple’s products to good use.

 

“A retail copy of Leopard comes with two labels in the box. ... What if we interpret (the EULA) like this: You may not install it or run without marking your system with our logo; because you are using our OS, kindly display our logo and promote it.”

 

But even an ambitious product like EFiX know when it’s licked. Von Vnukov has no plans to release EFiX stateside, he said, since Apple’s EULA “only has power in the U.S., because basically it is, in a logical way, fully nonsense.”

 

Aspersions aside, however, von Vnukov ultimately hopes to help Apple increase its market share and influence. While the Mac mini may be a perfectly affordable entry into the wonderful world of OS X, it’s certainly not cheaper than the millions of PCs already running Windows in homes around the globe, he said.

 

“People afraid of Macs because OS X sounds to them like a virus from Mars and not an alternative to Windows. Try to ask someone to buy a Mac after using Windows for many years. What they will tell you? ‘Why do the hell I need it?’

 

“I believe that through hard work, our solution can become really great and useful for people.”