Monday 17 November 2008

I've been thinking about that Hackintosh

Actually been digging and reading a bit. Seems it's quite do-able with suitably adapted software downloaded free from a torrent.

And therein lies the rub.

That is, basically, theft. Unless I buy a full copy, in which case it's breaking a (what should be unlawful) copyright, although that doesn't especially bother me as no-one's been done out of cash. But new the OS is £88, and I refuse to pay that for the privilege of trying out some slightly shonky software that may work with an uncertain degree of success (not all hackintoshs work properly y'see).

Now I may splurge on a copy off the bay, if I can find one for about £25, because I'd risk it for that much. I'd still have to download the illegal version, but hey, I've got original media, and in my economy that gives me an ethical carte blanche. I have 2 XP machines here, both with authentic licenses for conscience sake.

The other thing that left me unhappy - or reminded me that this is coming from a contaminated source - was that hunting on a torrent through google took me through to a porn-loaded page. Sure the correct software was on there too, but it was a reminder that it's apparently hard to keep clean if you're going to walk along the edge of the 'law'. I found other sources without the 'window-dressing', but that was enough to make me stop and walk away for a bit, reconsider the whole deal.

So for the immediate future there will be no hackintosh happening here. Not until I get a pukka copy of the OS at the very least. Annoying really, as if I liked it better than M$s offering it then an apple would almost certainly be my next work laptop. As it is, that's highly unlikely right now, and I'd certainly not trust it without some experience. My recent Linux experiments have taught me to be wary of smiling people offering 'better ways to work'.

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