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The 'Apple-Intel architecture' is a name used for Apple Macintosh personal computers developed and manufactured by Apple Computer that use Intel x86 processors, rather than the PowerPC and 68k processors used in their predecessors.
Running operating systems other than Mac OS X
Main articles: Boot Camp
Intel Mac Core (Mac Mini)
On April 5 2006 Apple made available for download a public beta version of Boot Camp, a collection of technologies which allows users of Intel based Macs to boot Windows XP Service Pack 2.[1] On March 28, 2007, Boot Camp 1.2 Beta was released which supports Windows Vista. The final version of Boot Camp will be included in Mac OS X v10.5, "Leopard".
Linux can also be booted with Boot Camp.Mactel Linux
Prior to Boot Camp, which provides most hardware drivers for Windows XP, drivers for XP were very difficult to find.
Being able to boot between multiple operating systems has the following benefits:
★ Being able to choose the user's preferred system and its interface.
★ Being able to use more software by being able to run programs designed only for Windows, which would likely be faster than emulation or a compatibility layer.
★ Being able to use software that is designed only for, works faster on, or is more intuitive on one OS.
★ Being able to make transitions between operating systems easier by using the same familiar hardware.
★ Being able to use an Apple-Intel computer to provide support for both systems using the same hardware.
★ Being able to test applications across different operating systems without having to invest in twice as much hardware, or to test files/documents between different platform-specific software suites.
Technologies
New hardware and firmware components that must be supported to run an operating system on Apple-Intel hardware are listed below.
Extensible Firmware Interface
Main articles: Extensible Firmware Interface
'Extensible Firmware Interface' (EFI) is the firmware-based replacement for the PC BIOS from Intel. Designed by Intel, it was chosen by Apple to replace Open Firmware, used on PowerPC architectures. Since current Microsoft operating systems, such as Windows XP and even Windows Vista are incompatible with EFI, Apple released a firmware upgrade with a compatibility support module that provides traditional BIOS support on their Boot Camp product.
GUID Partition Table
Main articles: GUID Partition Table
'GUID Partition Table' (GPT) is a standard for the layout of the partition table on a physical hard disk. It is a part of the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) standard proposed by Intel as a replacement for the outdated PC BIOS, one of the few remaining relics of the original IBM PC. The GPT replaces the Master Boot Record (MBR) used with BIOS.
Trusted Platform Module
Main articles: Trusted Platform Module
A 'Trusted Platform Module' (TPM) is a microcontroller that stores secured information. It was thought that Intel Macintoshes use the chip to prevent Mac OS X from running on non-Apple PCs. However, Amit Singh has claimed that the TPM is not used by Apple and is in fact absent from recent Intel Apple computers [1]. TPM technology is considered controversial by some users due to its presumed role in future DRM technologies, but to date Apple seems to have chosen not to implement its functions.
Dont Steal Mac OS X.kext
'Dont Steal Mac OS X.kext' is a file present in Intel-capable versions of the Mac OS X Operating System requesting that users of Mac OS X not "steal" it. Currently the extension is only included with the version of OS X that runs on the Intel Core processor family and is located at /System/Library/Extensions on the volume containing the operating system.[2][3] The extension contains a kernel function called page_transform() which performs AES decryption of "apple-protected" programs. A Mac OS X system which is missing this extension, or a system where the extension has determined it's not running on Apple hardware, will be missing this decryption capability, and as a result will not be able to run the apple-protected binaries Dock, Finder, loginwindow, SystemUIServer, mds, ATSServer, translate or translated.[4]
Virtualization
The Intel Core 2 Duo processor logo designed for Apple Macs with the processor.
The Intel Core Duo and Core 2 Duo processors found in Intel Macs support Intel's VT-X technology, which allows for high performance (near native virtualization), which gives the user the ability to run and switch between two or more operating systems simultaneously, rather than having to dual-boot and run only one operating system at a time.
The first software to take advantage of this technology was Parallels Desktop for Mac, which was released in June 2006. VMware offers a similar product, called Fusion. There are many subtle differences between the two products, however VMware's offering allows the user to assign more than one CPU core to the guest OS, and it also supports 64-bit operating systems. Regardless of the product used, there are always likely to be some limitations and inconveniences of using a virtualised guest OS, versus the native solution offered by Boot Camp. Therefore the best choice depends on the circumstances. Though, both Parallels and VMware's virtualization products allow for you to use your native (boot camp installations) of Windows XP or Windows Vista in a virtualised mode while running OS X.
See also
★ Apple Intel transition
★ BAPCo consortium
Notes
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External links
★ Intel EFI Open-source implementation, code-name 'Tiano'
★ XP on Mac Contest
★ Apple boots Windows XP on Intel-based Macs
★ Mactel Linux
★ Bootcamp for Intel Macintoshes
★ A video on BootCamp Beta
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