News for Friday 3rd October

Google wants to save the world
CEO Eric Schmidt lays out Google’s plan to break the US dependency on fossil fuel by 2030.

Apple says Psystar’s antitrust claims are deeply flawed
The Cupertino based company asks Judge to dismiss Psystar’s countersuit.

Nokia launches first touch screen phone
5800 Xpress Music phone runs Series 60 and supports Adobe’s Flash. Video’s here.

Digital download royalty rate stays at 9.1 cents
CRB keeps the rate at current level but songwriters are unhappy.

Internet users can do more to prevent Identity Theft
The National Cyber Security Alliance claims most Americans are not using antivirus, antispyware, and firewall software.

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Psystar Sues Apple, claims anticompetitive practices

In an unexpected move, Mac clone maker Psystar has counter sued Apple, accusing the company of restraint of trade and other violations of antitrust law. Apple had originally filed a formal complaint with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on July 3rd. Now that Psystar has responded, Apple has 30 days to reply to the allegations.

Psystar are looking to challenge the EULA of Mac OSX, which states that the operating system can only be used on Apple hardware. It’s starting to sound like a David and Goliath battle, but if the comment on Engadget that ‘EULAs have traditionally been upheld in California and Florida’ is any indication Psystar has a tough battle ahead.

This is one case that could have a huge impact on the future of Mac OS, especially the right to run it on non-Apple hardware. The chance to buy a legal copy of OSX for a hackintosh would be a big improvement, even though it’s looking like a very slim possibility at the moment.

Read more at

Appleinsider – Macworld – Engadget – Techradar

Open Tech Home – another hackintosh

Psystar haven’t even had a chance to defend themselves in court and another manufacturer has released an OSX compatible computer. The Open Tech Home is based on a not exactly cutting edge Pentium D 945 running at 3.4Ghz. Your $620 also buys a 500 Gb Hard Drive, 3Gb of DDR2 Ram and a Geforce 8600 GT 512Mb. The biggest difference appears to be that Open Tech are not selling the machines with Leopard pre-installed, just saying they are compatible. Will this prove to be a longer term business plan?

Psystar releases Openserv platform

Following on from its Opencomputer and OpenProcomputer models, Psystar has now released the Openserv 1100 and 2400 models. The 1100 offers four drive bays in a 1U rack space case and is available with a range of operating systems including Mac OSX 10.5 server. The 2400 models ups the drivebays to six in a 2U case. There’s been no reported action from Apple following the release of the Opencomputer, so it looks like Psystar are confident they can continue with their Mac OS range with impunity.

There’s also an Opengamer range on offer, but not surprisingly this is restricted to Windows Vista.

Also on the Psystar web site is a 10.5.3 installer for the Opencomputer range. This downloads and installs the 10.5.3 update from Apple for the hardware that the Opencomputer could be configured with. There’s no indication if this would work for a homebrew hackintosh with the same hardware.

Are Psystar for real?

The debate on Psystar and their ‘Opencomputer’ platform of pre built hackintosh’s continues. A couple of days ago Cnet published a review after they managed to get their hands on one of the mythical machines. Today there’s another article discussing the legal implications of what Psystar are doing, and the struggle ahead of them if Apple decides to take legal action. Good luck in that fight, I would say starting a legal battle with a company that has 19.4 Billion Dollars in cash is suicidal. I’m almost hoping Apple do decide to take action if only to see how the EULA hold up. Companies have been restricting our use of the items we buy for some time now, so maybe it’s about time someone challenged that.

Reviewers are gradually coming around to the idea that Psystar may be legitimate, though I would still wait to hear of a reasonable number of computers shipped before buying one. I’m sitting on the fence here, as the OS X updates page at Psystar is still empty. Lets see what happens when the imminent 10.5.3 is released.

Hackintosh goes mainstream?

With the recent news that Psystar are offering Mac OS compatible computers with Leopard pre-installed it appears the mainstream Mac press have taken notice. Macworld published an article yesterday detailing Rob Griffiths experiences of building and testing a hackintosh. Not much in the way of information on the install process, but there are some benchmarking results using Cinebench, Quake 3 and Xbench.

Its a good read until the conclusion, which I strongly disagree with. Listing the ‘many pitfalls’ as including ‘follow poorly-translated instructions to get everything put together’ makes me wonder what instructions Rob was using. There are some clear and well written guides online, especially at InsanelyMac. Having to shop around for the best components is something PC builders and users have done for years to get the right system, so it’s not a hackintosh weakness. And as for the case not being as attractive as a Mac Pro, is that really why people buy Mac Pro’s?

Read at Macworld