EA Wants you to buy a PC

[BarbulaM1 38]

If there where a large market for games on a mac than Im sure EA would provide games for it. Also (not to be a win fan) but Apple is moving to the Intel x86 base, at the same time Microsoft is moving off of it in favor of x64. Also Apple will still not allow for dual boots from what I hear and will still relentlessly control all hardware for their computers.

[Kakaze 0]

Apple has stated they have no intention of stopping users from installing windows on Macintel machines.

Right now you can dual boot OS X with Linux, so they've never stopped people from doing that.

[Voar Tok 4]

Date: 11/28/2005 11:27:27 AM Author: GoaSkin You know that you have to run Mac OS on X86 systems or Windows on PPC (Mac) systems in virtual machines? There are restrictions: - no 3D accelerated graphics - no native hardware access (simulated VM- sound, network and periphical adapters), some periphicals possibly unsupported - more memory overhead in the RAM - less performace due JIT-compiling (speed is comparable to java applications)

quote>

No, what I am talking about is way better than a VM.  I'm talking about being able to tell the computer to run a different OS of my choosing every time it boots.  The BIOS loads and then I tell the machine what OS to load.  Properly programmed, I could make a little macro or something to that affect and be able to tell the computer to automatically reboot into a different OS.  Most literally, I am talking about being able to change OSes on the fly.  And I know that can be done without the need of VM software, because I know people that have done it.

[GoaSkin 2]

About dual-booting: Apple computers allow to boot as many operating systems as you want. If you hit the ALT key while booting, a graphical menu containing all the HD partitions containing bootable images. Linux installations appear with a penguin icon, OSX installations with an X icon and older Mac OS installations with the face icon.

You cannot install a PC linux on Macintosh computers but there are special distributions to be used on PPC systems. This linux uses another binary format.

You cannot install Windows on Macintosh computers because Windows is only availlable as X86 binary. Windows NT 4.0 was availlable for PPC and MIPS too, but it can only be installed on older Macintosh computers because NT doesn't support the firmware. To use a native Windows NT 4, you can boot it up through MOL on a linux installation.

There are other operating systems that may be used on Macs. They're partly not officially supported and can be used with tricks,:
- MorphOS
- QNX
- *BSD
- ZYNOT
- MicronOS
- HAIKU
- OpenSolaris

There operating systems are only availlable for X86 and can be used through VMs only:
- Windows
- BeOS/ ZETA

The same for M68K systems (M68K CPUs can be simulated faster):
- AmigaOS
- ELAT
- Atari TOS

Mac OS X itself can be used on the following systems, not officially supported and hard to install:
- PegasosPPC
- Teron
- AmigaONE
- BriQ
- OpenDesktopStation

If a PPC operating system will be installed on a different machine, installation helpers and 3rd party drivers have to be used. These are sometimes buggy and neither the hardware manufactorer, nor the operating system developer gives you support for this. Officially, MacOS only runs on Apple computers and MorphOS only on the Pegasos.

[Padraig_2 0]

FYI:

OSX 86 Developement has been released, it allows you to run OSX native on intel. Yes it works very well. It is avaibale if you know where to look you do need a p4 to run it with DVD rom. you can also have your mac-pc dual boot windows/mac osx.

[Voar Tok 4]

Date: 11/29/2005 5:31:38 AM Author: Padraig_2

FYI:

OSX 86 Developement has been released, it allows you to run OSX native on intel. Yes it works very well. It is avaibale if you know where to look you do need a p4 to run it with DVD rom. you can also have your mac-pc dual boot windows/mac osx.

quote>

That was what I had in mind.  I personally know that dual-boots can be done with Linux, and I have know people who have done Windows/OS X dual boots on their computer.  No VM software was required.

 

BACK ON TOPIC

 

Personally, I think that the reason why EA didn't bother to port SC4 over to the Mac platform is because they don't think that there is a large enough market to validate the necessary work.  However, I personally believe that good games should be ported to other platforms.  They either ported SC3K Unlimited to Linux themselves, or they had someone do it for them.  I seem to remember though that the Linux version didn't sell to well, so maybe they have concerns about doing it and then it not selling.

[GoaSkin 2]

Maxis never ported games, because they have no experience on it. It is easier and cheaper them to let it do other companies.

The Linux ports were done by Lokigames in the past, but the company got bankrupted. Another company called Linux Game Publishing continued the work by Lokigames, but the bankrupty was meanwhile SC4 was developed. That's why there is no Linux port.

By the way, SC4 and RH can be run on Linux through Cedega without any limits.

www.transgaming.com

[Voar Tok 4]

Well, if that's the case, then EA really is cheap; and my opinion of them just sunk a couple of points.

[GoaSkin 2]

Most companies developing windows software let do the ports by other companies. It is a different knowledge that needs different coders. Only very big companies like Microsoft and Adobe develope Mac versions by theirselfes but even these companies use sometimes other companies for porting.

For example, Mainsoft ports a few application from MS to Solaris and HP-UX.


The platform transparency could be handled easier if the software companies make a decision for a cross platform framework.

- SDL (Simple Direct Media Layer) is a framework that allows you to compile the same game source code for Win, Mac, Linux and Amiga.

- QT (by Trolltech) is a C++ framework that allows you to develope applications for Win, Linux and Mac with the platform-related look and feel without the need of changes on the code.

Most companies make their decision for frameworks which are only availlable for Windows. What the porting companies do write libraries that catch up function calls of proprietary frameworks and call native functions. The worst thing is to port application written in languages availlable for Windows only like Visual Basic.

Only a few companies use cross-platform frameworks - that are the companies who release Windows-, Linux and Mac versions in one box.

[Subgrav 32]

Date: 11/11/2005 9:22:54 PM
Author: GoaSkin
Neither the Maxis tools (LOT Editor, BAT, Plugin Manager) start in any virtual machine because the programs require a native DirectX access to the graphics adapter (exit message: could not initialize DirectDraw)

Actually I use LOT Editor and BAT on my VPC without a hitch. There is occasional glitching with graphics, but if you don't rush the machine and let the virtual environment handle things at its own pace, the whole thing works quite nicely.

[GoaSkin 2]

On my virtual system, it does not work. It may be depending on the used Windows version. I use Windows 2000 Service Pack 4.

[Subgrav 32]

Could be... I use XP Pro, and it does quite a nice job. There are the occasional warning windows that pop up, but I ignore them.
Of course, sometimes the progs crash, but I save often