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'OpenMac' Promises $399 Headless Mac... But Not From Apple

yomamafor1 said:
Humm... so getting 2x priced hardware, and only get 90% of them back is not called screwed.... :rolleyes:
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This is so lame. Clearly you think it's overpriced, so why would you buy it, then return it, and claim you got screwed? :rolleyes: Nope not screwed. But I can think of a few words....
 
turboflam3 said:
I see what your saying, yeah in a professional environment with a lot at stake it's probably best not the best way to go.

But for a hobbyist or a casual user with some computer knowledge, a hackintosh would be great. For these people as long as they know what they're doing they shouldn't have too much trouble.
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I agree to some extent. I'm a newly converted OS X user (on a hackintosh). I've been using Windows and Linux for years, both as a CS student (and a student programmer), and OSX86 was STILL a pain to install. For the hobbyist, no problem. For the casual user, I don't know. If you don't mind the extra risk, I don't see a problem. However, in my opinion, a casual user shouldn't even have to know what a terminal or a kext is. Casual users should be like: "Drivers, OS X, huh?"
 
topgunn said:
Translated: I simply prefer to purchase a computer from a company who has hand-selected the hardware and deliberately programed the software to work near perfectly with it. I simply prefer to purchase a computer that doesn't look like a plain black box, have 3 miles of cables spewing from its backside, exude the brightness of a lighthouse in neon lights, and drops faster in resale value than a gallon of milk with two days left until expiration. No one other.
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"a company who has hand-selected the hardware and deliberately programed the software to work near perfectly with it"

Wow the apple commercials are very effective...
 
People don't seem to understand that a Mac IS MADE OF standard PC parts, and the only differences between a Mac and a PC are three things:

1. The OS
2. The exterior design
3. The support

Those 3 things were enough for me to buy a Macbook. For some people, #1 only may be enough to buy an OpenMac.
 
yomamafor1 said:
Translated: I simply like to purchase extremely overpriced products that can be had for fractions of its price. No other one.
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That's funny, because people who spend $60,000-$100,000 dollars on cars and $2,000-$3,000 dollars on TV's are morons too. This is all too funny. Apple is a business and protecting their investments. No one is forcing people to buy the Mac and OSX or even an iPhone. A large percentage are more than happy with their Windows Server, Windows 2000, WindowsXP and Windows Vista. I would be more concerned about how Microsoft does business. More than 5 years with Vista and now they decide to bring out Windows 7 in just a few years. That is ripping off the consumer.

If I couldn't afford a Mac, I would be happy too with just my Window Based PC. It seems to me that the people who are really whinning are the people not working or unwilling to work those couple of weeks OT to buy a Mac. I don't see the point of wasting all this energy in arguing how companies charge for their products. MacOSX is not god's gift to mankind.
 
i love hackintosh

i have over the course of 20 years paid inflated prices for apple products.

this year i built a hack rather than shelling out the $5000 i would have spent on an equiv powermac.

I spent $700 (plus $129 for osx leo ) and used the case and power supply from an old pc.

i now have a quad core that runs fine at 3.6GHz. Apple doesnt even make a 3.6GHz comp. my budget mac kicks the $5000 powermacs butt in benchmarks and runs reliable 24/7 as my main mac.

so for all the posts about hacks being unreliable and 'cheap' its the same if not better components being used as apple, just without the $1000 'snake oil'.

i've had pleanty of problems with 'real' macs to btw. i've also had less than stellar experiences dealing with apple customer service.

apple used to be a very cool company, now it is a greedy corporate monopoly. as a designer i also have real issues with being told what variety of helvetica to use at an os level... but thats a whole other issue.
 
oban14 said:
I'm a Mac Pro owner who fully supports those who want to build Hackintosh machines, and can see the appeal for a lot of people. That said, I challenge you to put together a machine with the same components that make a Mac Pro at Dell.com or any other website, and even get it 20% cheaper, let alone 4-5 times cheaper. The Mac Pro is actually a very good price for what you get - dual quad core xeons and that kind of memory don't come cheap.



Sadly, yes, he is serious. One needs look no further than this thread if you want to see how utterly brainwashed people become through Apple's marketing. They've confused a fortune 500 company with a close friendship. :rolleyes:



Hey - with modern Macs, if you don't like OSX (trust me, you will) you can still install Windows or Linux. But yes, at that point it really makes no sense to pay so much for hardware.

Honestly, putting together your own Hackintosh isn't difficult at all these days. I think most of the people protesting this new machine are old timers who don't really get what the shift to Intel means - there is nothing special, magical, or even particularly proprietary in Macs. It's just a Dell/HP/Lenovo/whatever guts in a pretty box.
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The most humble, honest and edifying post in this thread. Thank you, sir.

The Apple koolaid is getting dry; hurry up and refill it!
 
KindredMAC said:
To appease the gods, Apple needs to do the following:
- Lower the Mac Mini back to its original price point of sub-$500, or lower is always better.
- Bring the MacBook back down to iBook pricing of $999 for the base model.
- Offer one more Mac Pro model with a Quad Core chip below current offerings to get a price somewhere between $1799-$1999.

The third option would make me the happiest, being that I am a Graphic Designer, heavy Adobe CS3 design and web but light on the video end, I don't really need 8 cores at this point. I need something that can support 3-4 LCD monitors, multiple internal HDDs, a good amount of RAM and 1 extra PCI slot. $2000 is really all I can personally afford to put towards that type of desktop system, since I'm constantly putting all of my other money towards a MacBook Pro, Airport Extreme multi-based network, iPhones, Apple TV and such.

As for the OpenMac..... good for them. There is nothing wrong with shaking up the neighborhood. Sure it is a violation of TOU, but you can't make the perfect omelet without breaking a bunch of eggs!
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Good luck finding the system you're talking about for $2000 whether it be from Dell, HP, or someone else. Instead of having so many different, but similar products as other PC companies do, Apple decided to have products that addressed specific product segments. This is why almost all of Apple's products sell particularly well as opposed to those other companies which seem to have laptops and desktop that compete with each other. Macs have never been cheap when compared to Windows PC's. That because Apple chose to offer quality products. Custom build a Dell or HP with similar specs to a MacBook, MacBook Pro, or Mac Pro and the price will be almost the same. Even take the MacBook Air and compare it with ultra-portables from Sony or Lenovo. Some people think that computers should be free. And for those people, I say go to your public library. As for the people who try to save money by buying cheap, they're the same ones that have to go to their local tech store and upgrade their RAM or graphics card because the software they need to install requires higher specs. Inferior products produce inferior results. Apple just needs to squash this clone and address the void by creating their own mini tower.
 
ok i have one question. everybody is saying how expensive the mini is. well show me the alternative in the same form factor.

and i am not trying to be an ass. i am seriously wondering of a machine with windows on it with the exact specs made by a "major" manufacturer.

so please be serious with your responses. and something close to the mini format

i do know there is an apple tax. but i dont think it is as big as some people say.
 
FaasNat said:
Isn't this kinda what happened with the Mac clones in the late 90's? Umax, Motorola, and [especially] Power Computing were blowing away Apple's hardware sales.

Kinda funny, instead of trying to compete with that and have machines that appeal to the consumer, Apple bought Power Computing, killed it off, and then canceled the other clones.

:apple: I owned a Power Computing Clone and LOVED it! The fact is that the clones were CLEARLY providing better specs and filling voids that :apple: refused to fill or could not fill. I can make the argument that the Power Computing Marketing machine at the SF Macworld conventions were at least, if not more exciting than parent Apple! Apple killed the clones because the clones were driving Apple out of business putting out better hardware and specs, simple and plain. Now that Apple is singular in its hardware sales, they have returned to failing to fill their customers needs "headless affordable tower with acceptable specs". No matter who you are, you need competition to drive you to be better as a company, otherwise, you get lazy. I like pretty things like most people, but the fact is, I am paying for what is inside, and the cost difference is substantial from its competitors.:apple:
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Clive At Five said:
I guess since I can't afford the eye-candied, under-powered Steve Jobs-sanctioned Mac, I'm a jobless, slacker, who doesn't know how to budget his money, now, doesn't it?
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No. I'm in the same boat, living paycheck to paycheck with a wife and two kids. I want a new Mac and an iphone but I can't afford them just yet.

Hopefully, Apple makes a headless iMac one day, but if they don't another company can't just step in and do it instead. Yeah, Apple makes 30%+ profit on their hardware and a lot of that money goes into R&D, support, etc.

I'll save a few bucks, do some extra freelance jobs and sell my current Mac when I'm ready to upgrade--usually 3-5 years.
 
i think it shouldn' t be up to Apple whether sth is legal or not.

I buy the software and I should be able to use it.

USA means freedom but sometimes your freedom is so limited under these agreements etc.
 
digiguy23 said:
That's funny, because people who spend $60,000-$100,000 dollars on cars and $2,000-$3,000 dollars on TV's are morons too. This is all too funny. Apple is a business and protecting their investments. No one is forcing people to buy the Mac and OSX or even an iPhone. A large percentage are more than happy with their Windows Server, Windows 2000, WindowsXP and Windows Vista. I would be more concerned about how Microsoft does business. More than 5 years with Vista and now they decide to bring out Windows 7 in just a few years. That is ripping off the consumer.

If I couldn't afford a Mac, I would be happy too with just my Window Based PC. It seems to me that the people who are really whinning are the people not working or unwilling to work those couple of weeks OT to buy a Mac. I don't see the point of wasting all this energy in arguing in how companies charge for their products.
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Or possibly we value our money?

Cars and televisions are generally competitively priced for what you're getting. The price for mac hardware is excessive considering I could build a computer with almost the exact same components for less than half the price.
 
digiguy23 said:
That's funny, because people who spend $60,000-$100,000 dollars on cars and $2,000-$3,000 dollars on TV's are morons too. This is all too funny. Apple is a business and protecting their investments. No one is forcing people to buy the Mac and OSX or even an iPhone. A large percentage are more than happy with their Windows Server, Windows 2000, WindowsXP and Windows Vista. I would be more concerned about how Microsoft does business. More than 5 years with Vista and now they decide to bring out Windows 7 in just a few years. That is ripping off the consumer.

If I couldn't afford a Mac, I would be happy too with just my Window Based PC. It seems to me that the people who are really whinning are the people not working or unwilling to work those couple of weeks OT to buy a Mac. I don't see the point of wasting all this energy in arguing how companies charge for their products.
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This response permeates with snobbery. Great for people who can afford a Porsche rather than a shitbox Cavalier but don't look down on people who can only afford a domestic shitbox. People pay for that right to be a snob when they buy Macs; that doesn't mean they should exercise that right. Just take the higher road and be humble about it.

Your comments aren't entirely dreck, but it's the last part that I take exception to. Not all people who can afford a Mac buys one; likewise, not all people who can afford an exotic car go out to buy one.
 
Beric said:
People don't seem to understand that a Mac IS MADE OF standard PC parts, and the only differences between a Mac and a PC are three things:

1. The OS
2. The exterior design
3. The support

Those 3 things were enough for me to buy a Macbook. For some people, #1 only may be enough to buy an OpenMac.
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You missed a couple off:
4. The interior design: The inside of a Mac Pro is a thing of beauty and things such as adding disks or memory are far easier than on the majority of Windows boxes
5. The resale value: The resale value of a used Mac is far, far higher than the resale value of a "standard" windows box and if you sell your machine on when you've finished with it you'll recoup a lot of the extra money you spent buying it
 
i was excited at first. but then a macbook refurb with 2.4GHz 2GB ram, 120GB HD , X3100, ilife, os x would be around $1000. compared to the open mac with some upgrades for around $800 the macbook is better for me.

the open mac makes only sense if you need the fast GPU and don't need the portability ever.
 
The sad part of this is that Apple could offer this same box for a few hundred more and I would gladly pay it. I have no problem supporting Apple by buying their hardware, but they don't offer a mid-range tower, despite there being clear demand from consumers and almost unanimous agreement on this from every high-profile Mac commentator out there. For me, it's about the lack of options in Apple's line-up, not about getting OS X on cheap hardware.

Those of you writhing in agony over this so-called "unethical" move should keep that in mind. As long as Apple refuses to offer the product that people want (or at the very least, give more BTO options on the iMac and lower the ridiculous price of the Mini) then people are going to seek this out. It's pretty much Apple's own fault for not paying enough attention to their computer line-up.

As Apple's popularity continues to grow, they ignore the growing demands of their customers at their own peril.
 
twilson said:
Just so you all know, the E6x00 chips are the only ones in the Intel Core 2 Duo E series that support Intel's Hardware Virtualization (i.e. the chip in the OpenMac doesn't do hardware virtualization and also has 2MB L2 cache, not the 4MB of the Mac Mini)
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That's fine and all but I have been looking for a 400 dollar machine to abuse. I previously was interested in a G4 tower but if I can purchase this with that money, then screw the G4.
 
123 said:
Not true at all. Mac Pros (mid model) are competitively priced. (as long as you don't buy more RAM, disk, better graphics etc.).
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Humm let's see.

E5462 Xeon 2.6Ghz x 2 = 1600USD. [Edit: E5462 runs at 2.8Ghz, not 2.6Ghz.]
2Gb FB-DIMM DDR2-800 = 82USD
ATi 2600XT = 60USD
Tyan Intel DP board = 400USD
Optical Super Drive = 30USD
320Gb HD = 50USD.

Sub-total= 2142 USD.

+ Leopard = 100USD
+ Case = 300USD
+ feel good factor = 200 USD
+ Superior recognition = 100USD

Grand total: 2842USD.

Advertised on Apple: 2800USD

Yeh I guess it is competitively priced....;)

digiguy23 said:
That's funny, because people who spend $60,000-$100,000 dollars on cars and $2,000-$3,000 dollars on TV's are morons too. This is all too funny. Apple is a business and protecting their investments. No one is forcing people to buy the Mac and OSX or even an iPhone. A large percentage are more than happy with their Windows Server, Windows 2000, WindowsXP and Windows Vista. I would be more concerned about how Microsoft does business. More than 5 years with Vista and now they decide to bring out Windows 7 in just a few years. That is ripping off the consumer.

If I couldn't afford a Mac, I would be happy too with just my Window Based PC. It seems to me that the people who are really whinning are the people not working or unwilling to work those couple of weeks OT to buy a Mac. I don't see the point of wasting all this energy in arguing how companies charge for their products. MacOSX is not god's gift to mankind.
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That's exactly my point. If you're willing to get screwed on hardware, and still feel good about it, be my guest. But don't go around and beautify the truth that you just got ripped off, by saying "oh its safer", "oh its better", "oh it has great looks".
 
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