So I Bought An Intel Mac…

[alex_free]

In February of 2020, in the before times, I was going to buy an early Intel Mac after trying and failing to watch YouTube acceptability on my Mac mini G4. Then I discovered TenFiveTube. Later, I discovered PPCMC 6 Final, last updated on January 18th of 2020 and something changed when I saw YouTube being streamed using QuickTime on Tiger flawlessly in stunning 360p. I think you all know the rest of this story, but until today I still had no real need for an Intel Mac.

I bought a MacBook mid 2010 7,1 with 4GB of RAM and a 250GB HDD not because PowerPC does not fit my needs anymore, but because I want to port my PowerPC software and ports of existing software to early Intel Mac OS X (targeting 10.6+ since this can’t run anything earlier). Some ideas I have:

IntelMediaCenter7 (or PPCMC 7 Intel Edition?) - FFplay could be very useful on snow leopard and with the extra horsepower I think 720p/1080p using different audio and video sources mixed together would actually work full speed.

Half-Life for 10.4+ - steam official release requires 10.6.3, but the only thing stopping me from finishing half life for PowerPC 10.4+ is big endian bugs (I’ve gotten into the intro cutscene and random levels, killed and shot at enemies, etc. on PowerPC Tiger but random crashes and wrong code for big endian prevents a playable game.) I would need people with older Intel macs to verify it works.

Finally able to test things in Rosetta. And can release software for 10.6+ so more people can use it.

Wayyyy faster compile times for cross compiling PowerPC software. The full build of PPCMC 7 for Panther and Tiger for example take multiple hours.

I can’t really see myself wanting to purchase a Mac newer then this by maybe a year or two, and I’m not really interested in the apple that exists in 2021.

 

[B S Magnet]

In February of 2020, in the before times, I was going to buy a early Intel Mac after trying and failing to watch YouTube acceptability on my Mac mini G4. Then I discovered TenFiveTube. Later, I discovered PPCMC 6 Final, last updated on January 18th of 2020 and something changed when I saw YouTube being streamed using QuickTime on Tiger flawlessly in stunning 360p. I think you all know the rest of this story, but until today I still had no real need for an Intel Mac.

I bought a MacBook mid 2010 7,1 with 4GB of RAM and a 250GB HDD not because PowerPC does not fit my needs anymore, but because I want to port my PowerPC software and ports of existing software to early Intel Mac OS X (targeting 10.6+ since this can’t run anything earlier). Some ideas I have:

IntelMediaCenter7 (or PPCMC 7 Intel Edition?) - FFplay could be very useful on snow leopard and with the extra horsepower I think 720p/1080p using different audio and video sources mixed together would actually work full speed).

Half-Life for 10.4+ - steam official release requires 10.6.3, but the only thing stopping me from finishing half life for PowerPC 10.4+ is big endian bugs (I’ve gotten into the intro cutscene and random levels, killed and shot at enemies, etc. on PowerPC Tiger but random crashes and wrong code for big endian prevents a playable game. I would need people with older Intel macs to verify it works.

Finally able to test things in Rosetta. And can release software for 10.6+ so more people can use it.

Wayyyy faster compile times for cross compiling PowerPC software. The full build of PPCMC 7 for Panther and Tiger for example take multiple hours.

I can’t really see myself wanting to purchase a Mac newer then this by maybe a year or two, and I’m not really interesting in the apple that exists in 2021.

Congratulations!

You’ll hear no shortage of praise for Snow Leopard on early Intel Macs from me: Snow Leopard remains Apple’s high water mark in terms of flexibility, system stability, and overall refinement, and it was the last major version of OS X/macOS to lack iOS-related elements or the constant background telemetry which weighed down Lion and later. Plus, it has the aforementioned Rosetta. SL is a bit like a Swiss army knife.

The latest Intel Macs I like are those which can still boot Snow Leopard — which includes a couple of models sold even into 2012.

Come find us over on the Early Intel Macs forum!

 

[eyoungren]

I can’t really see myself wanting to purchase a Mac newer then this by maybe a year or two, and I’m not really interesting in the apple that exists in 2021.

Your Mac is younger than my two youngest Macs, which are 2009 vintage. I do have a 2015 MBP, but that's a work issued Mac and it's not mine.

Welcome to Intel!

 

[alex_free]

Your Mac is younger than my two youngest Macs, which are 2009 vintage. I do have a 2015 MBP, but that's a work issued Mac and it's not mine.

Welcome to Intel!

This will be my new daily driver. Eventually getting a new battery (you have to unscrew and open the case but the battery is secured by three screws!) and 16GBs of RAM.

 

[Dronecatcher]

My daily driver has been a Mac Pro 1,1 for a few years now however I have to dual boot with Mountain Lion to go online - browsing in Snow Leopard became untenable.

 

[Amethyst1]

Congrats on the purchase! Looking forward to seeing what you'll do with it.

Some comments from my side -

targeting 10.6+ since this can’t run anything earlier).

Is there no chance of you targeting 10.4+ on Intel? Tiger on Intel is pretty much orphaned these days.

I did get 10.5.8 to boot on my 2010 MacBook Air which has pretty much the same hardware as a MacBook BTW. No graphics acceleration though, which is to be expected. And you can always virtualise 10.4 and 10.5 on Intel if required.

Wayyyy faster compile times for cross compiling PowerPC software.

A 2011 13" MacBook Pro can also run 10.6, and its Sandy Bridge i5/i7 CPU runs circles around any Core 2 Duo. The quad-core i7 in the 15" and 17" is even faster but those suffer from blasted GPU issues (and can still get expensive despite that).

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

In February of 2020, in the before times, I was going to buy an early Intel Mac after trying and failing to watch YouTube acceptability on my Mac mini G4. Then I discovered TenFiveTube. Later, I discovered PPCMC 6 Final, last updated on January 18th of 2020 and something changed when I saw YouTube being streamed using QuickTime on Tiger flawlessly in stunning 360p. I think you all know the rest of this story, but until today I still had no real need for an Intel Mac.

I bought a MacBook mid 2010 7,1 with 4GB of RAM and a 250GB HDD not because PowerPC does not fit my needs anymore, but because I want to port my PowerPC software and ports of existing software to early Intel Mac OS X (targeting 10.6+ since this can’t run anything earlier). Some ideas I have:

IntelMediaCenter7 (or PPCMC 7 Intel Edition?) - FFplay could be very useful on snow leopard and with the extra horsepower I think 720p/1080p using different audio and video sources mixed together would actually work full speed.

Half-Life for 10.4+ - steam official release requires 10.6.3, but the only thing stopping me from finishing half life for PowerPC 10.4+ is big endian bugs (I’ve gotten into the intro cutscene and random levels, killed and shot at enemies, etc. on PowerPC Tiger but random crashes and wrong code for big endian prevents a playable game.) I would need people with older Intel macs to verify it works.

Finally able to test things in Rosetta. And can release software for 10.6+ so more people can use it.

Wayyyy faster compile times for cross compiling PowerPC software. The full build of PPCMC 7 for Panther and Tiger for example take multiple hours.

I can’t really see myself wanting to purchase a Mac newer then this by maybe a year or two, and I’m not really interested in the apple that exists in 2021.

My DD’s are a couple 08 aluminum MacBooks, a 08 MBP & a 1,1MP - all Intel. They all do what I need. I still absolutely enjoy my PPC and they have their uses. Anyhoo, Welcome to the club. We’ll be having this conversation again in twenty years about M1/x.

If I’m still alive in 2041 (should be).

 

[alex_free]

Congrats on the purchase! Looking forward to seeing what you'll do with it.

Some comments from my side -


Is there no chance of you targeting 10.4+ on Intel? Tiger on Intel is pretty much orphaned these days.

I did get 10.5.8 to boot on my 2010 MacBook Air which has pretty much the same hardware as a MacBook BTW. No graphics acceleration though, which is to be expected. And you can always virtualise 10.4 and 10.5 on Intel if required.


A 2011 13" MacBook Pro can also run 10.6, and its Sandy Bridge i5/i7 CPU runs circles around any Core 2 Duo. The quad-core i7 in the 15" and 17" is even faster but those suffer from blasted GPU issues (and can still get expensive despite that).

I will target 10.4+ (Like with the half life port) but will be unable to test it, maybe eventually I can get a 2006 Mac mini or something like that for an Intel Tiger machine.

Graphics is a deal breaker for me, so only 10.6+ Mac OS X wise. The GPU actually looks really good compared to previous MacBook models.

 

[Amethyst1]

I will target 10.4+ (Like with the half life port) but will be unable to test i

Great - I'll gladly test on 10.4.11 on my 2007 MBP.

The GPU actually looks really good compared to previous MacBook models.

That's right - the 320M is actually better than the HD 3000 in the 2011 13" MBP or 2011 Mac mini.

 

[MacFoxG4]

Nice! Welcome to the world of early Intel!

I like Snow Leopard too. It has pretty much the same UI as Leopard, but is able to run apps that Leopard can't. Plus I think SL's Disk Utility is better than 10.5's. Some websites don't work well with Snow Leopard's browsers though, so I usually multi-boot SL with something else like Mavericks or Ubuntu.

Would love to see an Intel version of PPCMC 7. Would it work up to and including Mavericks?

 

[Amethyst1]

I like Snow Leopard too. It has pretty much the same UI as Leopard, but is able to run apps that Leopard can't.

And it can (obviously) run on hardware Leopard can't.

 

[alex_free]

Nice! Welcome to the world of early Intel!

I like Snow Leopard too. It has pretty much the same UI as Leopard, but is able to run apps that Leopard can't. Plus I think SL's Disk Utility is better than 10.5's. Some websites don't work well with Snow Leopard's browsers though, so I usually multi-boot SL with something else like Mavericks or Ubuntu.

Would love to see an Intel version of PPCMC 7. Would it work up to and including Mavericks?

Thanks! Should be here on Friday. I don’t know how the compatibility will turn out but I’ll test it on 10.11 as well and possibly do multiple builds if necessary, like how there is a Panther and Tiger build currently. A Links2 native Intel build will also happen, as well as DGEN (the genesis emulator, which will actually run extremely nice since it has all kinds of x86 optimizations that the PowerPC build I did can’t use and had to use C, which made it relatively slow).

 

[wicknix]

Some websites don't work well with Snow Leopard's browsers though

This is where a VM comes in handy. No need to reboot. I use my custom made SLAX Linux for this to have chrome on Snow Leopard when needed.

 

[Macbookprodude]

In February of 2020, in the before times, I was going to buy an early Intel Mac after trying and failing to watch YouTube acceptability on my Mac mini G4. Then I discovered TenFiveTube. Later, I discovered PPCMC 6 Final, last updated on January 18th of 2020 and something changed when I saw YouTube being streamed using QuickTime on Tiger flawlessly in stunning 360p. I think you all know the rest of this story, but until today I still had no real need for an Intel Mac.

I bought a MacBook mid 2010 7,1 with 4GB of RAM and a 250GB HDD not because PowerPC does not fit my needs anymore, but because I want to port my PowerPC software and ports of existing software to early Intel Mac OS X (targeting 10.6+ since this can’t run anything earlier). Some ideas I have:

IntelMediaCenter7 (or PPCMC 7 Intel Edition?) - FFplay could be very useful on snow leopard and with the extra horsepower I think 720p/1080p using different audio and video sources mixed together would actually work full speed.

Half-Life for 10.4+ - steam official release requires 10.6.3, but the only thing stopping me from finishing half life for PowerPC 10.4+ is big endian bugs (I’ve gotten into the intro cutscene and random levels, killed and shot at enemies, etc. on PowerPC Tiger but random crashes and wrong code for big endian prevents a playable game.) I would need people with older Intel macs to verify it works.

Finally able to test things in Rosetta. And can release software for 10.6+ so more people can use it.

Wayyyy faster compile times for cross compiling PowerPC software. The full build of PPCMC 7 for Panther and Tiger for example take multiple hours.

I can’t really see myself wanting to purchase a Mac newer then this by maybe a year or two, and I’m not really interested in the apple that exists in 2021.

I’m not really interested in the apple that exists in 2021 - I agree with you there since a lot of useless propaganda is going around which most of it is lies and stupid fake tests. As for MacBook Pros ? Why did you get 2010 when most of those models had issues ? A 2012 would be a better choice - the final true MacBook Pro with a lot of upgrade power. I also see why you wanted to go Intel and Snow Leopard - to keep Snow alive which I am all for.

 

[Macbookprodude]

Your Mac is younger than my two youngest Macs, which are 2009 vintage. I do have a 2015 MBP, but that's a work issued Mac and it's not mine.

Welcome to Intel!

Is your 2015 dual graphics or just has Intel Iris only ?

 

[Macbookprodude]

Congrats on the purchase! Looking forward to seeing what you'll do with it.

Some comments from my side -


Is there no chance of you targeting 10.4+ on Intel? Tiger on Intel is pretty much orphaned these days.

I did get 10.5.8 to boot on my 2010 MacBook Air which has pretty much the same hardware as a MacBook BTW. No graphics acceleration though, which is to be expected. And you can always virtualise 10.4 and 10.5 on Intel if required.


A 2011 13" MacBook Pro can also run 10.6, and its Sandy Bridge i5/i7 CPU runs circles around any Core 2 Duo. The quad-core i7 in the 15" and 17" is even faster but those suffer from blasted GPU issues (and can still get expensive despite that).

Except the 2012 non-retina. No issues with that.

 

[Amethyst1]

Why did you get 2010 when most of those models had issues ?

The 13" 2010 MacBook, 13" 2010 MacBook Pro, or 2010 Mac mini is safe. No discrete GPU means no GPU issues.

Except the 2012 non-retina. No issues with that.

It doesn't run Snow Leopard.

 

[eyoungren]

Is your 2015 dual graphics or just has Intel Iris only ?

Intel Iris only. Work just had the battery replaced though (I was out five days waiting for it to be fixed) as it was swelling.

 

[retta283]

I will target 10.4+ (Like with the half life port) but will be unable to test it, maybe eventually I can get a 2006 Mac mini or something like that for an Intel Tiger machine.

Excuse my ignorance, but what HL port is in reference here? Steam version or a custom job? Edit: reread the first post and saw it was never a finished job, my bad.

2007 Minis are worth considering too. Dual core and sometimes easier to find than the 2006 models. Same OS support, but you can add Lion to it if you want that for any reason. I got mine for only $50 USD last year, and it already had maxed out RAM and an SSD.

 

[Amethyst1]

2007 Minis are worth considering too.

Their Intel graphics suck beyond words though.

 

[B S Magnet]

Their Intel graphics suck beyond words though.

Plywood was a better GPU.

 

[retta283]

Their Intel graphics suck beyond words though.

Sadly all Tiger-based Intel Macs with dedicated GPUs have failure problems. The 2007 iMacs are mostly fine in this regard though.

 

[Amethyst1]

Sadly all Tiger-based Intel Macs with dedicated GPUs have failure problems.

Sadly yes, but the 2006 ATI MBPs aren't nearly as bad as the later Nvidia ones. And there's the Mac Pro - if the GPU goes kaboom, just replace it.

 

[alex_free]

Excuse my ignorance, but what HL port is in reference here? Steam version or a custom job? Edit: reread the first post and saw it was never a finished job, my bad.

2007 Minis are worth considering too. Dual core and sometimes easier to find than the 2006 models. Same OS support, but you can add Lion to it if you want that for any reason. I got mine for only $50 USD last year, and it already had maxed out RAM and an SSD.

There is an open source half life engine called Xash3D which already works on just about any OS you could imagine.

 

[alex_free]

Their Intel graphics suck beyond words though.

Yea I can’t daily drive a GMA 950 with open gl 1.4, literally worse then the my iBook’s GPU which supports OpenGL 2.0.