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Why do apple use modified hardware

saltyzoo said:
If there is no copyright or patent infringement then there is nothing they could do. But you seem to be applying the laws backward. People can make knock-offs anytime they want. Apple has no jurisdiction to stop that. They can't send people out to burn down factories of competitors. Apple would have to sue to stop it, and then they would have to have a copyright or patent to back up the suit.
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I know that, if they set fire to your factory/house/wife and generally try to bully you out of the market then it becomes anti-trust right?

All i said is that it will be interesting when/if someone does offer a mac compatiable 8800 that isn't Apple how Apple will deal with them. How well does Apple normally deal with these kinds of companies as I don't know about you but I don't want to be limited to only one choice (Apple).
 
Meep said:
I know that, if they set fire to your factory/house/wife and generally try to bully you out of the market then it becomes anti-trust right?

All i said is that it will be interesting when/if someone does offer a mac compatiable 8800 that isn't Apple how Apple will deal with them. How well does Apple normally deal with these kinds of companies as I don't know about you but I don't want to be limited to only one choice (Apple).
Click to expand...

As long as it doesn't contain Apple code then they won't be able to do anything. EFI is not an Apple standard: it's primarily an Intel one, but it's open: anyone can make EFI compatible devices.
 
Meep said:
After reading all the threads about flashing 8800 GT's I was wondering if there was a reason why Apple use propriety firmware.
Click to expand...

The firmware enables full display resolution at boot time.

You get this even before the OS and its graphics drivers
have been loaded (particularly relevant for dual booting).

Windows boots in VGA mode (640x480) first, and so
a booting Windows machine looks absolutely rubbish
on modern displays.

Something like that, anyway :)
 
edesignuk said:
I think the installation of Bootcamp emulates a BIOS.
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Bootcamp emulates nothing. It is a partitioning tool and a method for burning the drivers to a CD.

You can install Windows on an Apple Mac and never ever touch Boot Camp.

The Nvidia card is not modified hardware. It is exactly the same card, it just has a different firmware which is compatible with EFI. The standard Nvidia firmware is only compatible with BIOS based computers, hence the fact that a bog standard Nvidia card will work in a Mac when it is running Windows (BIOS based) but not under Mac OS X (EFI based).
 
Cromulent said:
Bootcamp emulates nothing. It is a partitioning tool and a method for burning the drivers to a CD.

You can install Windows on an Apple Mac and never ever touch Boot Camp.

The Nvidia card is not modified hardware. It is exactly the same card, it just has a different firmware which is compatible with EFI. The standard Nvidia firmware is only compatible with BIOS based computers, hence the fact that a bog standard Nvidia card will work in a Mac when it is running Windows (BIOS based) but not under Mac OS X (EFI based).
Click to expand...
Are you sure about that?
 
Meep said:
Well at least there is a valid technical reason for the special firmware and hopefully by the time i need to update my 8800 there'll be more cards that support EFI by default without the need of all this flashing.
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I remember reading an article saying how EFI is slowly becoming the new standard. If/when that happens, hopefully we can just drop in any windows graphics card and, depending on driver support, avoid having to use 2 graphics cards for a dual boot machine.
 
Sometimes it's helpful to understand the history. It goes back to the architectural differences between PPC hardware and x86 hardware. Apple has always used graphical startup screens, and that requires a larger EPROM to hold the larger firmware. A few years ago most PC cards came with 64k EPROMs, while Mac cards needed 128k EPROMs.

I don't know the technical details, but I'd imagine that Apple has little desire to support anything beyond their needs for their current machines. Hence the EFI32/EFI64 problems.

People bitch and moan about Apple being proprietary, but that's just part of the deal. It has its upsides and its downsides. If you can't afford it, you can't afford it. There are many alternatives.
 
So here's my understanding: The Mac's EFI includes BIOS emulation, which has nothing to do with Bootcamp. (Bootcamp is optional, it just includes Windows drivers and partitioning).

But, on a PC, if I hold down "delete" while booting, I get a "bios" screen with tons of control options. Where is this equivalent in the Mac's bios emulation? Let's say I wanted to turn off the Mac's audio card for Windows, or disable the USB ports. I could do all that on a PC in its bios. How on a Mac?
 
Amigalander said:
So here's my understanding: The Mac's EFI includes BIOS emulation, which has nothing to do with Bootcamp. (Bootcamp is optional, it just includes Windows drivers and partitioning).
Click to expand...

No, it is not emulated. It is included in the firmware. Hence running Windows on a Mac is exactly the same as running it on a PC. There is no emulation involved.

Amigalander said:
, on a PC, if I hold down "delete" while booting, I get a "bios" screen with tons of control options. Where is this equivalent in the Mac's bios emulation? Let's say I wanted to turn off the Mac's audio card for Windows, or disable the USB ports. I could do all that on a PC in its bios. How on a Mac?
Click to expand...

I've forgotten what it is called, but you can access the firmware on bootup.
 
Amigalander said:
But, on a PC, if I hold down "delete" while booting, I get a "bios" screen with tons of control options. Where is this equivalent in the Mac's bios emulation? Let's say I wanted to turn off the Mac's audio card for Windows, or disable the USB ports. I could do all that on a PC in its bios. How on a Mac?
Click to expand...

In the PowerPC days, Macs used Open Firmware instead of BIOS, and you could get to the shell by holding down cmd-opt-O-F during boot.

With EFI, I'm not certain about this, but it appears that Apple did not include a user-accessible shell. However, you can install one:

http://refit.sourceforge.net/
 
robbieduncan said:
Yes, but not only can you copyright firmware, but the firmware on the cards is copyrighted. Firmware is not some special case: selling cards with Apple firmware without their consent is just the same as selling copied DVDs with Leopard on them.

If you do this an Apple Legal turn up I suggest giving them all your money and possessions as settlement.
Click to expand...

They'll want more. :p
 
um...the firmware on the Apple-friendly graphics cards from ATI and nvidia is not Apple firmware written by apple, and it is not owned by apple. They collaborate with the card manufacturers to make sure that they are getting what they want, yes, but the firmware is written and owned, whether for BIOS or EFI, by either nvidia or ATI. If you flash your card with custom code from another party, and they've asserted a copyright for that firmware, then they are the owners of that code.

apple can't use you for flashing nvidia's EFI firmware.

people need to stop being so silly.
 
robbieduncan said:
As long as it doesn't contain Apple code then they won't be able to do anything. EFI is not an Apple standard: it's primarily an Intel one, but it's open: anyone can make EFI compatible devices.
Click to expand...

Most likely the code isn't Apples. It is more likely to be nVidia's code as it has to interface with their hardware. So the OP could just ask nVidia for a copy of the code because he wants to sell Mac compatible cards. It just hasn't been done yet because there isn't much of a market for Mac compatible cards (well from the perspective of the current GPU makers I would presume).

EDIT: Dang ben you beat me to it :p
 
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