From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Macintosh clone
Macintosh clone
Apple eventually licensed the Apple II ROMs to other
companies. The earliest, the Bell & Howell Apple II+ was
manufactured by projector and lens manufacturer Böwe
Bell & Howell to capitalize on its stature in schools.[1] The
Bell & Howell Apple II+ was notable for its black enclo-
sure with carrying handle, its coaxial video output and a
stereo jack for headphones.[2] Unlike the Apple II+, which
lacked UL Certification because its case could be opened
while it was running, the Bell & Howell was fully certi-
fied.[3] Apple also licensed the Apple II ROMs to educa-
tional toy manufacturer Tiger Electronics to produce an
inexpensive laptop with educational games and the Ap-
pleWorks software suite, the Tiger Learning Computer
(TLC). The TLC lacked a built in display.[2] Its lid acted as
a holster for the cartridges that stored the bundled soft-
ware since it had no floppy drive.[2]
Wary of repeating history and wanting to retain tight
control of its product, Apple’s Macintosh strategy includ-
ed technical and legal measures that rendered the pro-
duction of Mac clones problematic. The original Macin-
tosh system software was a very large amount of complex
code that embodied the Mac’s entire set of APIs, includ-
ing the use of the GUI and file system. Through the 1980s
and into the 1990s, much of the system software was in-
cluded in the Macintosh’s physical ROM chips. Therefore,
any competitor attempting to create a Macintosh clone
without infringing copyright would have to reverse-en-
The StarMax 3000/160MT, a Macintosh clone manufactured by gineer the ROMs, which would have been an enormous
Motorola. and costly process without certainty of success. Only one
company, Nutek, managed to produce "semi-Mac-com-
A Macintosh clone is a personal computer made by patible" computers in the early 1990s by partially re-im-
a manufacturer other than Apple, using (or compatible plementing System 7 ROMs.[4]
with) Macintosh ROMs and system software.
Emulators
Background
Before true clones were available, the Atari ST could be
The Apple II and IBM PC computer lines were "cloned" converted into a Mac by adding the third-party Spectre
by other manufacturers who had reverse-engineered the GCR emulator, which required that the user purchase a
minimal amount of firmware in the computers’ ROM set of Mac ROMs sold as system upgrades to Macintosh
chips and subsequently legally produced computers that users. The Amiga could also be converted into a Mac with
would run the same software.[1] These clones were seen similar emulators.[5] Since Apple Computer never manu-
by Apple as a threat, as Apple II sales had presumably suf- factured a 68060-based Mac, the fastest way to run native
fered from the competition provided by Franklin Com- 68000 Mac OS applications without emulation is to run it
puter Corporation and other clone manufacturers,[1] on an Atari or Amiga with a 68060 upgrade.
both legal and illegal. At IBM, the threat proved to be There was also a software emulator for x86 platforms
real: most of the market eventually went to cloners like running DOS/Windows and Linux called Executor, from
Compaq, Leading Edge, Tandy, Kaypro, Packard Bell, and ARDI. ARDI reverse engineered the Mac ROM and built a
dozens of smaller companies, and in short order IBM 68000 CPU emulator, enabling Executor to run most (but
found it had lost control over its own platform. not all) Macintosh software, from System 5 to System 7,
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Macintosh clone
with good speed. The migration from 68000 to PowerPC, own high-end computers, where profit margins were
and the added difficulties of emulating a PowerPC on x86 highest.[11]
platforms, made targetting the later Mac OS versions im-
practical. Jobs ends the official program
Soon after Steve Jobs returned to Apple, he backed out
The first Macintosh clones of recently renegotiated licensing deals with OS licensees
that Apple executives complained were still financially
Apple’s strategy of suppressing clone development was unfavorable.[12] Because the clone makers’ licenses were
successful. From 1986 to 1991, several manufacturers cre- valid only for Apple’s System 7 operating system, Apple’s
ated Macintosh clones, including the portable Outbound; release of Mac OS 8 left the clone manufacturers without
however, in order to do so legally, they had to obtain of- the ability to ship a current Mac OS version and effec-
ficial ROMs by purchasing one of Apple’s Macintosh com- tively ended the cloning program.[13] Apple bought Pow-
puters, remove the required parts from the donor, and er Computing’s Mac clone business for $100 million, end-
then install those parts in the clone’s case.[6] In 1986, Ap- ing the Clone era.[14] Only UMAX ever obtained a license
ple made a deal to sell discounted Macintosh comput- to ship OS 8, which expired in July 1998.[11]
ers to Dynamac for conversion.[7] In 1988, Colby Systems, Jobs publicly stated[citation needed] that the program
which had previously produced their Macintosh-compat- was ill-conceived and had been a result of "institutional
ible laptops on a trade-in basis, began selling them to Ap- guilt," meaning that for years, there had been a widely
ple dealers who would then fit motherboards from their held belief at Apple that had the company aggressively
spare stock.[8] pursued a legal cloning program early in the history of
In the 1980’s, Brazil’s military dictatorship instituted the Macintosh, consumers might have turned to low-
trade restrictions that prohibited the importation of priced Macintosh clones rather than low-priced IBM/PC-
computers from overseas manufacturers. A Brazilian compatible computers. Had it pursued a clone program
company called Unitron (which had previously produced in the 1980s, in this view, Apple might have ended up in
Apple II clones) developed a Macintosh clone with spec- the position that at the time was occupied by Microsoft
ifications similar to the Mac 512K, and proposed to put - an extremely powerful company with high profit mar-
it on sale. Although Unitron claimed to have legitimately gins and a wide base of consumers perpetually depen-
reverse-engineered the ROMs and hardware, and Apple dent on its system software products. Jobs claimed it was
did not hold patents covering the computer in Brazil, Ap- now too late for this to happen, that the Mac clone pro-
ple claimed the ROMs had simply been copied.[9] Ulti- gram was doomed to failure from the start, and since
mately, under pressure from the US government and lo- Apple made money primarily by selling computer hard-
cal manufacturers of PC clones the Brazilian Computer ware, it ought not engage in a licensing program that
and Automation Council did not allow production to pro- would reduce its hardware sales.
ceed.[10]
Official Macintosh clone pro- Macintosh cloning today
Main article: OSx86
gram Since Apple transitioned the Macintosh to an Intel plat-
By 1995, Apple Macintosh computers accounted for form in 2006, and subsequent to a major increase in visi-
around 7% of the worldwide desktop computer market. bility and a gain in computer market share for Apple with
Apple executives decided to launch an official clone pro- the success of the iPod, large computer system manufac-
gram in order to expand Macintosh market penetration. turers such as Dell have expressed renewed interest in
Apple’s clone program entailed the licensing of the Mac- creating Macintosh clones.[15] While various industry ex-
intosh ROMs and system software to other manufactur- ecutives, notably Michael Dell, have stated publicly that
ers, each of which agreed to pay a flat fee for a license, they would like to sell Macintosh-compatible computers,
and a royalty (initially $50) for each clone computer they Apple VP Phil Schiller said the company does not plan
sold. This generated quick revenues for Apple during a to let people run Mac OS X on other computer makers’
time of financial crisis. From early 1995 through hardware. "We will not allow running Mac OS X on any-
mid-1997, it was possible to buy PowerPC-based clone thing other than an Apple Mac," he said.[16]
computers running Mac OS, most notably from Power Through the efforts of hobbyist programmers collab-
Computing. Other licensees were Motorola, Radius, APS orating on the Internet, modified versions of Mac OS X
Technologies, DayStar Digital, UMAX, MaxxBoxx, and v10.4, 10.5 and 10.6, dubbed "Mac OSx86", can be used
Tatung. However, by 1996 Apple executives were worried on generic PC hardware, though Apple contends that this
that high-end clones were cannibalizing sales of their is illegal as they use DMCA methods to prevent Mac OS
X from being installed on non-Mac hardware[17] a point
2
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Macintosh clone
U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup agreed [11] ^ Linzmayer, Owen W. (2004-01-01). Apple
with.[18][19] Confidential 2.0: The Definitive History of the World’s
Most Colorful Company. pp. 254–256.
Psystar ISBN 1593270100. http://books.google.com/
Main article: Psystar ?id=mXnw5tM8QRwC&lpg=PA245&pg=PA254.
[12] Gruman, Galen (November 1997). "Why Apple
Pulled the Plug". Macworld 14 (11): pp. 31–36
References [13] Beale, Steven (October 1997). "Mac OS 8 Ships with
[1] ^ Coventry, Joshua (2006-12-05). "Apples From No License Deal". Macworld 14 (10): pp. 34–36
Other Orchards". Low End Mac. [14] Beale, Steven (November 1997). "Apple Eliminates
http://lowendmac.com/coventry/06/1205.html. the Top Clone Vendor". Macworld 14 (11): pp. 30–31
Retrieved 2007-03-04. [15] "Dell: We Would License Mac OS". betanews.com.
[2] ^ Owad, Tom (2004-01-19). "Bell & Howell Apple http://www.betanews.com/article/Dell-We-
II+". Applefritter. http://www.applefritter.com/ Would-License-Mac-OS-X/1118955105. Retrieved
node/180. Retrieved 2007-03-04. 2010-11-16.
[3] "Apple II Plus - Bell & Howell Model". MacGeek. [16] "Apple throws the switch, aligns with Intel".
2006-04-09. http://www.macgeek.org/museum/ news.cnet.com. http://news.cnet.com/
bhapple2plus/. Retrieved 2007-03-04. 2100-1014_3-5733756.html. Retrieved 2005-06-06.
[4] "MacOS-Compatible Systems: NuTek". [17] Keizer, Gregg (November 30, 2008). "Apple adds
EveryMac.com. http://www.everymac.com/ DMCA charge to lawsuit against Psystar: It accuses
systems/nutek/index.html. Retrieved 2006-05-25. clone maker of breaking Mac OS copy-protection
[5] "The Official ShapeShifter Home Page". scheme". computerworld.com.
http://shapeshifter.cebix.net/. http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/
[6] Eric Taub (1991), "Taking your Mac on the road: 9121798/
Outbound Laptop System - Hardware Review - Apple_adds_DMCA_charge_to_lawsuit_against_Psystar.
alternative to Apple Macintosh Portable from Retrieved 2009-12-20.
Outbound Systems Inc - evaluation", Home Office [18] Elmer-DeWitt, Philip (2009-11-14). "Apple wins
Computing, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/ clone suit". CNN Money.
mi_m1563/is_n2_v9/ai_9820899/ http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/
[7] O’Connor, Rory J. (24 November 1986), "Apple 2009/11/14/apple-wins-clone-suit/. Retrieved
Backs Portable Mac By Dynamac- First Mac Laptop November 15, 2009.
To Gain Approval", InfoWorld: p. 5, [19] Keizer, Greg (2009-11-15). "Apple Wins Court
http://google.ca/ Victory Over Mac Clone Maker Psystar". Pc World.
books?id=hTwEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA5 http://www.pcworld.com/article/182218/
[8] Flynn, Laurie (31 October 1988), "Colby to Sell SE Apple_Wins_Court_Victory_Over_Mac_Clone_Maker_Psystar.htm
Model of Walk-Mac- Plans for Authorized Apple Retrieved November 15, 2009.
Dealers to Install Spare Motherboards", InfoWorld:
p. 8, http://google.ca/
books?id=pDsEAAAAMBAJ&ots=hWy5N3UQIG&pg=PA8
External links
[9] "A Contraband Mac 512K". low end mac. • Mac Clones and New O/S movie from archive.org
http://lowendmac.com/clones/unitron.html. • Mac Clones by Manufacturer (at EveryMac.com)
Retrieved 2011-05-22. • Macintosh clones (at LowEndMac.com)
[10] da Costa Marques, Ivan (2003), "O caso Unitron e • Infos on all macs and clones (incl. details on some
condições de inovação tecnológica no Brasil" (in mainboard PCBs / at MacInfo.de)
Portuguese), Proceedings of the 5th Brazilian Congress • Apple Squeezes Mac Clones Out of the Market (at
of Economic History and the 6th International LowEndMac.com)
Conference on Business History (Brazilian Economic
History Society), archived from the original on
2004-12-08, http://web.archive.org/web/
20041208203821/http://www.abphe.org.br/
congresso2003/Textos/Abphe_2003_39.pdf
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Macintosh_clone&oldid=462866399"
Categories:
• Macintosh clones
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Macintosh clone
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