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OS X on Windows?

Immediately after the announcement of Apple Boot Camp, some folks have been suggesting that Apple will soon be offering OS X to ordinary Windows users, either as a dual boot option or in VM form. Robert X. Cringely says:

I predict that Apple will settle on 64-bit Intel processors ASAP (with FireWire 800 please), and at that time will announce a product similar to Boot Camp to allow OS X to run on bog-standard 32-bit PC hardware, turning the Boot Camp relationship on its head and trying to sell $99 copies of OS X to 100 million or so Windows owners.

I doubt it.

First of all, OS X has the luxury of being tightly tied to hardware Apple controls. Allowing it to run on other Intel hardware would mean dealing with clones that someone else designs. Of course Apple wouldn't have to let just anybody have OS X: they could license only to specific vendors, cutting down on the hardware support issues. But a move like that would seriously damage Apple's hardware business while at the same time limiting adoption. At best they might end up selling the same volume of OS X and far less of their own hardware. Seems pretty dumb.

Apparently by the time Bob got to his enthusiastic "sell $99 copies of OS X to 100 million or so Windows owners", he had forgotten an earlier paragraph in the same blog entry:

Boot Camp, itself, is unexciting. So you can boot into Windows or OS X, big deal. You can't boot into Windows AND OS X. You can't cut and paste data between the two OS's or even access the same data, as far as I can see. For this you'd need Virtual PC - a Microsoft product - if only a version existed for the IntelMac platform.

Umm, Bob, check out Parallels Workstation and OpenOSX. But aside from that, you are right: Boot Camp is unexciting, and there won't be much interest in it. Which should make you realize that booting OS X on Windows boxes is just as unexciting. Apple wouldn't have a potential market of 100 million; they'd probably be lucky to sell a million copies. Very lucky.

I just don't see it happening. Maybe a port and licensing to a VM environment, though that seems unlikely too. The only reason I see a possibility there is if Microsoft has been helping Apple out as Cringely says:

One reason why Microsoft isn't surprised by Boot Camp is because Microsoft has been working with Apple to make sure that Windows Vista runs well on IntelMacs. Apple will support Vista dual boot, though I don't know if they will become a Vista OEM, but I can't imagine why they wouldn't if it will help sales.

If Boot Camp is part of an OEM deal worked out with Microsoft, that suggests that Microsoft will take the high ground by offering a version of Virtual PC for IntelMacs. To be perfectly honest here, I KNOW about the Vista compatibility through Microsoft (not Apple) sources, but I am only guessing about the Virtual PC part.

If there is tit for tat there, I would think Apple would provide their part in the form of a license to run and distribute OS X in Virtual PC. That at least would be a controlled environment and while still threatening to their hardware business, it's not nearly as bad as open season for any old hardware. But although less unlikely than what Cringely guesses, I still would be surprised by that. Maybe not as surprised, but still surprised.

It certainly is possible that Apple sees the future as I do: Their place in such a mix could be enhanced if they had both VM Windows on their own hardware and a VM capable Mac OS X product. I think that's still more than a few years away, but smart companies do plan far ahead..

On another Boot Camp/virtualization front, we have a McAfee marketing director Allan Bell again demonstrating why marketing directors get no respect from the techs: Apple Mac still potential Typhoid Mary warns McAfee exec tells us that we need to worry about Macs with Windows bringing infection into corporate space.

Lax security practices on Macintosh machines may enable Windows viruses to incubate on their Macintosh hosts and later infect Windows machines on a network

"An issue (Macintosh) users need to be aware of is that in some cases they can be a carrier - effectively a Typhoid Mary," said Bell. "That is because you can have infected files on the Macintosh that do not infect the Macintosh but at a later date those get transferred across to a Windows machine which they can infect. Macintosh users still need to be scanning for Windows viruses to make sure that they've got clean files and don't have infected files that they can pass on."

I guess Allan Bell has no idea how corporations use McAfee products at all, does he? At most middle sized and up companies today, no machine even gets on the network without having virus software policies force fed to it, and a VM or dual boot instance of Windows would be no exception. At smaller orgs, security policies will be just as bad or just as good as they are for the existing Windows boxes; the Macs pose no extra threat.

So what do you think? Is Apple in bed with Microsoft and tucking a wad of cash under the pillow in exchange for favors? Should corporations batten down the hatches against those dangerous Macs? Are you getting ready to ditch Windows and buy Mac or Linux? Or is Vista your holy grail?

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