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Boot Linux, BSD, and OS X from Vista
An anonymous reader writes, "NeoSmart Technologies has just released EasyBCD 1.5, complete with support for Vista, Windows NT/2k/XP, and Windows 9x/ME. EasyBCD 1.5 adds experimental support for dual-booting any of these along with Linux, Mac OS X, or BSD — straight from the Windows Vista bootloader without any additional configuration needed!" From the article: "Windows Vista's new bootmanager is a double-edged sword. It's one of the most powerful booting scripts in existence, and a far cry from the very limiting boot.ini of legacy Windows operating systems. But it overwrites the MBR without a second thought, and doesn't provide any means for users of alternate operating systems and boot managers to use their old system. That's where EasyBCD 1.5 comes in!" EasyBCD 1.5 is free.
This one won't make it to the gold master.
Kind of like stealing from a Las Vegas casino. Won't happen.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
So... any particular reason why BCD instead of GRUB or Lilo? I don't get it.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
What if you install Vista and Linux on your new Intel-based Mac and would still like to boot into OS X sometimes?
Um, you can do just that, then?
...
(What are you trying to ask? Because Boot Camp will officially support Vista, and you'll legally be able to purchase and install Vista on an Intel-based Mac, and you can of course install Linux (yes, the final version of Boot Camp will very likely support more than two partitions and thus more than two OSes), and Mac OS X is obviously a supported OS on an Intel-based Mac.)
If, on the other hand, you're one of these people who uses ridiculous sophistry (like saying you primarily use Windows/Linux or some other OS that's not Mac OS X on your new Intel-based Mac, and therefore you should be able to reuse that license on a non-Apple PC), I'd just say that's pretty much bullshit, because if you had an Intel-based Mac, you'd just run Mac OS X on that, instead of using an ugly, ugly hack to shoehorn it into running on non-Apple hardware. Yeah, yeah, I know, "What if I have a non-Apple laptop and really want to take Mac OS X with me?" Sure, just keep making things up. I'll tell you what: why don't you find a person who is actually trying to stay legal by doing this imaginary scenario instead of continually bringing this up as a justification?
You also forget that it's still against Mac OS X's license agreement, and may be in violation of various laws in various nations or jurisdictions. I'm sure some will just say "screw the license agreement" and "I think the laws are wrong"; that's fine. That's your choice.
Also, one other point: if you're jumping through all of these hoops to justify running Mac OS X without "pirating" it (i.e., what if you wanted to use the license from an Intel-based Mac), it's only the license agreement that is keeping you from running it on more than one machine in the first place. So, by that logic, you should be able to buy one copy of anything, and run it on an unlimited number of machines, correct?
Or is this one of those things where people think they get to personally decide what principles of law, contractual agreements, purchasing, copyright, and so on that they will follow, and which others they choose to ignore?
You don't have to respect all their wishes. What happened to fair use?
I can't tell what exactly the introduction means, here. The Windows installer has _always_ felt it has the right to overwrite the MBR, at least as far back as Windows 95. But, it only overwrites the MBR if you run the installer or "fdisk /mbr". Are they trying to suggest that Vista is going to overwrite the MBR more often (eg. every time you boot or something)?
The other thing I'm still not clear on is why someone would care about this boot loader, rather than grub or lilo. What's the significance?
(I'd be happy if the Windows installer at least didn't overwrite the first sectors of other disks. Last time I reinstalled XP, it overwrote the first sector on a FAT32 partition and made the disk unusuable. Had to read the FAT specification and guess at values to make the drive readable again.)
I've had Red Hat (years ago) completely corrupt my HD while shutting down. Obviously I should never use any Linux distro ever again!
Remember kids, tin foil doesn't work, so use LeadHat.
Pretty much, yeah. If you're a control nazi, don't release your shit. Fuck corporations like Apple who wanna fuck the consumers up the ass sans lube.
Apple doesn't exactly try to get people thrown in jail for doing this. Sure, they frown on people who distribute hacked versions of their OS. But, I think they are right to do that merely from the point of view that they are protecting less savvy people from fucking themselves and also making it really clear that running OS X in that manner is unsupported and therefore unwise if you are doing any work that might actually be important. But frankly, I've spoken with lots of people from Apple on the subject (admittedly they are not from Apple Legal and are not speaking officially) and they pretty all say that if you want to hack something for the sheer fun of trying to get it to work and aren't redistributing their stuff, then knock yourself out.
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