From owner-freebsd-questions Sun Mar 4 20:36:54 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from nameserver.austclear.com.au (nameserver.austclear.com.au [192.83.119.132]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E80B537B71A for ; Sun, 4 Mar 2001 20:33:11 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from ahl@austclear.com.au) Received: from tungsten.austclear.com.au (tungsten.austclear.com.au [192.168.70.1]) by nameserver.austclear.com.au (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA53609; Mon, 5 Mar 2001 15:33:00 +1100 (EST) Received: from tungsten (tungsten [192.168.70.1]) by tungsten.austclear.com.au (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA18084; Mon, 5 Mar 2001 15:33:00 +1100 (EST) Message-Id: <200103050433.PAA18084@tungsten.austclear.com.au> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.1.1 10/15/1999 To: David Kelly Cc: MisteraSturno@worldnet.att.net, questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: OT: MacOS X (was Re: Can you recommend... ) In-Reply-To: Message from David Kelly of "Sun, 04 Mar 2001 20:53:23 MDT." <200103050253.f252rNe51281@grumpy.dyndns.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Mon, 05 Mar 2001 15:33:00 +1100 From: Tony Landells Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG David Kelly writes: > Gan Starling writes: > > I wish to first buy a supported laptop and then install FreeBSD on it. > > > > I have the list of supported devices, but I don't trust the sales staff > > of any store...for good and sufficient reason based upon sad past > > experience. I must say this is one of my biggest problems in the whole UNIX-on-PC deal--actually having enough knowledge of the PC hardware to know what will work and what won't. With twenty-something years of UNIX experience the software doesn't really scare me, but knowing whether one motherboard rev is sufficiently similar to another... > Faced with a similar desire I ordered an Apple Titanium Powerbook G4 > and have preordered MacOS X. All after a brief couple of hours with > MacOS X Public Beta convincing myself "This really is Unix." > > Am expecting all the advantages of Unix plus all the advantages of a > commercially supported consumer OS. > > My new Powerbook is really nice. http://www.apple.com/powerbook/ I'm impressed by your faith. Much as I love the Macs, and this is a combo I'm considering, I'm not committing until I've seen the real MacOS X in action (particularly as something has killed my Public Beta in the last few days and I haven't been able to fix it yet). The G4 chip is awesome, and the new powerbooks pack a full G4 and are still thin, thin, thin. Great hardware, but it does cost. I've found it hard to work out where to find some things in the Public Beta, and I don't think I'm a big fan of NetInfo (the database system used for passwd/shadow/hosts/... kind of like NIS/YP). The other thing where MacOS X loses at the moment is that it doesn't have something like BIOS passwords and boot orders, so I can't stop people from rebooting from a CD, for example, to get access to my (unencrypted but still important) files. Cheers, Tony -- Tony Landells Senior Network Engineer Ph: +61 3 9677 9319 Australian Clearing Services Pty Ltd Fax: +61 3 9677 9355 Level 4, Rialto North Tower 525 Collins Street Melbourne VIC 3000 Australia To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message