5 ms·

This is somewhat a philosophical question/ Ship of Theseus - you are only licensed to run MacOS on Apple hardware, but what if I had, say, an Xserve and replac

This is somewhat a philosophical question/ Ship of Theseus - you are only licensed to run MacOS on Apple hardware, but what if I had, say, an Xserve and replaced a hard drive? What about a Motherboard? Would a Franken-XServe with an AMD Threadripper still be ‘Apple Hardware?’

alcidesfonseca 6y ago
Windows 7 (and 8?) had an activation procedure that would be blocked if the hardware changed since the last one (I can’t remember the exact hw they hashed). They have since went back on the restriction and windows 10 has more forgiving activation rules.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client/deployment/validate-oem-activation-key https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client...
- asveikau 6y ago
  I remember hitting that on Vista when I swapped out a motherboard that died, circa 2007. It asked me to call a phone number. So I did. I explained to the phone rep what I did to cause the error. They asked me where I got my copy of Windows. I told them. They unblocked me.
  - encom 6y ago
    How nice of them to grant you permission to run their software on your machine!
    - dddw 6y ago
      ... that you already paid for
      - asveikau 6y ago
        To me it was amusing that they put up this barrier, but hired a staff of humans to make sure you could bypass it. I suppose that could be a gate to prevent people from installing on more machines than the license allows if done at scale. But doesn't lock out legit reinstalls from paying customers. For a cost to MS, to employ that staff.
        pjmlp 6y ago
        It also helps sorting out issues where everything fails. This is what makes a big difference with doing business with Google and having to deal with bots instead.
        ziml77 6y ago
        I believe the scale part is correct. They don't want anyone sharing the software, but they especially want to stop people from selling illegal copies and to stop businesses from using a single license across a hundred machines
- xondono 6y ago
  They still do, but they are more forgiving in some sense (they fingerprint more info, not just your motherboard so they can detect “small” changes). I’m still regularly hit with “Activate your account” when I run my windows partition from parallels because the “hardware” has changed!
wpm 6y ago
It would count as Apple hardware until you swapped the logic board, thus removing the boot ROM/EFI/SMC.
- steffan 6y ago
  Supposing you could adapt the ROM/EFI/SMC to work with the new motherboard. (I'm not claiming practicality here, just possibility), perhaps desoldering & resoldering the respective chips onto a new daughterboard or even a PCI card. Does that make it a Mac still? You could literally replace almost every component in a Mac except for the motherboard and have it still be a Mac, but shouldn't the converse be true as well? If I used the original case, hard drive/SSD, video card, keyboard & mouse, even the CPU, but replaced just the logic board (swapping the ROM/EFI/SMC somehow), it seems to me it would still be considered a Mac. Particularly if in the process the original logic board was rendered inoperative to head off any claims of duplicate license use.
m463 6y ago
Is this question in relation to darling? Because it is based on freely available source, not hackintosh-type stuff. > Does it violate Apple's EULA? > > No! We only directly use those parts of Darwin that are released as fully free software.
- steffan 6y ago
  No, it's not related to Darling, but it did provoke the question for me of whether it is [legally] possible to 'upgrade' an original Mac to modern components and still have it be considered a Mac. Clearly a hard drive, ram replacement, and video card replacement are acceptable, CPU if it happens to be replaceable, keyboard, mouse, monitor. Really the only thing that might remain is the motherboard. But if you kept that and replaced anything else, shouldn't that could as still being a Mac?
  - m463 6y ago
    I guess the answer might be ... it depends (on what stands up in court)
LockAndLol 6y ago
They can put anything in the license but the question is if it'll pass in court. Maybe in American court but European too? How can it be permissible to buy software and not be allowed to use it on whatever you own? You own both. It's like DRM without the actual protection.

alcidesfonseca 6y ago

Windows 7 (and 8?) had an activation procedure that would be blocked if the hardware changed since the last one (I can’t remember the exact hw they hashed). They have since went back on the restriction and windows 10 has more forgiving activation rules.

pjmlp 6y ago
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client/deployment/validate-oem-activation-key https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-client...
asveikau 6y ago
I remember hitting that on Vista when I swapped out a motherboard that died, circa 2007. It asked me to call a phone number. So I did. I explained to the phone rep what I did to cause the error. They asked me where I got my copy of Windows. I told them. They unblocked me.
- encom 6y ago
  How nice of them to grant you permission to run their software on your machine!
  - dddw 6y ago
    ... that you already paid for
    - asveikau 6y ago
      To me it was amusing that they put up this barrier, but hired a staff of humans to make sure you could bypass it. I suppose that could be a gate to prevent people from installing on more machines than the license allows if done at scale. But doesn't lock out legit reinstalls from paying customers. For a cost to MS, to employ that staff.
      - pjmlp 6y ago
        It also helps sorting out issues where everything fails. This is what makes a big difference with doing business with Google and having to deal with bots instead.
      - ziml77 6y ago
        I believe the scale part is correct. They don't want anyone sharing the software, but they especially want to stop people from selling illegal copies and to stop businesses from using a single license across a hundred machines
xondono 6y ago
They still do, but they are more forgiving in some sense (they fingerprint more info, not just your motherboard so they can detect “small” changes). I’m still regularly hit with “Activate your account” when I run my windows partition from parallels because the “hardware” has changed!

wpm 6y ago

It would count as Apple hardware until you swapped the logic board, thus removing the boot ROM/EFI/SMC.

steffan 6y ago
Supposing you could adapt the ROM/EFI/SMC to work with the new motherboard. (I'm not claiming practicality here, just possibility), perhaps desoldering & resoldering the respective chips onto a new daughterboard or even a PCI card. Does that make it a Mac still? You could literally replace almost every component in a Mac except for the motherboard and have it still be a Mac, but shouldn't the converse be true as well? If I used the original case, hard drive/SSD, video card, keyboard & mouse, even the CPU, but replaced just the logic board (swapping the ROM/EFI/SMC somehow), it seems to me it would still be considered a Mac. Particularly if in the process the original logic board was rendered inoperative to head off any claims of duplicate license use.

m463 6y ago

Is this question in relation to darling? Because it is based on freely available source, not hackintosh-type stuff. > Does it violate Apple's EULA? > > No! We only directly use those parts of Darwin that are released as fully free software.

steffan 6y ago
No, it's not related to Darling, but it did provoke the question for me of whether it is [legally] possible to 'upgrade' an original Mac to modern components and still have it be considered a Mac. Clearly a hard drive, ram replacement, and video card replacement are acceptable, CPU if it happens to be replaceable, keyboard, mouse, monitor. Really the only thing that might remain is the motherboard. But if you kept that and replaced anything else, shouldn't that could as still being a Mac?
- m463 6y ago
  I guess the answer might be ... it depends (on what stands up in court)

LockAndLol 6y ago

They can put anything in the license but the question is if it'll pass in court. Maybe in American court but European too? How can it be permissible to buy software and not be allowed to use it on whatever you own? You own both. It's like DRM without the actual protection.