People have long wanted to run the Mac OS operating systemon PC hardware, specifically on Intel and AMD architectures. But despite pleasand prayers, that wish remains unfulfilled.

MacOS X 10.0 is the first full, official version that is really recognizable as Modern MacOS X. Installation instructions. Installation notes: This version of Mac OS X is for PowerPC. X86 emulators like VirtualBox, VMWare or Virtual PC will not work. These releases will only run on specific models of PPC Apple Macintosh computers.

Althoughrunning Mac OS natively on PC hardware is not possible, there is anotheroption--running Mac OS X on an emulator. In this article, I will show you howto install and run Mac OS X Panther on your PC using PearPC, a free,architecture-independent PowerPC platform that runs on PCs. To check outPearPC's features, go to thePearPC-PowerPCArchitecture Emulator web site.

Here are thesteps you'll take to use PearPC to install Mac OS X:

1.Download the PearPCPowerPC Architecture Emulator.

2.Obtain hard disk imagesfor use with PearPC.

3.Obtain images of yourclient OS installation disk.

4.Configure PearPC to usethe hard disk image and the OS images.

Downloading PearPC

Downloadthe PearPC PowerPC ArchitectureEmulator. Once it's downloaded, extract its content to a folder, say,[Desktop]:PearPC. This is the folderthat is going to contain all of the files you'll see in the next couple ofsections.

Note:[Desktop]refers to the path of my Windowsdesktop; that is,C:Documents and SettingsWei-Meng LeeDesktop.

Hard disk images

To install MacOS X on the emulator, you need a hard disk image. You can download preformattedhard disk images from http://pearpc.net/downloads.php. Two disk sizes are available:3GB and 6GB. If you plan to install the full Mac OS X, then use the 6GB image.If you have limited disk space on your hard drive, use the smaller, 3GB image.Be aware that the default install of Mac OS X takes up a little more than 3GB,and so you need to unselect certain components during installation if you usethe 3GB image.

The diskimages come in two formats: BZ2 and RAR. I used the 6GB RAR disk images. Youneed to uncompress the disk image before you can use it. To uncompress the RARimage, I used WinRAR from http://www.rarlab.com/download.htm. Uncompress theimage and save it in the[Desktop]:PearPCfolder.

Making images of your client OS

To install MacOS X on your hard disk image, you need to make copies of your Mac OS Xinstallation disk in ISO format. You can use Nero or any other disk utility tosave CDs or DVDs in ISO format. In my case, I have saved the images in theC:PearPCfolder. I have named the first diskPanther1.iso.

Note: You needto purchase Mac OS X in order to run Mac OS X in PearPC.

ConfiguringPearPC

Once you'vetaken the previous steps, you're ready for the final step: configuring PearPCto use the all the relevant disk images. To do it, you need to create aconfiguration file. You can find the instructions on how to create one manuallyat http://pearpc.net/guides.php?guides_id=2. Or you can download a Windowsapplication that does all the hard work for you. In my case, I used thePearPCControl Panelto help memanage my Mac OS X emulation.

Dvb t2 drivers. Launch PearPCControl Panel and click on the Create New Configuration File icon. You will seethe first screen as shown in Figure 1. Click on Continue to proceed to the nextstep.

Figure 1. Using the Create ConfigurationFile wizard

In the nextscreen, you have to supply a few pieces of information (see Figure 2). First,specify the location of the PearPC emulator. In my case, it is[Desktop]:PearPCppc.exe.

Next, specifythe location of the hard disk image; that is,[Desktop]:PearPCmacosx_6gb.img.

Note: Be sureto replace[Desktop]with your own desktop path.

Also, set theamount of memory you want to set aside for Mac OS X. (I have allocated 255MB.)Click on Continue.

In the nextscreen, you have the option to specify the screen resolution and color depth touse. Click on Finish when done (see Figure 3).

Note: I triedto enable networking, but I never got it to work. Also, use G3 and not G4 CPUemulation.

Give a name tothe configuration file and save the file in the location specified (see Figure4). Name itMac OS X Pantherand save it in thelocation[Desktop]:PearPCmacosxpanther.cfg.Click on Finish.

You should nowsee the icon for your Mac OS X Panther in the PearPC Control Panel (see Figure5). You need to complete one final step before you start installing Mac OS X onyour PC--check the 'CD-ROM device is installed' option and specifythe location of the Mac OS install disk image. In my case, it is[Desktop]:Panther1.iso.This is the image that will be used to boot up the emulator.

Figure 6 showsthe files in my[Desktop]:PearPCfolder. The important files arehighlighted.

That's it!Double-click on the Mac OS X Panther icon and you should see the PearPC 0.3.0window pop up (see Figure 7). Your Mac OS X installation should start soonafterward.

Note: It tookme quite a while to get my Mac OS X to install. I encountered a number offailed attempts--when I booted into Mac OS X, it prompted me to restart mymachine. But after several attempts, it worked.

Once the OS isinstalled, you will be asked to restart the machine. For subsequent attempts torun Mac OS X on your emulator, you should uncheck the 'CD-ROM device isinstalled' option so that it can boot directly from the hard disk image.If the installation is performed correctly, you should see something likeFigure 8 when Mac OS X boots up.

Figure 8. Mac OS X booting up

Figure 9 showsI am having fun with my newly installed Mac on my PC.

And if youstill doubt if I am really running Mac OS X on my PC, Figure 10 will prove itto you.

Summary

Beforeinstalling PearPC and using Mac OS X, you need to keep several things in mind:

1.You need a license torun Mac OS X. That is, you need to buy a copy of Mac OS X.

2.The installationprocess takes time. Don't install Mac OS X on a slow machine; I tried the stepsoutlined in this article on three different machines--933MHz, 1.7GHz, and3.0GHz, all equipped with 512MB of RAM. The 3.0GHz machine installedsignificantly faster compared with the rest, but it still took me several hoursto get all of the installation done. Also, make sure you have lots of free harddisk space. The hard disk image itself takes up 6GB, and the additionalinstallation disk images are going to take up a few more gigabytes.

3.Even though theinstallation process is painfully slow, once the system is installed it isactually quite responsive. While you won't be able to fully experience Mac OS Xas if you were using a real Mac, the emulation provides a good way for you totry out Mac OS X before you head to the nearest Apple shop to get the latestiMac.

Have fun, andlet me know if PearPC works for you.

Got a doobie of a problem.

So a client of the company I work in, who is an individual company designing and manufacturing industrial print textiles of some sort, has in their headquarters a room full of filing cabinets containing filed film negatives for these print textiles; there are so many files that they must be catalouged. Problem is, when the most recent catalouge was implemented roughly 15 years ago, it was designed to be a 15' iMac G4 with an 800 MHz PPC G4 chip and 256 mb of RAM running OS X 10.3.9 Panther and a custom-ordered/designed catalogue software application written specifically for this company and no other purpose (as in, it's not available for purchase otherwise). The software contains a huge database that is vital to the company to continue functioning; however, the iMac is predictably on its last leg and needs to be replaced very soon.

Optimally, we want to get them set up with a thin-panel 21.5' iMac running a quad-core i5 and 16 GB of RAM; since the database is contained in the old software, itself running in Panther, realistically the safest method would be to image the entire computer through Target Disk Mode and create some sort of emulated virtual machine within the newer OS, be it Sierra or otherwise; however, Panther was released before any Mac used Intel processors, and thereby is written in a strictly PowerPC-based architecture. How do I emulate that on a modern Intel machine? Any advice would be much obliged. Thanks!

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