Mac in Europe

Apple in 1992 started to work on the Star Trek project with the goal to create a version of Mac OS that would run on Intel x86-architecture. This project was cancelled in 1993, since Apple realized that going with it would mean a completely new business-model, which will create a prominent drop in Apple’s hardware sales. A further complication was that Star Trek was designed to be source-level compatible, not binary compatible. Therefore, Mac OS applications would have to be rewritten or recompiled to run on x86 architecture.

Although, the software for the project Star Trek was never released, other emulators (third-party) eventually made it possible to run the Mac OS on Intel-base personal computers. These emulators were constrained for emulating only 6800 series of processors, not for PowerPC processors. Apple then recognized the need to integrate a PowerPC emulator into Mac OS X during the Apple-Intel transition, so as to keep its costumer’s investments in software designed to run on the PowerPC. Solution for this problem was Emulator. An emulator replicates the functions of one system using a different system, so that it behaves like the first system.

Emulators designed for Mac OS X are –

• PearPC – It is able to emulate the PowerPC processors, which is essential for newer versions of the Mac OS X. It was released on May 10, 2004 under the GNU General Public License and can be executed on FreeBSD, Linux and Microsoft Windows. It still lacks some feature needed for a complete emulation of the PowerPC experience.

• vMac – It is an open source emulator for Mac OS, Unix/Linux, NeXTSTEP, OS/2, MS-DOS, Windows and other emulators. It emulates a Macintosh Plus and can run Apple Macintosh System version. It supports HFC image files, floppy disk insert, sound, display output, CPU emulation and much more.

• Rosetta – It is a dynamic translator (emulation of one instruction set by another through translation of code) for Mac OS X. It enables apps compiled for the PowerPC processors to run on Intel processors (Apple System). Rosetta has no GUI and the most amazing software you will ever see.

• SheepShaver – SheepShaver, released in 1998, is an open source PowerPC Apple Macintosh emulator that can be run on both PowerPC and x86 systems. However, it runs faster on a PowerPC system than on an x86 system.