I’m posting this from my Dell Optiplex 755 running Mac OS X 10.5.1. Awwwww yeeeaaahhhh.
Yes, I own several Mac’s, so Apple’s already got my money. Their desktop product line is either far too limiting (Mac Mini), far too powerful (Mac Pro), or far too packaged (iMac). I wanted a nice mid-tower machine with good expandability, a decent CPU, dual-head video, and NO integrated monitor. I’ve had the Optiplex 755 for months running initial Vista then XP Pro. Loaded with a rock-solid Intel chipset, a Core 2 Duo 2.33GHz, and 2GB of RAM, it seemed a natural fit. With the great work being done in the OSx86 community over the last 6 months I’m finally able to do this with minimal work (for a geek).
Let’s be clear - this is a hack. It works great, but it wasn’t easy to get here. The built-in gig-E NIC and sound chip don’t work, nor did the included Radeon 2400 XT. Fortunately, I had an Nvidia 7300LE PCI-e card and an old Intel 10/100 NIC laying around. I’m still without sound, but I’ve got a USB sound “card” on the way that’s proven to work out of the box. I’d love a better video card but for now this setup is working with both of my monitors at decent speed and all resolutions, so I shouldn’t complain. I’ve got VMware Fusion running XP Pro in “Unity” mode for those apps I just can’t leave behind (MS Money, the occasional IE website, and VMware’s Infrastructure Client), and it’s damn faster than Parallels. All in all, this machine is beautiful, fast, functional, and productive.
Who knows, the whole thing could collapse in 2 weeks, but I’m going to enjoy it while I’ve got it…
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