Is it legal (yet) to virtualize Snow Leopard?

Question

Level 1

27 points

Is it legal (yet) to virtualize Snow Leopard?

Dear Folks,

The disappearance of Rosetta from Lion leaves me in a situation where I *have* to be running Snow Leopard on at least one system.

There's been so much chatter about the *possibility* of legally running older OSX clients under Parallels that I can't find a definitive word on whether or not Apple has officially decided to allow this, yet.

So, what's the word, yea or nay?

(Yeah, I've considered leaving one computer permanently in SL or buying something like an old Mac Mini to run SL and drive my hardware and softwre that must have Rosetta, but both options are "clunky" and have some real downsides for me).

Thanks!

pax / Ctein

2.2GHz 15" MacBookPro+6GB RAM+500 GB HD & '333' Lombard w/PowerLogix 500 MHz G4, Mac OS X (10.4.11), also, a 27" quad-core 12GB i5 iMac and a 64GB 3G iPad

Posted on Jul 21, 2011 11:26 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

John.Kitzmiller

Level 3

881 points

Jul 21, 2011 11:45 AM in response to (none) Ctein

I don't know the specific answer to your question, but I do have an alternate idea:

You could always partition a hard drive and dual boot OS X 10.6 and 10.7. Not quite as nice of a solution as virtualization, but certainly better than purchasing another machine (or not upgrading an existing machine).

Reply

Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,541 points

Jul 21, 2011 12:00 PM in response to (none) Ctein

The license for the base version of SL doesn't allow virtualization (the Server version does.)

The transition of the Mac platform to Intel processors was announced six years ago. The last PowerPC Macs were discontinued five years ago. Whatever PowerPC application you're running is dead. In the long run, you're going to have to migrate. You might as well get it over with.

Reply

Answer 3

(none) Ctein Author

Level 1

27 points

Jul 21, 2011 12:07 PM in response to Linc Davis

Dear Linc,

The whole license thing appears to be in flux right now. Is your info 100% up to date, or are you just pulling up old files?

Your second comment is useless. Reread my very first sentence. This isn't a choice. Some of us out in the real world HAVE to deal with legacy issues that arise around IRREPLACEABLE hardware and software. So we figure out the best work-arounds we can.

pax / Ctein

Reply

Answer 4

(none) Ctein Author

Level 1

27 points

Jul 21, 2011 12:17 PM in response to John.Kitzmiller

Dear John,

Excellent point! And good of you to introduce it into a thread that others will refer to.

I make all my external drives bootable, and I intentionally leave the older versions of Mac OS on some of them. On (rare, thank the gods) occasions, this has really saved my bacon.

Unfortunately, for daily workflow, it's even clunkier than my mentioned alternatives, since it means entirely shutting down a machine and interrupting any workflow in progress to acces the Rosetta function. Doable, but not fun.

'Course, I've no guarantee that virtualizing SL will actually work-- virtual environments can get hinky about correctly seeing external I/O. Dunno until I try.

pax / Ctein

Reply

Answer 5

Asatoran

Level 4

2,532 points

Jul 21, 2011 1:25 PM in response to (none) Ctein

So, what's the word, yea or nay?

Nay. The release of OSX 10.7 does not change anything with the EULA for earlier versions of OSX. Apple will have to announce a specific change to the EULA for older versions of OSX.

That said, it is already legal to virtualize OSX Server 10.5 or 10.6, with the restrictions that the virtual machine be run on Apple hardware, and you have purchased a separate license for each virtual machine. Leopard Server and Snow Leopard Server do include Rosetta so at this very moment, it is very possible to run Rosetta in a virtual machine legally. It is not financially practical for most people since OSX Server is $500 retail. But if the question was strictly about legality of running Rosetta in a virtual machine, then the answer is "yea".

(BTW, before you ask if this is my opinion, I was very active on the VMware forums for this subject. The above statement is the official interpretation from VMware. VMware, being the leader in the virtualization industry, I have complete respect for the correctness of the statement, despite my not fully agreeing with some of the interpretation details.)

Reply

Answer 6

(none) Ctein Author

Level 1

27 points

Jul 21, 2011 2:18 PM in response to Asatoran

Dear Astoran,

Thanks for settling that. I've posted a request for this to Apple Support.

Hopefully they'll decide to loosen things up for old client OS's. I can't see an economic downside for them and it'd take some pressure off them when legacy problems arise.

The VMWare fora are great. I used the frequent them before I switched to Parallels (yeah, I know, turncoat). Buncha really shmaht guys.

pax / Ctein

Reply