Meet Tmax.

[Deadtrees]

http://www.tmaxwindow.co.kr/main.asp

http://translate.google.com/tr...&tl=en&history_state0=

Now, this is very and very interesting: this S.Korean software company officially announced Tmax Windows today. What the hell is Tmax Windows? Get this. It's an OS that is supposed to be 100% compatible with MS Windows. In other words, you can use all the programs that are made for MS Windows without any additional porting. Even DirectX and MFX works on it. Even drivers work on it. It even supports multiple OS, including Linux, Unix! I guess it's based on Linux.

They claim that they made it all work under such a short time with tiny pool of programmers.
And, no. MS has nothing to do with it. Everything was done in the house, so they claim.
Is it possible? I don't think so and people who are sane wouldn't think so.

Interestingly, prior to offical announcement, they released a few photos of Tmax working. Check it out on the 2nd link. As you can tell, they seem to have made this OS using one tool that rules all the others: Photoshop. People laughed and this drew more attention to the official announcement demo.

Finally, today, they ran it in front of thousands of audiences. The system booted. Internet banking worked. ActiveX worked. Adobe Flash worked. MS Word and other word processors worked. Starcraft worked though system crashed once(Instead of Blue Screen, it showed White Screen.) Everthing looked and worked like Windows!!

Now, I doubt it'll ever work well on our end; however, the fact that they made it to work that much is interesting. Must be some sort of gimmick. Even if it works, I doubt MS would sit back and enjoy the amusement. This thing looks like a law-suit bringer.

 

[KeypoX]

looks like kde to me. looks pretty cool if it is what is claimed.

 

[xtknight]

This is like ReactOS, right?

Do you speak Korean? How did you learn of this? I can't really tell much by looking at the first site, just registration and stuff.

 

[Nothinman]

Finally, today, they ran it in front of thousands of audiences. The system booted. Internet banking worked. ActiveX worked. Adobe Flash worked. MS Word and other word processors worked. Starcraft worked though system crashed once(Instead of Blue Screen, it showed White Screen.) Everthing looked and worked like Windows!!

You know that installing Crossover Office will let you run Office and IE (with some ActiveX controls, dunno the extent though) pretty well, right?

 

[Crusty]

So wait... Starcraft crashed the system? If a game that old can crash it then I highly doubt you'll have a fun experience trying to get any newer games running... far from 100% working if you ask me.

 

[Snapster]

Wonder how much of the stolen Win2k codebase they used ?

 

[Deadtrees]

Originally posted by: Crusty
So wait... Starcraft crashed the system? If a game that old can crash it then I highly doubt you'll have a fun experience trying to get any newer games running... far from 100% working if you ask me.

Starcraft freezes Windows 7 to death though newer games run fine. That doesn't mean Windows 7 sucks or anything.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: Deadtrees

Originally posted by: Crusty
So wait... Starcraft crashed the system? If a game that old can crash it then I highly doubt you'll have a fun experience trying to get any newer games running... far from 100% working if you ask me.

Starcraft freezes Windows 7 to death though newer games run fine. That doesn't mean Windows 7 sucks or anything.

Yes, but does it crash the OS? An application freezing != OS crashing

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

Finally, today, they ran it in front of thousands of audiences. The system booted. Internet banking worked. ActiveX worked. Adobe Flash worked. MS Word and other word processors worked. Starcraft worked though system crashed once(Instead of Blue Screen, it showed White Screen.) Everthing looked and worked like Windows!!

You know that installing Crossover Office will let you run Office and IE (with some ActiveX controls, dunno the extent though) pretty well, right?

Exactly. This sounds a lot like a Linux distribution with Wine.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

Why not just get Windows? I don't understand ReactOS and this Tmax. If people want Windows so bad, they should go buy it.

 

[Deadtrees]

Originally posted by: Crusty

Originally posted by: Deadtrees

Originally posted by: Crusty
So wait... Starcraft crashed the system? If a game that old can crash it then I highly doubt you'll have a fun experience trying to get any newer games running... far from 100% working if you ask me.

Starcraft freezes Windows 7 to death though newer games run fine. That doesn't mean Windows 7 sucks or anything.

Yes, but does it crash the OS? An application freezing != OS crashing

Yes, it does crashes OS because it freezes Windows 7 and there's nothing you can do about it except rebooting the whole system.

Originally posted by: WaitingForNehalem
Why not just get Windows? I don't understand ReactOS and this Tmax. If people want Windows so bad, they should go buy it.

Because some people or countries desire to be 'independent' from having to buy MS products. Think about how much money they would save from not using MS products. Even if they may spend more money, they want to give it to firms that are from that nation.

 

[Deadtrees]

Repost.

 

[taltamir]

Originally posted by: Crusty
So wait... Starcraft crashed the system? If a game that old can crash it then I highly doubt you'll have a fun experience trying to get any newer games running... far from 100% working if you ask me.

i just tried installing the latest downloadable version of starcraft (from battle.net) on windows vista 64bit, and it was not pretty... weird colors and artifacts everywhere...

Old programs and games do NOT work on windows since its not backwards compatible... Especially bad is directX, only old openGL games work.

 

[Nothinman]

Because some people or countries desire to be 'independent' from having to buy MS products. Think about how much money they would save from not using MS products. Even if they may spend more money, they want to give it to firms that are from that nation.

But if you're reproducing the same stuff MS puts out then you're not free from them, you're just making more work for yourself.

 

[taltamir]

saving lots of money by HIRING SOMEONE to do something cheaper than the incumbent is not making work for yourself. You personally work just as hard (you pay money for software... its the developers that have to work extra).
plus, being compatible with existing tech and reproducing exist stuff is different. Compatible but different is what gave us the internet (ATT was not happy about devices that work with their phone network, but courts ruled its perfectly acceptable to make non interfering compatible devices...like a modem)

 

[tcsenter]

Why would I want something that "looks and operates just like MS Windows" but which is not MS Windows?

I could understand if we were talking about a Gucci bag or Rolex watch or something, but why would I want a (certainly inferior) knock-off when the genuine article is both highly accessible and affordable?

 

[Rhonda the Sly]

They copied Windows down to the theme and icons... interesting. It's going to be fun watching the Microsoft version of Apple v Phystar (well, kinda...) happen over the next few months. If they sell even a single copy as it looks now Microsoft will descend on their asses a bolt from Zeus.

---

And, Tat, I used to play StartCraft all the time on Vista x64 and I still occasionally do on Windows 7 x64 and I don't see any problems with artifacting.

 

[taltamir]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
Why would I want something that "looks and operates just like MS Windows" but which is not MS Windows?

I could understand if we were talking about a Gucci bag or Rolex watch or something, but why would I want a (certainly inferior) knock-off when the genuine article is both highly accessible and affordable?

affordable? you have an interesting definition of affordable

 

[tcsenter]

Originally posted by: taltamir
affordable? you have an interesting definition of affordable

I'm glad that you find it interesting, but my definition is actually commonplace. e.g. People can readily afford this:

main: Q9400, 8GB DDR2, eVGA GTX260 SC, gigabyte EP35-DS3R
fileserver: AMD X2 EE @ 2.4ghz, 4GB DDR2, 5x750GB WD CaviarGP drives

But they cannot afford to spend 1/5th ~ 1/8th as much on the OS? If they purchase an OEM system with the default OS option that they want, Windows adds no more than $30 or $40 to the final cost.

"I'd rather it be cheaper" is not a measure or indicator of "affordability". I'd rather that everything I've ever purchased be cheaper, wouldn't you?

Vista Ultimate OEM is a mere $200. I know habitual software/music pirates who spend $200 on Starbucks over a three month period. Priorities, you know.

 

[lxskllr]

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Originally posted by: taltamir
affordable? you have an interesting definition of affordable

I'm glad that you find it interesting, but my definition is actually commonplace. e.g. People can readily afford this:

main: Q9400, 8GB DDR2, eVGA GTX260 SC, gigabyte EP35-DS3R
fileserver: AMD X2 EE @ 2.4ghz, 4GB DDR2, 5x750GB WD CaviarGP drives

But they cannot afford to spend 1/5th ~ 1/8th as much on the OS? If they purchase an OEM system with the default OS option that they want, Windows adds no more than $30 or $40 to the final cost.

"I'd rather it be cheaper" is not a measure or indicator of "affordability". I'd rather that everything I've ever purchased be cheaper, wouldn't you?

Vista Ultimate OEM is a mere $200. I know habitual software/music pirates who spend $200 on Starbucks over a three month period. Priorities, you know.

I've never understood the complaint about Windows pricing. For the cost of 2 A title games, you can get software that makes your energy expending doorstop do something, and it'll do it for years after you stopped playing those games. I don't have any problem with the way MS prices Windows.

 

[taltamir]

actually windows is certainly cheaper than OSX, which include hidden apple taxes on hardware...

As for my systems:
Q9400 - bought on ebay used. Sold Q6600 for 160$ (bought it a year before for not much more), bought 9400 for 165$.
8GB DDR2 - 30$ per 2x2 pack
eVGA GTX260 SC - 210$... I got a three discount combo (30 MIR that arrived in mere weeks, 30$ off, and 30$ coupon).
gigabyte EP35-DS3R - 130$, it was a mistake spending 5$ extra on the energy reduction feature since they don't work, I figured it will pay for itself, but it was only 5$.
OS: Vista, because I like playing games and MS has a monopoly on that.

AMD X2 EE @ 2.4ghz - 35$ in newegg.
4GB DDR2 - old set bought years ago on the cheap.
5x750GB WD CaviarGP drives - new from ebay
OS drive - salvaged 160GB IDE drive
Rest of system - too old to be worth selling hardware.
OS - opensolaris

But my point was more that this is for the chinese government... So a school is getting some computers using dirt cheap components, as cheap as they can find... 300-400$ per computer... now tag on to it the MS price per system and see how much a thousand computers cost you, 10,000 computer, etc.

 

[lxskllr]

If you can afford Windows compatible software, you can afford Windows. In your example of the Chinese, they could outfit the computers with Linux, and run Linux apps. It's all open source, so they can modify the programs as necessary, or create entirely new ones. I'm just not seeing much advantage to a Windows clone.

 

[tcsenter]

Originally posted by: taltamir
But my point was more that this is for the chinese government... So a school is getting some computers using dirt cheap components, as cheap as they can find... 300-400$ per computer... now tag on to it the MS price per system and see how much a thousand computers cost you, 10,000 computer, etc.

Governments get an all-you-can-eat institutional license that works out to several dollars per seat.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

Originally posted by: lxskllr
If you can afford Windows compatible software, you can afford Windows. In your example of the Chinese, they could outfit the computers with Linux, and run Linux apps. It's all open source, so they can modify the programs as necessary, or create entirely new ones. I'm just not seeing much advantage to a Windows clone.

Exactly, if you don't need/can't afford Windows, use Linux.