Attack of the Macintosh Clones: The $399 non-Apple box that runs OS X

ZDNet went the nostalgia route to remember the good ol', stunt-filled days of Power Computing, the company that cranked out licensed Macintosh clones in the '90s before real Steve Jobs shut the @#$^ down.

But with the OSX86 project closing in on letting you me and the other guy run OS X on generic PC hardware, you knew that somebody out there was ready to bring Macintosh-clone goodness to the rest of us.

Enter a company, entity or imaginary figment (I'm not sure what to call it at the moment) called Psystar (the Web site has gotten so hammered, don't even try clicking).

Here's what they claim (with thanks to Jason D. O'Grady at ZDNet for posting what the rest of us can't even see at present):

The company is offering “OpenMac” a US$399 Mac-compatible tower built from generic PC components:

* 2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
* 2GB of DDR2 667 memory
* Integrated Intel GMA 950 Graphics
* 20x DVD+/-R Drive
* 4 USB Ports
* 250GB 7200RPM Drive

For another US$110 and you add an NVIDIA GeForce 8600GT and for another USS$50 you can add FireWire.Apple’s current, lowest-cost machine is the Mac mini which starts at US$599.

Here it is in a nutshell:

Psystar has assembled a system that is completely operational with Leopard called the OpenMac. We call it the OpenMac to reflect the opening of what has previously been a hardware monopoly.

ArsTechnica also has the story, and I have them to thank for the picture above.

In the Ars Technica article, they nail down the price for a box with OS X preinstalled:

Psystar, a plucky little company from Miami, Florida is, for the moment, selling OpenMac, a Mac clone with Leopard pre-installed for $554.

Not to throw too much cold water on the whole thing, the cheapest Mac Mini (which doesn't have quite the specs of the proposed Psystar machine, but nonetheless is a "real" OS X machine) is $599. However, the $799 Mac Mini also doesn't meet the Psystar specs. A Mac Pro -- which the proposed Psystar machine decidedly is not -- is way more than twice as good as this proposed clone, but way more than twice the price, too, starting at $2,799

This story is developing, so expect more -- much, much more -- in the hours and days ahead.

More stories on the Psystar clone:

PC World
Gizmodo
Ubergizmo
The Mac Observer
Insanely Great Mac
Mac Daily News
Wired
I4U News
Yahoo! Tech
Geek.com
Hot Hardware
Electric Pig
The Inquirer

Maybe now we can all see why Psystar's Web site is inoperable. That puppy's taking quite a hammering. If you absolutely must see it, here's Google's cached, graphics-free version.