Snow Leopard 10.6.2 Pulling Atom Support

The current developer build of Snow Leopards next version is being reported to have effectively eighty-sixed support for Intel Atom CPUs. Currently, Apple OS X 10 Snow Leopard will run on Atom chipsets, so users were able to install the Mac operating system on low priced Netbook computers, creating what are termed Hackintoshes. The lack of support could be an unintentional oversight in the developer build, but recent trends (iPhone OS updates that prevent jailbreaking, legal actions against Psystar, etc) would support the view that Apple is going after Hackintosh users.

The report comes via the OS X Daily site, which speculates that "this move is Apples attempt at shutting down the growing and popular Hackintosh Netbook community, since Apple has no product line that runs the Atom itself... Maybe its in effort to kill the Atom Hackintoh Netbooks in anticipation of the rumored Tablet?"

Users of unauthorized Mac Netbooks are advised to not update, and stay with version 10.6.1 or 10.5.8 until a workaround emerges from the Hackintosh community. 10.6.2 is meant to be the second maintenance and security update to Apples OSX Snow Leopard; it will update more than 150 components, including AppleBacklight, Battery Menu, Dictionary, Expose, FileSync, Family Controls, Fonts, Front Row, HFS, Inkwell, iPhoto, MobileMe, OpenCL, Parental Controls, QuickTime, Screen Sharing, Spell Checker, Spotlight, Time Machine, and USB.