Apple, Psystar reach partial settlement

Posted by Dennis Sellers Dec 1, 2009 at 3:00pm

Apple and Psystar agreed Monday to settle a 17-month lawsuit that will effectively stop Psystar from preinstalling Mac OS X on the Intel-based computers it sells. However, according to Computerworld, it may not stop the Mac clone maker from selling Mac clones. Instead, Psystar says it will shift responsibility for installing Apple’s operating system onto its customers.

Settlement details were not available, although Psystar indicated in a motion submitted Monday that additional information would be filed today in federal court in San Francisco with Judge William Alsup. The settlement, which requires Psystar to pay Apple an as-yet-unspecified amount of damages, would not be awarded until Psystar has exhausted all appeals, notes Computerworld.

Now whether many folks will actually buy Psystar hardware, then install Mac OS X on it is questionable. Psystar has only sold about 768 systems, according to an economist hired by Apple to analyze the clone maker’s business records (as reported by TechWorld). Under its conservative projections, Psystar told investors it would sell 70,000 computers in 2009, 470,000 systems in 2010 and 1.45 million machines in 2011.

The firm’s aggressive growth model, however, put those numbers at 130,000, 1.87 million and 12 million during 2009, 2010 and 2011, respectively, says TechWorld. By comparison, Apple sold 10.4 million Macs during its 2009 fiscal year, the 12-month span that ended Sept. 30, 2009.

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