My daily driver is a mac, and while the new ones are overpriced, they’re not underpowered.
I have IIRC an 8 core CPU with 4 at 3.6 Ghz and 4 at 2.0 Ghz, and a 7 core GPU (this is on the entry level laptop).
The last macOS that supported 32-bit programs (not hardware, programs!) was High Sierra, last updated in 2018.
And if Linux and Windows are unsupported, then the OS for such older hardware (besides BSD) would be… Haiku!
Is that what Haiku’s place is right now?
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freebsd14 said : it’s the last release with 32 version.
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There is still NetBSD, there will always be NetBSD (if it even has a BeBox port…).
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netbsd, it is not so good at desktop area.
That is why Haiku could become the dominant OS in that space.
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The last 32-bit-only Mac CPU was the Core Duo, way back in 2006. There was a compatibility layer for a decade or so, but that was phased out with Catalina.
This is a very ageist comment for you to make; there are old people who are quite confident in dealing with changes in technology, there are also young people who hate computers. The world’s not as black and white as you think.
Maybe ChromeOS (and the ‘Flex’ variant) wouldn’t satisfy your desire for a non-corporate OS but otherwise it ticks your boxes well enough.
After reading in the topic about computers for old and young… I wanted to tell you what is important to me in software.
What I appreciate most about the software:
- legibility.
- functionality.
- productivity.
If Haiku adheres to these basic principles, it will have a future, I think. And Haiku will be great product.
And this (below) what ChatGPT generated about those principles. It is not bad at all.
Dear Paiani,
I am 75, and most of my friends are in their seventies. ALL of us, however fit and able we are, know that we are not what we were. In my case I still have a full time job and take a very active interest in Haiku, amongst other things, but I don’t learn as quickly as I used to, and, what is worse, I quickly forget what I have learnt. That’s why simplicity is important, and why Linux (which I still have on one of my computers) is no longer viable for me.
When you get to 75 you’ll know what I mean.
Have a great 2024.
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I have a number of old Thinkpads, and when I have time I am going to try to sell them on Ebay with Haiku installed. Should be interesting.
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Chrome OS is an over glorified web browser running on top of a Linux kernel. I would never ever consider using Chrome OS.
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Ok chaps, it’s clear I’m not going to win this battle. I wish you the best.
Why is it a battle? I don’t understand why you attacked someone on claiming that something is a selling point for a demographic in the first place.
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In one of my past jobs (my only lasting one actually), one of my colleagues was relatively elderly and I can recall an awkward situation when I implied old people are generally techno-illiterate, bearing in mind this was a department where most of us were using AutoCAD for one thing or another, and he could probably have recalled a time when the office might had have a few computers with AutoCAD running on DOS and everyone else drafting manually. I’ve been very cagey about making such assumptions since.
Assumptions about groups of people are not the same as assuming everyone inside a group fits that assumption.
Observing that more elderly people habe problems with technology than the average population is true, that doesn’t mean every elderly person fits this however.
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It’s over nephele, there’s no need to dwell on it. My attack was a last-ditch attempt to be seen as ‘right’, knowing that more people were liking their kind of posts than mine, and it didn’t work.
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I’m also disappointed that developers have been somewhat quiet as they were my main audience I think.
When ppl here talks about Desktop OS
they think about classical PC instead. Generally it is used by one people this way perosnal. It came of that era when the computer technology allowed mostly one user program running on the computer. Think about DOS, Windows until NT technology, Apple OSes until MacOS. Even OS/2.
Yes of course if a PC bought into a family that would be shared among family members if they cannot get or want more machines for every person in the family due to
their material possibilities
or
they do not need more ones as they have other interests in their life. Foir example they use it shared like a fridge or other kitchen equipments - they usually not installed in a home doubled or tripled if not justified.
However if we do not
A Personal Computer this way just evolved into a machine nowadays as multiuser computer … thanks to their HW resources and time sharing technology.
All exception is GNU/Linux as it was multiuser from its beginning, just as Linus Torvalds wanted a UNIX for a machine he can have , on a PC, so he started to develop a kernel onto his 386 CPU machine.
UNIX is time sharing, multiuser OS.
Of course you can say BSD, but BSD went into the opposite direction.
Today you can run BSD on a PC, but it started on university and big firms bigger machines at least on mini computers … not micro computers like a PC. From there the several BSD went into other platforms.
Meanwhile Linux evolved on PC category, PC HW servers, and after conquered the servers on bigger platforms like blade servers, and other HWs thanks to scientific communities and industrial usage , internet, and later the big companies which started to use it for several purposes - using the fruits of open source communities development efforts and some previously closed source SW solutions getting into Open Source.
I understand both kind of ppl here
→ one who wants their own machine and Haiku is OK as it is now
as he uses Haiku alone and do not need features come with multiuser - in their mind - this way refer Haiku as it is a Desktop OS. It comes also from the past. As only servers need generally multiuser opportunities. Now service users, authorization separation and some other services also benefits from a multiuser OS.
Those needed by the opposite group of ppl.
→ they want multiuser in Haiku, generally to increas security (sudo-like option, service users), some to share a machine in the family, or else option - meanwhile they want to do it with Haiku.
Although they could do it with using other OS, or with SBCs if they have no more many. I also understand them well.
Long live Haiku ! – written in their heart and want to use it and want to share its beloved parts among their relatives, friends, colleagues, etc.
Unfortunately there is an extreme group that envisions everything into Haiku - everything that exists somewhere else in the existing
systems.
Me partly can understand them - I want some other stuff in Haiku I just dream of.
There’s an extremely small group of ppl I cannot understand - those who envisions as
Haiku getting crowds
and just what is missing
to achieve this Holy Goal.
I hope your note about
do not lift you among them.
Just search for Youtube how many projects exists to create 8-bit and 16-bit bare metal machines, for example as Commander X16 or custom built arcade machines, etc …
These are exists due to nostalgia, the today technologies, business or people who loved those eras and built it again today more cheaper or they just can buy now …
… and sometimes young ones discovers the past “relics” and become fans or likers.
It’s more better to not reduce the things - in case Haiku … to your interests and own beliefs what belongs to 2023 or even 2024. 
I don’t genuinely understand why some people here have some problems with an OS being multi-user.
Some systems like android early on were (for the person holding the phone) single user but inside the hood the unix “users” were in use as a sort of filesystem sandbox. Probably Haiku could take advantage of this feature in that way.
Under powered… HA! Have you even LOOKED at any reviews of the M1 vs. recent Intel offerings? And we’re now up to the M3! I expect you to have a soon revelation of “foot, meet mouth”. 
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