Sometimes people forget what 'beta' means. What some might confuse as a fish can indeed mean a piece of software with potential bugs that isn't ready for prime time. Regardless of this beta tag, countless users took the plunge into dual-booting OS X and Windows XP when Apple released Boot Camp last week. PC World has pointed us to an Apple Knowledge Base article detailing issues some users are having with Apple's newest beta software. Apparently, after using the Boot Camp installer, some users' computers have been rendered unable to boot OS X leaving customers waiting perpetually at the OS X loading screen.
The irony is of course, the machine that they purchased to run OS X can now only boot XP unless the customer does a wipe and restore. Some users are reporting some success running Disk Repair or by using some command-line voodoo but the frustration seems to be running high at the moment. Perhaps most frustrating for some of the early adopters is the fact that they have not received any acknowledgment from Apple as of yet. Of course Apple did make a point to say this was not a supported product. What about you? Any problems?
The ''Boot Camp'' boot screen; in which the user opts for loading under Mac OS or Windows
Last week, Apple Computer released a program for their Mac OS operating system called ''Boot Camp Assistant'', which will allow Macs to boot Microsoft Windows. The software was released as a beta version for Apple computers powered on the Intel architecture, which is also used by Windows. ''Assistant''  works by creating a hard drive partition to contain the Windows operating system. Unlike the current method of reformatting, the software will arrange files so that the new partition will not erase existing files. After the partition is created, the user must load a Microsoft Windows install disc.

While Macs will support booting competitors' operating systems with ''Boot Camp Assistant'', Apple will not offer support for them. ''Infinite Loop''  reports that this has led to people accidentally permanently installing Windows on their computers. Another concerned party is Microsoft, who claims that their commitment to the Macintosh operating system "has not changed."

One group seen to benefit is gamers, who will no longer be left waiting for delayed releases of Macintosh versions of games. Peter Cohen of ''Macworld'' notes that he has been able to play certain games with a moderate level of quality. However, he considers this to be a disadvantage for Mac developers, who are responsible for bringing software already available for Windows to the Macintosh operating system.