Clone wars revisited

A decade has passed since the last of the official Mac cloners threw in the towel, with Apple’s recent run of success blurring memories of its mid-90s turmoil. Still, last month’s emergence of Psystar — a company offering to sell PCs capable of running Mac OS X — has rekindled memories of the days when Apple’s own machines weren’t the only hardware capable of running the Mac operating system. Because of that, we thought we’d take a look back at the Mac clone era, examining their rise and fall — and why we’re unlikely to see the re-emergence of any sanctioned clones any time soon.