Rosetta is the PowerPC (PPC) emulator for OS X – it allows Intel-based (x86) Macintosh computers to run older PPC software, slowly.
Rosetta should be disabled for X-Plane; Rosetta simply isn’t fast enough to run X-Plane with reasonable framerates.
About Universal Applications
All applications and plugins for OS X are either PPC, x86, or universal (meaning both). X-Plane version 840 and higher is universal; versions before 840 are PPC only.
Because Rosetta is too slow to run X-Plane, users with an x86 Macintosh need a universal version of X-Plane; version 8 users should be sure to update to the latest version of X-Plane 8!
Disabling Rosetta
To turn Rosetta off, pick “Get Info” for X-Plane, and uncheck the box labeled “Open Using Rosetta”.
Starting with X-Plane 930, X-Plane will put up an error message if launched using Rosetta.
Rosetta and Plugins
X-Plane cannot load an x86 plugin when it is running as a PPC app, and it cannot load a PPC plugin when it is running as an x86 app. Therefore:
- X-Plane users with an x86 macintosh will need x86 native or universal plugins.
- X-Plane users wit a PPC macintosh will need PPC native or universal plugins.