Want to play Half-Life 2 under Mac OS X? How about running Microsoft Office XP, Lotus Notes, or Visio -- all without Windows? Do it, and soon, with CodeWeavers' CrossOver Mac, which will be arriving in late July or early August this year, for a retail price of $59.95. And you read right, you don't need a copy of Windows.

We reported over a year ago that CodeWeavers would be bringing their CrossOver technology to the Intel-based Mac, and happily it's almost here. Under CrossOver, supported applications run alongside OS X apps in "rootless" fashion, unlike virtualization products such as Parallels Desktop which run Windows apps in a dedicated Windows window.

How does CodeWeavers do it without requiring a copy of Windows? CrossOver is based on Wine (Wine Is Not an Emulator), which is a compatibility layer that provides alternative (native) implementations of the DLLs that Windows programs call at runtime.

CodeWeavers recently told MacRumors that the application is still in alpha testing phase and will provide a level of Windows application support equal to that of their long-running Linux version. Users will be able to examine the list of supported applications at CodeWeaver's compatibility center.

Gamers out there will be happy to hear that CodeWeavers has confirmed that they are working to support DirectX and OpenGL functionality. Stay tuned....