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Ars Technica Reviews OS X 10.5
E1ven writes "Ars Technica has published their in-depth review of the newest version of Mac OS X.
John Siracusa both covers the user-visible features such as the new UI tweaks and Time Machine, and dives into the increased use of metadata and the new APIs introduced and what they mean for the future of OS X."
I run Tiger. My regular userid is not an administrator.
OSX will prompt me to enter an administrator username and password under three circumstances (in my experience):
In all three cases, I expect the prompt and the reason is clear. I think it works well...
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
I'd never consider buying a computer I couldn't rebuild or modify (or build entirely) so using Apple's software is never an option for me.
Nor would I. That's why I bought a Mac desktop, where I can replace all the same components I can with a PC desktop... and lets face it, with just about any PC chassis you're going to be almost as limited since motherboard formats change over time. Over the years people have offered processor upgrades as well, made easier of course by them using Intel chips now where processor swaps are just as easy as any other PC motherboard.
And of course I have a laptop. And just like most laptops, there are more limited changes I can make - but Mac laptops come with a good range of i/o options, including gigabit ethernet and firewire 800.
Are you honestly saying you never ever would buy a laptop? To me I just can't see saying that someone would never buy a Mac because they can't upgrade one, is just not being true to yourself. You don't want a Mac for other reasons, that's fine - but lets all stop pretending the upgrade options are so very different.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
After having used Leopard for the past four days, the one feature that I so far love to (almost) hate is Stacks. From a theoretical standpoint, Stacks sound great, but Apple's implementation leaves something to be desired. In it's current incarnation, Stacks are barely usable, especially if you relied on the old Dock functionality that turned any docked folder into a nested hierarchal menu.
There's currently a debate going on in the Macintoshian Achaia over at Ars on whether or not Stacks are a useful addition to the OS, or a horrible mess that should've been sorted out before Leopard's release. My personal opinion is that while Stacks show promise, making them a substitute for the old functionality (hierarchal menus) was unwise (to put it kindly). Stacks should have been an addition to Dock functionality, not a replacement for a widely-used system of navigation.
because it's sold as a system rather than as bits and pieces
You do realize that the majority of Windows machines are sold as a system, not as bits and pieces. It's a fairly small subset of the population that builds their own computers. And aside from the motherboard, everything else on a Mac is just as configurable / replaceable as with a Windows machine. Apple fans might tend to choose not to upgrade components, but there isn't any real reason that they can't (again, aside from the motherboard / mainboard)...
ZuluPad, the wiki notepad on crack
Others are set to join him.
Almost 12 months since Java 6 was released on other platforms. Still waiting, Steve.
It was the single most comprehensive, interesting, thorough, thoughtful, and worthwhile review of *any* product I have ever read, *ever*.
I personally don't care about your accusations of fanboy-ism. You are irrelevent. You did not produce an absolutely awesome review, with about as much balance and fairness as is humanly possible. The author at Ars Technica *did*, and your unfounded accusations and complaints are just not even worth reading. Which is why I only skimmed your post.
I did read your last sentence though, and honestly, do you think anyone *cares* if you shudder when you read reviews that don't match your personal preferences? Or that you are going stick to running two operating systems?
Seriously man. This was an incredibly good review. It did not deserve your accusations of fanboy-ism. I don't even own a Mac, and my total time using Mac OS X amounts to probably less than 5 minutes. And yet, even I could recognize the quality of this review. You say that the review didn't "slam" OS X for its user interface inconsistencies???? Did you even read the review? It *did* slam OS X for the new UI inconsistencies; maybe it didn't do it using obscenity and OMFG THIS SH** IS THE SUCKS language, so you didn't understand what was being written. Regardless, it definitely slammed OS X pretty hard for these problems. But it also recognized that these are relatively minor faults that most people probably won't even know or care about. Which is undeniably true.
I think there is something so insidious about the kinds of complaints that people like you make about reviews. You express this sort of unprovable accusation that "if you were reviewing product X instead of product Y, you would have a completely different bias". But they aren't reviewing product X, they are reviewing product Y. How is what they would do when reviewing product X even relevent? It's mud-slinging that you engage in when you accuse the author like you have, and I think it's pretty lame, especially when considering how clearly well thought out, detailed, and just all around *excellent* that review was.