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Apple To Ship Mac OS X Snow Leopard On August 28
okapi writes "Apple announced that Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard will go on sale Friday, August 28 at Apple's retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers, and that Apple's online store is now accepting pre-orders."
Leopard messed up audio programs of all kinds until Apple finally got around to addressing the issues with the .3 update. The recent .8 update screwed up some people's wireless connectivity. It hasn't been that long since some early adopters lost entire volumes of data when they upgraded.
Snow Leopard is supposed to be fixes, tweaks, and improvements, so maybe this one is a better bet, but still, I can't see myself pre-ordering.
Tweet, tweet.
I've never owned a mac, but was thinking of getting a macbook in the future. Are OSX upgrades free?
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
always back up. use time machine.
try an in-place update. the installer should inform you if it is able to do an in-place update (it should be able to).
if that fails, a clean install should be just fine, with your time machine backup used for applications, user files, and settings.
Pretty soon, Apple is going to run out of cats to name their OS X versions after. How many are left? When are they going to stoop to calling a new version "Housecat"?
Yes. Historically, there have been issues with each major upgrade of Mac OS X. I had kernel panics on a regular basis when I upgraded to 10.5 but now it seems fairly solid. I'm hoping that since the focus for 10.6 was speed and stability that it won't have these issues but I'm not holding my breath.
Well, it has never been successfully tested.
The only feature of Snow Leopard that looks at all interesting is the hanzi/kanji input on the trackpad. Probably hard to draw the twenty-stroke characters, unlike the five-stroke example screenshots. But since I rarely use my laptop OPEN (I run in clamshell mode to an external monitor most of the time), even that is not particularly useful to me.
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The SL upgrade is much more like going from Win 98 to Win 98 SE if it must be put in those terms.
Almost all of the upgrades are things under the hood that most users will notice little of, except the general speed up (which is quite significant in many parts), dock improvements, better Exchange support and improved dock functionality. This is a good update for tons of reasons most people shouldn't even really care about, so the pricing is quite justified.
--- I do not moderate.
the truth is we are literally swimming in pussy
1) this is an update, not a full installation. There is no "full price" edition, you MUST have mac os 10.5 on it now
2) 10.6 drops support for PPC (already mentioned previously here) so if they have older versions of Mac OS X on them it doesn't matter. However, some of the earliest intel macbooks and imacs shipped with 10.4.7-9 and their owners have not upgraded to 10.5 so there are some intels floating around without leopard on them.
3) VERY IMPORTANT - Apple will stop selling 10.5 the day they release 10.6. So if you have a macbook or intel imac with 10.4(.11) on it and don't get it updated to 10.5 before the 28th you cannot install Snow Leopard. The AASPs are going to go mad as of today trying to order as many 10.5 retail packs as they can get their hands on. If you will be needing one, you'd better get it NOW.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
See, I changed one letter, an 'n', for another, an 'l', as a way of making fun of the new release of Mac OS... I don't have any real reason for thinking it's slow, and it's not like I really have anything against Snow Leopard (apart from the fact that I, myself, am not interested in running Mac OS X any more) - it's just fun to make fun of it.
iSee.
What dumb Microsoft idea did they "steal"? Programs use configuration files, not a registry, this is better and way easier to manage. They are almost always stored in ~/Library/Preferences.
To restore an application you would restore it to /Applications. To restore any personal configuration would you have to restore the files in ~/Library.
Of course, if you back up and then do an in-place update, there should be little reason to restore anything. They have continually gotten better with their upgrade system. There is very little cruft as the old system is moved to a different directory and kept separate from the new one. Applications and configuration is already kept separate from the operating system itself.
Just wait until it gets bloated and begins to slow down. It happened with every previous version of Windows and unfortunately the behavior continues in 7 (I blame the registry). I have never had this issue with OS X, maybe because it separates the OS from the Applications so much.
The ideal IPv6 setup does not even use fixed DNS and NTP, etc. The system should be using stateless autoconf and multicast services for that.
3) VERY IMPORTANT - Apple will stop selling 10.5 the day they release 10.6. So if you have a macbook or intel imac with 10.4(.11) on it and don't get it updated to 10.5 before the 28th you cannot install Snow Leopard. The AASPs are going to go mad as of today trying to order as many 10.5 retail packs as they can get their hands on. If you will be needing one, you'd better get it NOW.
Apple sells a "boxed set" that upgrades Tiger to Snow Leopard, with no intermediate steps.
Yes, the Boxed Set is $169, which is more than Leopard alone was($129) but it does inlcude iLife and iWork as a bonus. (Yes, this is just a ploy to get more copies of iLife and iWork out there.)
As I understand it, the version numbers here are pretty much on par with a Microsoft OS version number so 10.5 to 10.6 will be like going from 98 to Win2k and should be handled the same way
You're kidding, right? Please tell me you're kidding. Anyone who could possible equate going from OSX 10.5 to 10.6 to upgrading Windows 98 to the NT kernel-based Windows 2000 is one of two things:
- Too young to have actually used Windows 98
- Undergoing unhealthy bombardment by the Reality Distortion Field
Reading the list of changes, it looks more like going from 10.5 to 10.6 is more like going from RTM XP to XP SP3 (which includes the upgrades to MS software that comes free with a Windows license like Messenger, Windows Mail, Movie Maker, etc). It's the same operating system, same kernel, same framework, just with various "improvements" and some new programs.
"What do you despise? By this are you truly known." --Princess Irulan, Manual of Muad'Dib
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You must be confusing Win2k with WinME. Going from 98 to 2k was an earth-shaking whose-yer-daddy OMGWTFPWN upgrade.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Actually you could argue that Apple has named their operating systems after German tanks. Of course they probably never did it purposly, but it is interesting to consider: http://ormset.no/wordpress/2007/01/01/german-armored-vehicles-and-apple-mac-os-x/
Even "snow leopard" is a German tank. Not sure how many German Tank names are left, but we'll have to see what happens after SL.
You sir are an idiot.
The more you use your OS- the slower it gets. Browser histories get bigger and take longer to open. Search bar suggestions take longer to load (as the data gets more bloated). Folders take longer to open as there is more to list. 'My Computer' gets slower with every drive you add since it feels the need to refresh its data with the latest usage and sizes. Sometimes programs install themselves to context menus and that has some overhead when right clicking. How about programs that have background processes always running... these didn't come with the OS (I am looking at you Java- where the hell do you hide?). And why can't more registry items slow down windows? Searching takes time. Storing it in memory takes... well, memory (which could cause you to swap).
You're right in that an OS doesn't slow down on its own. It's additional applications that do it. But most people don't have a computer to JUST "use" Microsoft Windows. And for some other typical applications (browser, office, email)- usage causes more overhead overtime as the program tries to become smarter or has to show the user more data.
*drops the mic*
Picked up a mini first of the year. This will be my very first upgrade.
As I understand it, the version numbers here are pretty much on par with a Microsoft OS version number so 10.5 to 10.6 will be like going from 98 to Win2k and should be handled the same way, upgrading will make for an unstable system so I should backup everything and do a fresh install. Is this conventional wisdom still correct?
You shouldn't have to backup your Mac just for Snow Leopard; ideally you've been keeping backups all along. Leopard made keeping good backups so brain-dead easy that all you have to do is get yourself an external USB/Firewire drive and plug it in, and let Time Machine take care of the rest. You don't even have to start the process in any way -- plug the drive in occasionally and let it do its thing in the background.
However, presuming for a moment you haven't being doing regular backups: yes. Backup everything first.
That having been said, with OS X I've never had to do a full wipe and reinstall. OS X has this very, very nice "Archive and Install" option that will move all of your existing system files into a "Previous System" folder, and then do a clean system install (optionally preserving all of your users and network settings, which I suggest). This does require a lot of free disk space, but it's safe and effective, and has always given me a very nice stable install of each new OS X release since Panther (10.3).
Yaz.
They're changing thedefault Gamma from 1.8 to 2.2???? Hell just froze over!!
I'm on 10.6 right now and even the betas seemed far more stable than 10.5. Also, the speed increase is definitely there. I honestly never expected moving to 64 bit using every day desktop apps like mail and safari would have a noticeable speed increase, but I was wrong. It is much faster. However, I admit the speed increase is the most noticeable on first load of that app, or a cold start. After that most apps in 10.5 are so fast the speed increase in 10.6 is hardly noticeable.
The dock has changed yet again. The even in the most resent release of 10.5 I have issues dragging an item from a folder in the dock to the trash. If I do this to quickly the trash can does not come up. 10.6 has cleaned out most (if not all) of the dock issues in 10.5 in my case. The new folder design in the dock is nice but I wish it had more options. I would love to shrink the icon size or change the display format (like details) in the folders in the dock.
Quicktime X bothers me. The logo for the new quicktime in the dock is terrible looking and when running the program even if the UI looks nice it doesn't match the rest of the OS. It is like running the most recent version of windows media player in Win2k. The theme may be nice but it is kind of odd. They also removed features I used from quicktime 7. Like, I would go into full screen and it would auto start playing. In quicktime X I have to manually hit the play button after full screen. If I stream a video I can't find the options any more to turn off the auto play. I hate it when it starts playing randomly when the window is minimized ffs.
All in all, 10.6 is nice but so is 10.5 and honestly the UI changes with the dock and quicktime in 10.6 I dislike. I would of been much happier with 10.6 looking identical to 10.5 and just running faster and being far more stable.
The only features I haven't "played" with yet is OpenCL. My macbook pro has a 128meg geforce 8600 which is the min requirements. In windows for openCL the min is 256meg (it sometimes works half assed with 128meg) so I need to make an RSA decrypter or something to see how well it runs. I'm honestly not expecting much in this area.
You'd think twice about that if you had an SSD in your machine. Think about the Macbook Air with the 64GB SSD... ;)
Menzoberranzan Networks
I'm a laptop user, you fucking cunt.
I don't want to drag portable HDs with me all the time, and what you fucking yanks call Internet connectivity is anything but.
You will not get 64 bit kernel, since by default 32 bit kernel is installed on all supported hardware except XServe. Even more, you can not install 64 bit kernel on hardware that could normally run it, since it appears Apple has restricted 64 bit kernel to hardware that has 64 bit EFI. Also, 64 bit kernel is not available on any Macbook.
So, basically, you have 32 bit kernel with 32 bit kernel extensions and drivers, just like in Leopard with hacks to allow it to run 64 bit user applications. True more applications are now 64 bit, but who cares if their mail or calendar is now 64 bit instead of 32 bit? It's not like your mail program needs more than 4 GB of RAM anyway.
And the applications that could really benefit from 64 bit like Photoshop are not available anyway. And once they are available they will run on Leopard as well (which was marketed as 64 bit end to end, when in fact the only application that is 64 bit on Leopard is Chess, and XCode).
So unless you really need that exchange support, I don't see compelling reason to upgrade at all?
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
OpenCL is going to change scientific computing, for good. NVIDIA's CUDA is great and all, but you get bogged to one vendor's platform. With OpenCL you can define compute kernels that will be run in the GPU, if the thing supports it. For neural networks, genetic algorithms, matrix stuff, fast fourier transform, etc, expect HUGE performance gains. Especially whenever there's an NVIDIA TESLA with 192 cores behind it you might find gains of 100x speed. I'll probably be modded as funny or some shit, but imho OpenCL is a game-changer for the scientific community.
Finally, ONE DAY, there will be a killer app for the general public using the power of the GPU. Then I hope everybody will understand.
In the meantime, I, and my students, will be studying and working with it.
Microsoft's Astroturf campaign has been phenomenal for Windows 7.
It reminds me of the old days when Microsoft Marketing could have sold shrink-wrapped poo; those guys were that good. It's too bad the software was never as good as the marketing.
Notes From Under *nix: blas.phemo.us
Without a doubt what you say is true.
However, the parent is right in that increasingly, over time, Windows systems typically slow down. even if you don't add much in the way of applications or other software. Without a doubt, part of this phenomenon is related to increasing data bloat, especially in the registry. (After all, this is where things like the a MRU lists and settings are stored.)
But the difference between Mac OS X, Linux, etc. over Windows is that the former lack the registry altogether, instead preferring to store this data in individual files rather than one huge database.
Like it or not, this slowdown is a limitation of the system as designed.
My blog
You will not get 64 bit kernel, since by default 32 bit kernel is installed on all supported hardware except XServe.
(a) we don't know if this is true of the final release.
(b) it hardly matters unless you planned to add more than 32GB of RAM to your system. All user apps can still run in 64-bit mode just fine.
And the applications that could really benefit from 64 bit like Photoshop are not available anyway.
Well sure, the system is not out yet!
But we'll see those apps before too long, especially a lot of apps that add GrandCentral and OpenCL support. The boost for those apps is a good reason to upgrade.
Also there are simply a ton of little feature improvements across the whole system, making it more than worth a paltry $29 for the upgrade price until the supply of 64 bit and accelerated apps does arrive. There's not reason why plugin vendors for instance cannot quickly incorporate updates.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Which makes their failure to sell Vista especially noteworthy.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Indeed - they've dug themselves into a hole in that "OS X" is the brandname, as much as "XP" or "Vista", and not simply a version number. Already they acknowledge this by the fact that they call it OS X 10.4, when repeating the "10" is redundant. It wouldn't surprise me if they bring out "OS X 11" or something dumb like that (or more likely, they'll eventually switch to a new brandname altogether).
It's not like the 10 was ever a version number anyway, in that it's a derivative of Next, not ("classic") Mac OS, which they had to ditch. The "X" has always been a marketing thing.
And I have never had this issue with Windows. I've used various versions of Windows on multiple computers for years, with no such troubles. Just wait? How long should I wait, exactly? The only slowdown is when I run Itunes.
Ah that's right - anyone claiming to have an experience otherwise is obviously a "troll".
Why is my anecdote not valid? Or is this a case of sticking your head in the sand if it doesn't concur with your preconceived assumption?
Perhaps the mod points should be given out to those who use them properly for a change.
Except operating systems are judged by how many people upgrade
Are they? Says who?
The point is there are many ways of rating a product - and sure, it's no doubt of concern to MS that Vista isn't as successful as XP (although we still have to take into account that XP has been on sale a lot longer - what was XP's share in 2003?), but in no meaningful sense is over 20% market share a "failure".
But I don't know why I bother - evidently even posting hard figures from sources is "flamebait", if it doesn't toe the pro-Apple line of the mods. Why aren't mod points given out fairly, randomly, and evenly anymore?
How much you gonna be paying for Windows 7 just to make Vista work properly? ;-)
What part of "a well regulated militia" do you not understand?