OS X :: Glimpse At Snow Leopards More Subtle Refinements
May 29, 2009
While many of the changes present in betas of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard have been discussed at length by Apple followers, one tester has taken to the web with observations on some of the more subtle refinements spread through the most recent build of the next-gen operating system. AppleInsider reader inewton1974 pointed us to an annotated Flickr album of nearly four dozen Snow Leopard screenshots he published a bit earlier in the week. He begins by noting that the software's setup assistant will now warn users if they don't supply a password hint and claims that QuickLook capabilities have been built into universal Open and Save dialog windows.
Another interesting discovery is Apple's use of transition effects within the new Cocoa-based Finder. In particular, the Clean Up command for tidying Finder windows reportedly "slides" icons into place instead of shifting them abruptly. This is described as a "a neat visual effect," and several others similar to it are likely to follow. The Finder also present an slider control for resizing icons in the lower right-hand corner of windows displayed in icon mode, as can be seen in the first screenshot below. Additionally, it's noted that a QuickTime preference pane is absent from Snow Leopard, as are any preferences from within the QuickTime X Player itself, leading to renewed speculation that Apple may do away with its premium QuickTime Pro offering entirely. A series of screenshots with inewton1974's observations follows:.......................
Snow Leopard seems to have an endless number of tiny tweaks up its sleeve, and here are a few more morsels. In Expos�, when your mouse pointer is over a window thumbnail, press the Space bar to expand it (press again to return it to its minimized size). This will interest only programmers, but Quick Look now applies syntax highlighting for source code files in at least some programming languages. If the Trash contains locked files, emptying the Trash displays a new dialog that gives you the option to delete all the unlocked files, rather than repeat the action with the Option key held down to delete everything. In the Icon view in a Finder window, if any filenames overlap, the names in the background turn gray. It's a nice tweak to avoid the solid block of black that happens when lots of items are stacked on top of each other.
Snow Leopard seems to have an endless number of tiny tweaks up its sleeve, and here are a few more morsels. In Expos�, when your mouse pointer is over a window thumbnail, press the Space bar to expand it (press again to return it to its minimized size). This will interest only programmers, but Quick Look now applies syntax highlighting for source code files in at least some programming languages. If the Trash contains locked files, emptying the Trash displays a new dialog that gives you the option to delete all the unlocked files, rather than repeat the action with the Option key held down to delete everything. In the Icon view in a Finder window, if any filenames overlap, the names in the background turn gray. It's a nice tweak to avoid the solid block of black that happens when lots of items are stacked on top of each other.
Bottom on is 10.6, upper is 10.5. You'll notice that in 10.6, nearly every UI widget has been tweaked. The blue grid highlights has a slightly darker color (probably due to the gamma adjustment) Every checkbox, button, etc now has a slight shadow, the ball selector is now much smaller and rounder and darker. The arrow selector has a completely different gradient look. Most of the drop down selectors now have a *slightly* different gradient, making them more pronounced. The traffic lights at the top for SL seem less embossed and much softer / part of the UI. Flip through them, you'll notice nearly everything has changed.
In general, reviewers are very positive about Snow Leopard, calling it a welcome performance boost with strong under-the-hood improvements. But what's really captivated everyone is the price: at $29, critics see the inexpensive upgrade as a no-brainer for most Mac users. The new 64-bit architecture, built-in support for Microsoft Exchange, and the ability to open Mac OS X files while running Windows via Boot Camp are all welcome additions highlighted by reviewers.
But in the end, it's all about the performance: Applications load faster, and the OS install frees up an average of 7 gigabytes on a user's hard drive from Leopard. That's not to say all is perfect. There are reports of applications that do not work or are glitchy in Snow Leopard. Some of the more popular software that has reportedly had problems includes Microsoft Word, Photoshop CS3 (which will no longer be supported for Snow Leopard), Growl, and CyberDuck. But as with any OS upgrade, some older applications will need to be updated in order to fully work with the new system. As has happened in the past, most software will likely see updates in just a matter of weeks to increase compatibility and performance issues.
Here are some of the review highlights:................................
All of the following questions are in regards to Snow Leopard and my 2008 mac pro Octo.
1) Will Final Cut Pro 6 from FCS2 work? If so, any issues, and will I see a performance increase/decrease? (I have 8 cores dual ati 2600's) 2) Will Quicktime pro carry over when I install Snow Leopard? And Will it use all 8 cores? 3) Will Final Cut Pro 6 have an issue with the new quicktime? 4) Will visual hub, mpegstreamclip, or Handbreak be incompatible with snow leopard? 5) Will my final cut pro projects that I created in leopard, still work when I install snow leopard? 6) Will Word 2003 work with Snow Leopard?
I use my mac pro to make a living, should I risk installing Snow Leopard if Leopard works fine? Or do you think I should wait?
I am planning on buying the upgrade of Snow Leopard from the Apple store on Saturday. Do you think they will sell out fast, or will Apple prepare for the worst and stock on alot?
It is a subtle kind of vibration, notable only as a ticklish sensation on your palms when resting them on the case, rather than a concrete, strong up and down shaking.
I wouldn't even mind, if my wooden desk didn't pick up the vibration, acting as a soundbox with an audible, deep humming noise. You probably need good ears to hear it, I only do in a quiet room (like, my home desk...). After a short while, the deep humming is joined by a subtle higher-pitched humming. This is when there is absolutely no activity (no programs running, just an empty desktop). I am definitely not talking about the higher fan speeds accompanying increased processor activity and heat.
Now I heard multiple reports of MBPs doing this, but never found an objective conclusion: Is that something MBPs simply do (it's still better than most laptops)? Should I, *sigh*, return the damn thing?
In other words: Is there someone who could confirm that he or she has a 2009 MBP 13" (standard hardware load, cheapest of the unibodies) that has no vibrations whatsoever? Please note that it's subtle and I only noticed it after a while (but now can't stop thinking about it).
I've been having many issues with routers working with my new (to me) macbook running Snow Lepord so I bought a new Snow Airport base station off of ebay due to a college students budget... It works great however I need to put a password on it and the configuring tool available from apple which is supposed to work with all of the newer versions of osX doesn't work with snow lepord. I do have a windows vista computer but can't get the configuring utility (4.1/4.2 IIRC) to recognize my router.
I have a Snow Leopard Install Disk for the 13-inch Macbook Pro model.I also have a 21-inch iMac. I have OS X Lion installed on both. I have Snow Leopard installed as a partition on my Macbook Pro, which I installed via the install disk. I want to do the same thing for my iMac but I am unable due to (seemingly) my install disk is for a Macbook Pro and not for an iMac.
"Photoshop CS" and "Acrobat 6.0 Standard" suddenly stopped working in my iMac, apparently after I upgraded it to MacOS 10.6.8 (the latest version of Snow Leopard). Both programs had worked normally until that OS upgrade. I deleted Photoshop CS and tried to re-install it from the original CD, but the installation never proceeds because I get an error message entitled: "Install Adobe Photoshop CS quit unexpectedly". This is the full error message:Â
Process:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â LaunchCFMApp [1516] Path:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â /Volumes/Adobe(R) Photoshop(R) CS/Adobe(R) Photoshop(R) CS/Install Adobe Photoshop CS.app/Contents/MacOS/Install Adobe Photoshop CS Identifier:Â Â Â Â Â com.MindVision.InstallerVISE
Today I performed a clean install of Snow Leopard on my late 2009 Mac Mini. After completing the installation, I began running software update to bring everything up-to-date.While software update did find and install a number of updates (10.6.8v1.1 Combo update, Security Update 2012-002, Apple Software Installer Update, iLife Support 9.0.4, Remote Desktop Client Update 3.5.3, Airport Utility, Java, Safari) it did not find an update for iTunes (which starts at version 9.x, I believe, in a SL clean install).I assumed that this was some sort of random glitch and manually downloaded and installed iTunes 10.6.3.After that, I re-installed iLife '11 (from a retail DVD, not the App Store).When I ran Software Update again, it found updates for Garage Band, iDVD, and iWeb, but it did not show the updates for iPhoto and iMovie.I found this to be unnerving, as I performed a clean install when I first obtained this Mini a few months ago and didn't experience any of these problems - all of my Apple software updated automatically through Software Update without a hitch.
I began researching this problem online and found that other people have been experiencing this same problem (or some variation of it), and it seems like it began appearing around the time Apple updated some of its security certificates in March.In particular, I've found several references to the missing iPhoto update.This one is especially noticeable because an iPhoto library created in iPhoto 9.2.3 will not open in iPhoto 9.0, and this generates an error upon opening the program (i.e., a user backs up their iPhoto library created in 9.2.3, performs a SL clean install, reinstalls iLife, goes through the Software Update process until it shows that no more updates are available, and are shocked to find that they are unable to open their backed up iPhoto library because they have an out of date version of iPhoto).The most common (and admittedly logical) solution proposed in the threads I've read is to download any necessary updates directly from the Apple website. However, I am curious as to why this previously functional feature now appears to be broken.Has anyone else been struggling with this? Does it indeed have something to do with the new security certificates? Is Apple aware of the problem?
I'm currently using a MBP 13 inch and am running Leopard on it.
I just bought a copy of snow leopard today but i don't know if I should do a direct upgrade from leopard to snow leopard, or wipe my MBP and do a fresh install so i have snow leopard on a clean slate.
Have any of you tried the second option before? Or do any of you have advice on which path I should take?
I have my drive partitioned between Tiger and Snow Leopard. I am trying to move myself over to Snow Leopard so I don't have to keep switching. The problem is that my old apps that alledgedly will work in SL, give me an error box when I launch them. It happens with Appleworks 6 and Quicken 2007. I've installed Rosetta but don't know what else to do.When I launch either application, it says it unexpectedly quit and gives this info:Â Process: [code]
iMac with 2Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM, plenty of space available and currently operating 10.5.8. Now I want to upgrade to Snow Leopard and since my Mac Mini came with it, I attempted to use the OSX install disc from the Mini in the iMac. I don't see a reason why this shouldn't work. There's no DRM or anything as far as I know. I'm just trying to bridge the gap so I can download Lion. I've looked into some of the advice others have given on this subject but my computer doesn't have those issues. I've tried booting from disc but I get the same message.
... long time reader, first time poster!! So I'm doing it. I'm switching from PC to Mac. I've been waiting for a while now and the new MacBook Pro's have convinced me. I'm buying the 13 inch this week.
However I'm slightly worried about the upgrade to Snow Leopard in September.
My question is if I buy a new MacBook Pro this week and upgrade from the current version of Leopard to Snow Leopard will it be the EXACT same as the version of Snow Leopard that ships with new MacBooks after September?
Is the upgrade just the same as the full software version available post September? Does the upgrade it just detect if you have the previous software and installs as if it were the full? Or does it just "patch" things depending on what's different from previous versions?
I can wait till after Snow Leopard is released in September 09 if it is different to Leopard upgraded to Snow Leopard.
Question: I already have snow leopard installed on my iMac. But can I still do a CLEAN snow leopard installation onto my imac even though snow leopard is already installed?
I tried it just now like twice but I got the spinning wheel of death. It wouldn't go pass the apple sign and spinning wheel.
I've been using Leopard since 2008 and everything has worked well. Now that I have to have at least Snow Leopard to run some apps, I'd like to upgrade to Snow Leopard. Are there any pitfalls I should be aware of? I'm assuming I will still be able to run all my apps and access my files.
I'm finally upgrading my Intel imac from Tiger. I found a new retail copy for $28 on Amazon. How many macs can I install with a regular copy? For about $50, I can get a server copy of SL, on ebay. I know it has a lot more features than I can, or will use, but will it run as a regular version? I know there will be no support from these vendors,but if I pay a little more at the Apple store, will I get free support fro Apple, if I have any problems with the install.
I will need the full install, because my oem Tiger DVD doesn't work anymore. Will I have any problems networking with my ibook running Tiger? I like to use my ibook to listen to the itunes from my imac, over wifi. The ibook has itunes version nine.1.
With Apple's plan to release Leopard, iLife '09, and iWork '09 as a box set for a price of $169, does anyone think they would do the same with Snow Leopard? If so I would buy it instantly. It makes sense that they would...
I am trying to install G95 on my macbook to run fortran. Its turning out to be a nightmare so far. I have downloaded the binary from the website (for x86 OSX), but from then on, installing it seems difficult.
If I try the command they mention on the manual, it says that I do not have permission to access the usr/bin directory. Then if I try to sudo the commands, it says that the directory urs/bin/g95 is not there. I used sudo to create one and everything seemed to work - except, it does not recognise the g95 command! I even tried to install it in usr/local/bin using the same procedure.
Background: I have a MacBook White (13-inch, Mid 2009) that isn't unibody, and was running Leopard 10.5. I am the only one that will use the Mac and my user account is as the 'admin'. When I was using 10.5, I could open the 'X11.app'. But few days ago, I did a clean installation of 10.6.2 Snow Leopard from the USD$29 disc. After that I installed the iLife '09 (the gray disc bundled with the MacBook),and I cloned the drive to my ext. FireWire HD immediately after the installation of SL and iLife'09 by using the CCC (Carbon Copy Cloner). After that, of course, I was going to install the apps I need, and update the software. But the problem appears: When I try to open the 'X11.app', the X11 icon begins jumping on the Dock, but nothing happens. Jumping and jumping... finally, it doesn't jump any more, with just the X11 icon on the dock. What's more, there is no white dot under the icon, which means the app isn't running at the moment. I right-clicked the icon, it shows me 'application not responding'...........
I have a Macbook 2,1 with Intel core 2 duo, currently running 10.4.11. So I've got an upgrade 'Box Set' from apple to get me up to Snow Leopard. It clearly says on the side of the box that I need 3GB of RAM and 12GB of free HD space and sure enough, when I try to install the software it tells me I don't have enough RAM (as this Macbook only has 2 GB I believe). And yet, in the instructions it says I only need 1GB of RAM and 5GB of free HD space - this I have, but why isn't the disk installing!
