Apple Takes Leopard out of Beta

I'm not sure if it's brave or stupid, but I have to test these things, so what the heck. So far so good.

SP2 for XP went great a few years back [actually, it updated flawlessly for all of us and everything worked fine], but I remember two large Mac OS updates that were pulled because of a lot of issues, then reissued a day or so later. Fortunately, I was on call and missed one and was sick for the other. That's when I started to wait. Also, I first update a copy of my Mac OS volume before update my main drive. Life's too short for me.

Paul is right. Although each Tuesday (or is it Wednesday I can't remember) morning my PC will automatically downloads a few patches from Windows Updates, but it seems every time I switch on my iMac it gives me a list of sometimes in excess of 100mb+ of patches for the Mac OS and its bundled software which is really starting to annoy me.

I think Paul is being fair here. Apple's process doesn't cast a very wide net on the beta testing front compared with Microsoft's massive beta program. I can't really say that Apple's OS releases are less reliable at 1.0 then Microsoft's since both companies do a ton of regular patching over the lifetime of their OS's. I guess one could try to argue that because of Apple's hardware/software strategy, they have dramatically fewer configurations to support and therefore may not need the kind of massive beta program that must cost MS a fortune to monitor and maintain. Still, there have been Apple releases that have had pretty unforgivable bugs in the release code, only to see a quick fix soon after release. That's a fair criticism. On the plus side, Apple seems to be very good at responding to the user base pretty quickly. People act like Apple is this irrational dictatorship run by Steve Jobs, but they're obviously willing to change stuff that we don't like (stacks, transparent menu, etc).

Who copied who's headline? http://db.tidbits.com/article/9455

Well, this is clearly going to be hugely appreciated by the Mac users - but if we're comparing the release mechanism of Microsoft to Apple, I have to say I don't see how Microsoft are doing a better job. Microsoft have allowed the perception of Vista to become one of a slow, buggy OS reminiscent of 'Me' - the reality is of course different, but shouldn't the beta programs allow them to pre-empt that, just as much as getting feedback for development purposes? Apple meanwhile are to a certain extent guilty of not listening until it's too late, but the perception of the OS hasn't become one of a 'bad product' - now that may be because of the Apple zealot army, but I myself have both Macs and PCs at home - and my Leopard system does work perfectly well - yes the design changes seem odd, but the overall performance and stability of the OS doesn't give me cause to question. On Vista - I do have cause to question. Why can't my 3.2GHz PC play that simple music track without it going choppy? Why can't I browse the network without it locking up? Why does Windows Calendar crash every time I log on? The list goes on and on. They're all minor issues and ones I can explain and mostly understand - but with the yearning masses out there (coupled with a seemingly blood-thirsty tech media), it's gone down badly - Microsoft, with their extensive TAP, private and public beta testing, partner networks and developers - should have seen it coming. 10.5.2 will bolster the Leopard release - and the Mac 'community' (oh yes, and the zealot army too)- ahead of a Vista SP1 release that people seem to be straining to get their hands on - if Microsoft have managed things right, the news will be that SP1 is solid, and Vista will race away - but if the news is anything else, the fur will fly!

Nevertheless, I have seen Mac OS updates getting pulled due to problems that the update caused, then re-released later, so the points about [lack of beta] testing seem to be true. That's why I wait and first update a copy to test it for a few days, before updating my main boot drive. I got burnt once when I updates to 10.4.10 and lost mounting of my external USB drive, but it worked fine on the old backup copy off 10.4.9 [Pro Tower quad 3GHz, 4GB RAM, 1TB RAID 0 and two spare internal 500GB drives, ATI 1900XT]

Another thing that bothers some of us is the forced obsolescence. We all know that Macs last a long time, but new hardware gadgets [iPods] requires recent OS and recent OS upgrades require new hardware [computers]. Leopard requires at least an 800Mhz CPU, but there are apps that will fool the installer but making the pram look like it qualifies, and allowing the installer to work on older machines with slower CPU's, that have reportedly done fine running Leopard. The new iPod Touch requires at least OS 10.4.10. Why brag that our Macs run for years, but Apple tries to make you upgrade one way or another? I just doesn't seem very friendly to me.

Well I have to agree with Paul that Apple doesn't have beta testing program that deserves this name. But I have to disagree on the fact that Leopard 10.5.0 is dubbed a beta. All features advertised worked very well, the performance of the system (stability+speed+footprint) was at least on par with the latest Tiger release. The only things that were screwed up were the UI things: translucent menu and no hierarchical navigation in the stacks grid mode. Now I'm not saying that some people didn't encounter glitches with it, but all people around me who upgraded were very pleased with it, and that's at least 10 people.

Well your site, and my subscription to Windows IT Pro has been getting thinner and thinner. With less relevant material. Your Windows FAN BOY attitude shines through with this post more than ever. I almost fell out of my chair when I read "takes Leopard out of Beta". Vista came out in December 2006/Jan 2007 and 100 million people (yeah right) paid for ALPHA CODE. Not that many had a choice when buying a new PC, or did not know better. Vista SP1...there is not one, well there is, its slower, has driver problems, wont be out for a few months after it went gold, cant be slipped streamed, well maybe a few can have it. What a Joke. Industry/User perception Vista = disaster stay away. Leopard = Great OS with a few bugs for upgraders. Perception of Leopard after 10.5.2 "Apple makes a great OS better, and shows MS how to Service Pack something in a timely manner". Perception of Vista after Leopard 10.5.2....where can I sell my Vista notebook so I can get a Mac? I have been using MS OS's since DOS 3.3. I work all day on their server products, have ben for years now. Vista was the OS that got me try a Mac/OS X. Good luck with Vista/MS Paul. You are like the Shawn Hanity/Rush Limbah of MS fanboyism. Maybe you should download their POD cast's to your Zune, and gain a few pointers from them.

wow paul, you really have an 'interesting' following... you really shouldn't pick on those apple programmers - they have nearly dozens of hardware configurations to deal with, while those lazy windows programmers have only thousands to worry about. tisk tisk... i was waiting for 10.5.2 for my macbook (which is running vista sp1via vmware fusion - nice app that is), but from what i've been reading over at the macrumors forums maybe that's a tad premature?

Leopard Beta... hahaha. I guess it all depends on what you're comparing it against. Tiger was better than Vista. Leopard is head and shoulders above... .0 or .2. It doesn't matter.