Poll: Your first impressions of Mac OS X Leopard

[MacRumors]

Vote: Poll: Your first impressions of Mac OS X Leopard (http://www.macpolls.com/?poll_id=561)

[halprin]

The revamped developer tools basically rock!

[JasonElise1983]

i said "wow"...not because of how great it is...because it's like a kick in the ass to Vista and it's "wow" campaign.

[GSMiller]

Of course it's a kick in the ass to Vista!

I voted OK, because it's got great potential but not yet quite as good as Tiger. But of course Tiger had been updated 11 times :p

[hagjohn]

I was thinking about how "similar" both are getting.

I like 10.5 because it's more polished than 10.4.

i said "wow"...not because of how great it is...because it's like a kick in the ass to Vista and it's "wow" campaign.

[zombitronic]

I said Great, because Wow is lame.

[zombitronic]

What's with the semi-transparent menu bar? It's not transparent at all. I heard it was toned down, but this is turned off. Anybody know how/if you can turn this feature on? Either I'm blind, or it's nowhere in the System Prefs.

[Aranince]

Well...I went from the Apple store playing with Leopard to Best Buy and playing with Vista. Leopard kicks Vista's rear.

[QuarterSwede]

What's with the semi-transparent menu bar? It's not transparent at all. I heard it was toned down, but this is turned off. Anybody know how/if you can turn this feature on? Either I'm blind, or it's nowhere in the System Prefs.
Apparently it's videocard specific and therefore automatic.

[minik]

Thanks Apple! My last generation PowerMac G4 (DP 1.25Ghz, FW800) is live again. Everything just works.

[mynameisjesse]

I thought Leopard was going to be a let down...boy was I wrong. Soooo much better than expected.

[Macnoviz]

Great!

like it has been said: this is evolutionary, not revolutionary, but everything worked basically as advertised, and hitches were scarce, and mostly due to the indexing by spotlight, everything else works fine

[Dagless]

I think it's fantastic. I've already rambled on here enough about how Coverflow made it oh-so easy to check for duplicate image files in my digital portfolio and documents folder. The system is as fast as anything, especially on my PowerBook. Wasn't expecting that, Apple!

My last remaining external drive isn't big enough for a Time Machine backup without removing some important folders. But I've been planning a HDD update for both internal and external for a while. 500gb on both sides should be good for another few years :)

But I digress! This is the best OS I've used. It's not a giant leap from Tiger, but Tiger was near enough perfect. Just give me ZFS and fix some of the minor bugs in Leopard and I'll be a very happy bunny.

MS- learn from this. Vista bloated my PC partition. It absorbed resources with no immediate compensation. I'd laugh if I saw Vista running as well as Leopard on a 3 year old laptop (which was dragging it's spec heels even back then - 12" PowerBook).

edit. My best bits are -

Networking is just whole worlds better, and seeing representative icons in the Shared panel is a really nice touch.
It's fast. It really bloody is. iTunes opens, even with my 200gb library, in 2 bounces. No loading bar like in Tiger. Photoshop, iLife, mail just scream by.
Gui is wonderful. I was doubtful of the transparent menus at first, but they're nice. They're not too glaring compared to Vista. Subtle, I didn't even notice the soft blur effect till an hour ago. It's all very iTunes and makes me wonder if a time will come when iTunes is built right into the OS.

[hob]

I'd love to be able to tell you all my first impressions but TNT seem to have lost my package !!! :mad:

[AdeFowler]

I voted OK, because it's got great potential but not yet quite as good as Tiger
Couldn't have put it better myself. Now, I'll get back to the beta-testing ;)

[MrSmith]

A statistical survey where 45% of the sample aren't even within the sampling population? These kind of surveys would be more useful if they were worded something like, "For those who have actually used Leopard for more than an hour..." As it is, we've apparently got 20% who think "Wow", whereas it should be 37% or so. My Yen.

[imageforce]

how come, i cant show someone my cam in ichat4. seems it only works, when the chatpartner also has a cam installed?

[powerloader]

The reflection in the top menu is annoying and should be able to be turned off.

Nisus Writer Express 3 will not work at all.

The glowing dot in the dock that tells you a program is active is almost invisible within the reflection and needs to be bigger and/or brighter.

When you add your own folder to the dock to use as 'stacks' all you see is an ugly jumble of icons, one on top of the other.

I'm looking forward to a quick update to fix this stuff. I amazed that after such a long time in development the simplest things have been neglected.

Best thing? It's better than Vista, though that's not saying much.

cheers

Steve

[p0intblank]

I must say... I am VERY impressed with Leopard so far. It feels like an entirely new OS for the most part. I love the new Finder, the new interface, Time Machine, etc. etc. etc.

Well done, Apple! :D

[Vigilante]

I saw the Leopard firsthand from my friend this morning (obviously he's a Mac freak!) and I am kinda torn between loving some of the functionality and hating the idea altogether. He just shown me some of the little things he knew prior, like Time Machine, which I thought was a nice visual change to things that already existed. Some others, though, like the Cover flow view of files and the multiple desktops seems like it's more for showing off visually than productivity.

People also need to stop comparing this to Vista, I'm a Windows lover (I was considering possibly running two OS if Leopard shown any improvements over XP), and I hate Vista! :) The only benefit of Vista over XP currently is DirectX10, which people will have effectively ripped for XP as soon as there is a true need. I was disappointed with Leopard in comparison to XP as use for a home operating system. Then again, (b.s. statistic incoming) probably something like 90% of the people that have Leopard now are Mac lovers to the end and would get the system no matter what. Don't lie, you know it's true! :D

[arkmannj]

I really like it so far, worth the upgrade.

I only have two things I wish were in it so far.

1) for folders (stacks now I guess) in the dock we now have 2 options
"fan" and "grid".
I wish there was a third option it might be called "folder view" or "standard"
basically an option to view a folder how we could in Tiger.

2) more preference options for the view of things
* the dock: 2d/3d, color of active apps dot, (I have a hard time seeing the blueish glow on the 3d dock)
* menu bar opacity level

[ariza910]

After using it for 24hrs I have to say that it feels like a solid OS.

Everyone has heard the good stuff here are my complaints....

Stacks - are cool but why cant I keep a regular folder in the dock? I dont want every folder in the dock to be a stack. The trash doesnt stack - and when there is nothing in a folder it just opens up a finder window?? Also from a usability stand point I dont think new users will make the connection that a documents stack and a the documents finder folder are the same thing. The limit of icons in grid view is a drag.

Address Book - where did the connect to bluetooth device go? Also, you cant right click on a number anymore and pull up the options 'dial' and 'send SMS' WTF - I thought they would ad this function to the iPhone connected to Leopard- not take it away from everyone. For those that don't know - you use to be able to connect to a cell phone from OSX via bluetooth from address book and any time you received a call it would display caller ID right in OSX, you could also dial a number on the cell right from address book and even send and receive SMS through your cell right from a pop up screen in OSX, it was awesome.

Folder Icons - I know this is minor - but really? blueish grey 2D folder icons? what is this 1987? EVERY icon is a folder - even the library icon - I cant tell them apart and they look so boring.

[wrldwzrd89]

Looks great to me.:D

It's not without its issues, though - especially when it comes to stacks in the dock.

[thejadedmonkey]

Dashboard is faster, Finder is... different. So far, that's the only difference I see (and use). I basically paid $129+6% sales tax for a dashboard upgrade.

I'm sure in 5 months it'll make sense, and I'm glad I got the free T-shirt, but honestly, it's hardly a stones throw better then Tiger. Stacks? Transparency everywhere? Sluggishness? They need to lay off the hooka and release 10.5.1 pronto, and then maybe I'll change my tune.

[zombitronic]

Apparently it's videocard specific and therefore automatic.

Thanks for that tidbit. My G4 has a 3rd party 256 MB ATI Radeon 9800, which I'm sure could handle it, but some support just must not be there. My other G4 has the preinstalled 64 MB card. I'm kinda shocked that it can't handle the menu bar transparency but it does the drop down menu transparency and the dock reflection just fine. Not to mention, core animation is smooth as butter.

I'm hoping for a compatibility fix in an update.

Overall, though, I'm pleased.

[offwidafairies]

It's great reading all the posts. Makes me feel almost like I already have Leopard, and I was almost at the launch (instead of singing in a concert). :(
I can't wait to try it out in about 10 days when my new MBP arrives :D

I can't believe some people voted terrible. From everything I've read it sounds fantastic!

[scott523]

At first I was like WOW when all my startup programs started up as if nothing happened before restarting. Then the glitches and choppy graphics started sinking in -- but then it was still great. The Live partitioning wowed me for bit, which was after I defragmented my HD, which made way for Time Machine to be utilized. And yes, I'm using Time Machine on my startup disk, believe it. :cool:

[CD3660]

Having read through this thread it sounds very promising, but there are enough negative posts to lead me to the conclusion that I should hang fire a while before 'upgrading'. :)

[cbrain]

I voted "Wow".

[pimentoLoaf]

Had I switched from os9 to osX, I would have said Wow; since it's only a revamped Tiger with some really cool :cool: features, I proffered Great.

[Vigilante]

Maybe it's because 9800 Radeons suck, get an Nvidia 8 series GTS, thank you. :)

Is there any way to change some of these options, namely make it so all icons are created have a different default image?

[sjk]

Dashboard is faster, Finder is... different. So far, that's the only difference I see (and use). I basically paid $129+6% sales tax for a dashboard upgrade.
That begs the question, why the heck did you buy 10.5 if nothing but its Dashboard upgrade has value for you?

[motorazr]

I would have said wow (namely because of Vista), but leopard isn't a wow upgrade to Tiger. It is a great upgrade, and a well worth one, but now wow. Tiger had many, many more revolutionary features than leopard, but leopard is much more polished and has a greatly enhanced versions of most of tiger's stuff. Spaces is one of the most impressive things (to me, I am able to use it a ton with 16 spaces...), but the new Front Row disappoints. Am I the only person who is noticing that you can only play music in FR when it is open (as to you used to be able to close it and it would still play)? Well... I love leopard and wouldn't go back to Tiger on my intel mac, but my iBook is staying Tiger (for now, not enough disk space, still have some classic apps, iBook is minimum specs for most all of leopard).

PS. Thanks Apple for giving me the Ultimate version for $129!

[ucfgrad93]

I haven't purchased Leopard yet. Might wait a couple of months.

[pjarvi]

Wow for me. I love the translucent menu bar and the new dock. I'm barely touching the Finder thanks to Stacks. Everything was painless to install.

Good riddance to Tiger.

[rickvanr]

'Great' because the blue screen hang due to application enhancer.. and the lack of logitech support..

[UpQuark]

I think the single level for stacks is a mistake. It would be great to do the spring folder thing in stacks.. you click once, get the grid, point, click and hold, opens the next folder, then so on.

I like that you can click a stack..and it stays right there...

SPACES RULE!! I have used Opensuse/Ubuntu -and loved the virtual desktop.. but this implementation of that technology is the best I have seen thus far.

iCal - huge issue for me - you cannot see the Notes or details without opening the entry. In Tiger, there was a 'preview' pop out window. In 10.5, you must double click an entry to see the notes/contents therein.

How do you add Notes to mail? How do you have todo's show up in the calendar from mail and vice versa?

memory utilization is going to take a while for me to get used to. after using 10.5 for a few hours, my used memm. (thanks to menumeters) is 1.5Gig of my 3 gigs of ram. I thought it wasn't a big deal, so I closed all my apps, shut off spaces - went to bed.

8 or so hours later - still 1.5 gigs of ram being used. Odd... But it makes me paranoid to try to run parallels... I don't want to start having to go into swap space when I didn't at all with Tiger.

On the plus side - 10.5 is definitely faster than Tiger. More stable, I don't think so, not yet anyway. I have experienced a few lockups for no particular reason. I have been able to restart and that has worked.

Also, I have had Finder just simply disappear. It was in the 'Forced Quit' box, so I did that, and it came right back.

The finder screen sharing rocks

if you boot into single user mode - root is now locked by default - awesome!

iChat works like a champ. iChat screen sharing works great too. And, if you screen share, an audio session is automatically started. Very nice. You can also drag and drop files between the sessions. Awesome!

Time machine is really great.. I am worried about how to 'cycle' backups.. when my external drive gets full, what happens?


I disabled the 3D dock. Not for the 3d-ness, but because I had a hard time seeing what was active - that blue dot sucks, IMO.

Apps the run Rosetta seem to execute much faster and 'seem' to be more stable.

ZFS is definitely read only. But, you can download a read/write version from Apple Dev site for free. I am going to install it soon and try it out.

I miss the stark differences between the folders that was exhibited in Tiger. I don't care that they are flat etc, but it is difficult to determine which folder is which at a glance...

Finder - wish I could change the font size - but other than that, I like it alot!

Spotlight - Apple sucked when they removed the categorization of the spotlight window. JUST SUCKED. I really am loathed to use it....
Spotlight works great! Fast bla bla..and I love the dictionary tie-in, but the lack of categorization just blows.

[synth3tik]

I don't see how anyone could be disappointed. They revamped everything. Not a single area was left untouched.

[sjk]

I voted "good" based on two hours of tinkering with Leopard at an Apple Store launch event on Friday. From my Newvine post about it:

What I care about are the stability issues I encountered, like why Mail crashed at least twice while trying to configure some things I'd want to do similarly on my own systems. Managed to crash Finder a few times, too. And something caused the upper-right corner Spotlight window to open display off-screen to the right, which I think might have been related to using Spaces. In general, Leopard seemed fragile to me compared with Tiger. If it's that easy to discover problems on a relatively pristine system at the Apple Store then I'm definitely not ready to run it on my home systems yet.

I'd vote "great" if it were as stable for me as Tiger has been, which it probably will be after a few updates. I'm still waiting for a few critical apps to be fully Leopardized anyway.

Time machine is really great.. I am worried about how to 'cycle' backups.. when my external drive gets full, what happens?
Older backups will be deleted automatically. I don't remember the exact policy but it shouldn't be hard to find that information, maybe even in Time Machine's own help documentation.

Spotlight - Apple sucked when they removed the categorization of the spotlight window. JUST SUCKED. I really am loathed to use it....
Spotlight works great! Fast bla bla..and I love the dictionary tie-in, but the lack of categorization just blows.
Could you do something similar to categories by setting up Smart Folders?

[minik]

Maybe it's because 9800 Radeons suck, get an Nvidia 8 series GTS, thank you. :)

Is there any way to change some of these options, namely make it so all icons are created have a different default image?

My 256MB Radeon 9600 Pro works fine. c'mon. ;)

[MacMarcie]

I voted "WOW"! So much better than Tiger! I got my macbook a week before Leopard was released so I got to dabble with Tiger for a little bit before upgrading. I love all the upgrades especially to the email program. I thought I would have to continue to rely on Outlook...but not anymore! I could go on and on about all the AWESOME things Leopard has to offer-and it's easy to use!

[Macnoviz]

I installed Leopard friday, and now Time Machine has saved me for the first time. I think that is pretty good for a back up program...

[zwida]

Looks great to me.:D

It's not without its issues, though - especially when it comes to stacks in the dock.

Yeah, I stopped using stacks in the dock altogether today after being annoyed with it for the last three days. Now that it's gone, I don't hate it nearly as much...:D

[I WAS the one]

I'm glad I installed Leopard on a Powerbook 12" that I just use for internet and Mac to Mac needs, beacuse I had bad experience since day one.

1) after upgrading I was looking at a blue hanging screen for hours and needed to do an erase and install all over again.

2) I need to configure the wireless access (WEP password and all)everytime I start up my Mac. (I did an update that Apple recomends for that but I need to try it first before I post my opinion here)

3) I download an app from versiontracker to rezise images (a freeware) and I received a first KERNEL PANIC after that. I erased it and never happened again.

Things I love about Leopard but really not use yet:

1) coverflow ( I love it it looks awsome, but everytime I'm browsing for a file I click on icons view... so I'm not feeling confortable with coverflow for an everyday browsing for files view style)

2) Stacks ( I love stacks, it is something amazing, but I miss the folder I used to put in my Dock for file browsing... thats gone! and I don't like that)

3) Mail ( I love the stationary mail templates but it is kind of limit, you should check this if you want more for Mail: Statonary Pack (http://www.equinux.com/us/products/stationery/index.html)

4) Start up screen ( I miss the progress bar at starting up my Mac, I don't like waiting for my Mac and no seeing nothing that tells me that is coming up....)

[UpQuark]

I voted "good" based on two hours of tinkering with Leopard at an Apple Store launch event on Friday. From my Newvine post about it:

What I care about are the stability issues I encountered, like why Mail crashed at least twice while trying to configure some things I'd want to do similarly on my own systems. Managed to crash Finder a few times, too. And something caused the upper-right corner Spotlight window to open display off-screen to the right, which I think might have been related to using Spaces. In general, Leopard seemed fragile to me compared with Tiger. If it's that easy to discover problems on a relatively pristine system at the Apple Store then I'm definitely not ready to run it on my home systems yet.

I'd vote "great" if it were as stable for me as Tiger has been, which it probably will be after a few updates. I'm still waiting for a few critical apps to be fully Leopardized anyway.


Older backups will be deleted automatically. I don't remember the exact policy but it shouldn't be hard to find that information, maybe even in Time Machine's own help documentation.


Could you do something similar to categories by setting up Smart Folders?


Doesn't setting up Smart Folders kinda delete the purpose of Spotlight?

[Plymouthbreezer]

I had issues. Blue screen. Single User Mode didn't fix it. Kernel Panics. I needed a reinstall on my MBP, which was only a week old. Kinda angered, but I didn't lose anything, I went in with Target Disk Mode from my iMac. Overall, the process took a few hours, since I needed to reinstall all my iLife apps from my Restore Disks, as well as iWork '08, CS, and Lightroom; not to mention 20GB of music plus a few gigs of photos.

Anyway, now that it's running, everything is working fine on my 2.2GHz SR MBP (2GB RAM, 128MB VRAM). I'm in love with the consistence look, and the new features are awesome improvements. Not a massive fan of the semi opaque menu bar, but I'm sure it will grow on me. Stacks is handy, and I have already been using Spaces lots. Time Machine will be useful for me, because not losing a job's 200 raw photos more than pays off the price of the software (but I only paid $10 for the UTO CD) were I to buy it at full retail.

Next project to tackle will be getting Vista on this thing, just for kicks.

[tbealmear]

I love Leopard so far. The only real problem that I have run into, is that Mail doesnt like my Insightbb account settings for some reason and I cannot set up my email. I have to use Thunderbird for my Insightbb account and use Mail for my yahoo account (which pops up every couple minutes saying that yahoo rejected my password...but that happened a lot in Tiger too) Other than the mail problems, I freakin love it!!

[Jetson]

I finally received my copy of Leopard last night. I started the installation process just before going to bed.

Leopard installed flawlessly and was waiting for me this morning when I awoke. I've only had a short while to play with it, but I have several impressions I'd like to pass on:

General
I have an iMac G5 2.1 20", so I can't take advantage of Boot Camp. I haven't configured Time Machine yet.

Overall I'm very impressed with Leopard, though it obviously needs a little trimming around the edges, so to speak.

The Good
Start up seems to be about as fast as Tiger.

I like the appearance and backgrounds.

Operations such as opening folders, starting applications and general responsiveness is noticeably improved - quicker.

Most of my settings in Tiger were retained in Leopard which was very convenient.

Safari really is snappier! It displays and renders pages much more quickly. I finally feel the power of the machine and of the broadband connection. Also, some little annoyances have been removed. One annoyance in particular in Tiger, if I accidently placed my cursor over the Bookmarks menu item, I would be stuck for 1-2 minutes watching the spinning beachball while Safari pulled up hundreds of bookmarks ever so slowly. It was like a quicksand trap that I couldn't help but fall into ocassionally. Now, selecting the Bookmarks menu item barely registers a blip - 1 second if that.

I feel as though I have a new computer - almost. Everything is refreshed and new looking with better performance.

The Bad
Leopard will not remember the View settings for individual folders. For instance, I like my Hard Drive folder to view as icons, but my document folder to view as a name list. When I set my documents folder to view as list, Leopard resets all the other folders as list. Come on Apple - this is a basic Finder feature, how could you forget to include it?

There is a Downloads folder at the far right of the Dock. I tried to move the contents of my existing downloads folder into this one, but it wouldn't work - it just created a stack of my former downloads folder on the Dock.

iTunes starts just as slowly as it did in Tiger - it loads ridiculously slowly, and I get the progress bar waiting for it to start up.

The Ugly
Safari doesn't render some web pages correctly. For instance, the text and selection items of my Seller Account page in Amazon.com look like unreadable, tiny blobs. I can't increase the font size on them. This worked fine in Tiger, but is broken in Leopard.

The Dock is a little buggy. For instance I ran a pinball game, then quit. When I looked at the dock, some of the icons were overlaid with green blotches. If I moved the Dock to the side then back to the bottom, the icons were restored.

Conclusion
I really like Leopard - I'm happy that I bought it. I've just begun to discover it's secrets, but I like what I see so far. There are a few annoying bugs which Apple should fix immediately. Nonetheless I think that Apple has done a fantastic job! :D

[sjk]

Leopard will not remember the View settings for individual folders. For instance, I like my Hard Drive folder to view as icons, but my document folder to view as a name list. When I set my documents folder to view as list, Leopard resets all the other folders as list. Come on Apple - this is a basic Finder feature, how could you forget to include it?
There's a detailed explanation/analysis of the view settings snafu in the Finder section of John Siracusa's Leopard review at Ars Technica.

[johnnyjibbs]

I said 'disappointed' because I guess that's currently how I'm feeling (I didn't get this feeling with Tiger and Panther upgrades). My problem isn't with the small bugs - Mail won't quit, DVD player crashes when visually rewinding and reuiqres hard reset, etc etc - these will be fixed in 10.5.1 and 2.

My beef is with the new flawed implementations that Apple is forcing down our throats - stacks and Finder behaviour for example. Stacks are not new - they've just rebranded the preivous folder-in-dock and removed functionality and usability (and the "Address Book applications folder" icon implementation is unforgiveable, Apple). Futhermore, why is the dock is so bloody space-consuming compared with previously?

But there is lots to like - Time Machine, iChat (once I get a chaeap iSight to tide me over until my next Mac), etc. One of the best new features (with scarecly a mention) in my opinion is iCal - finally it's been updated!!!

[Jetson]

There's a detailed explanation/analysis of the view settings snafu in the Finder section of John Siracusa's Leopard review at Ars Technica.
Thanks a lot sjk.

I read that rather lengthy article and first of all I have to say that it was very impressive. It was like a mini computer science course - that Siracusa is a pretty smart guy. I learned quite a bit reading it.

But to the point - while Siracusa didn't say it exactly, he did give a clue as to how I can get the Finder to save window views. You have to select the "keep window in list view" button and Leopard remembers that setting for that window. It's not as good as Finder automatically remembering the setting for each window, but at least it can be done.

[madmaxmedia]

For me-

1. Spaces
2. Quick Look
3. Faster Spotlight
4. Time Machine

They're not necessarily 'WOW!!!!' type features (although a couple of them are cool), but they're the things that make an impact in my normal day-to-day work.

I've had 2 HD's fail on me in the last couple of years, and I was lucky to be able to recover the data from them before they completely died. This time I won't need luck... ;)

[macfan881]

ive had leopard on my computer for a few days im loving i did a archive and instal was a lil slow then did a total fresh install seems much faster smother anyway i think its the best os ever i think this upgrade was like upgrading from 7.5 to os8 just in terms of wowness factor

my top 5 fav features so far

1. safari i love it it is fast i have yet to use firefox since i installed this on my computer
2 finder i think this is amazing quicklook and cover flow are amazing
3 bootcamp i tend to notice a little speed improvement i duno if its me or its the drivers but since i put the new drivers in my windows partition seems a lil speedier
4 front row i love how it resembels the apple tv and the trailer section has pretty good up to date trailers
5 spaces deffintly a nice lil feature to have

again i think this is the best os X upgrade so far i wanna get a biger external hd for time machine so i can use that feature.

[azpalmprincess]

I love the spaces and the dock...much more friendly for the things I do. I always have too much clutter on my desktop. This helps a lot!

[sjk]

Almost missed your reply …

But to the point - while Siracusa didn't say it exactly, he did give a clue as to how I can get the Finder to save window views. You have to select the "keep window in list view" button and Leopard remembers that setting for that window.
I think he mentioned sometimes having to toggle the setting to get it to stick.

It's not as good as Finder automatically remembering the setting for each window, but at least it can be done.
I'll need to use Leopard more to fully understanding how its Finder View Options and new global preference (whatever it's called) in Leopard affect windows compared to "This window only" and "All windows" radio buttons for View Options in Tiger. Looks like Leopard Finder's global preference is similar to the old "All windows" for each individual Tiger Finder window. That part of the changes makes sense but the overall spacial/browser schism (as John described it) still exists and makes it more complicated to determine when window views/sizes should be automatically saved.

I posted a comment on the Ars thread with some basic thoughts about OS X Finder evolving with a strictly browser-like metaphor while some method(s) to provide the spatial metaphor will emerge. Maybe that's the ultimate fate of Finder instead of the metaphor-unifying suggestions for it John makes. I dunno - the current realm of file management seems relatively stale and dead-ended but it's still not clear what could better replace it.

[SiliconAddict]

From a evolutionary standpoint its a "good" update. Not great. Not set the world afire. Just good. Good features. (Love spaces however even there, there is some work to be done by third party developers, Adium?, and for some reason Spaces likes slingshotting me over to the previous desktop after I close an app on the current desktop. Huh?) Good UI tweaks. (I generally like how Apple tweaked their network settings. However 2 steps forward 1 step back with how they did Firewall. apple please get a clue and have REAL advanced options under the advanced button. Do we need to wait until 10.6 to get this "feature"?) Good speed updates for Finder. (Nothing to complain about. Its just good. My only real request would be full screen Finder Coverflow. Which AFAICT you can't do.) Just good. Everything was going along swimmingly at first. Right now WIFI has turned into a buggy pile of crap. When I come back from sleep after being at a Caribou Coffee I enter my password since I have the system lock after going to sleep. The WIFI finds my home router. Doesn't connect but lists it and the other two routers in the area. So right off the bat it isn't picking up the default router. I then select my router and lo and behold it doesn't use the keychain that HAS this passphrase cached. I type it and no go. Won't connect.
Note that this is a Netgear router that I NEVER had any problem with on Tiger. NEVER.
So I disable WIFI and reenable it. Finds Cipher, my router, and connects. However now it isn't picking up a DHCP address and auto assigns it. Hit the renew DHCP button, no good. Still is auto assigning it. So I disable it again and reenable it and as Jobs is so fond of saying....BOOM. All is fine again.

Oh then there is this...http://att.macrumors.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=89205&stc=1&d=1193611996
Contrary to what OS X is telling me I KNOW I DO NOT have a compromised network.

As for how I installed Leopard. I backed up my data files, synced .Mac, repartitioned the drive via Leopard and reinstalled from scratch, created a new account from scratch, resynced my .Mac account, ran an update, reinstalled all my apps, and copied my data back. Its about as clean of as install as you can possibly get. I have nothing that should be remotly causing network problems other then possibly VMWare Fusion and that is a major stretch.

Dear Apple. Good OS overall but fix your crap. Its embarrassing. Especially when we know where your QC went. (Think about it guys. Apple all but said as much.)

PS- Yes I've installed all the current patches.

[pubwvj]

I'm disappointed that Apple has not reintroduced support for Classic applications. There are a tremendous number of older educational and small business titles that are not being produced for OSX.

The huge jump in required disk space is also disappointing. I have an 80GB drive in a laptop still under AppleCare. No way to upgrade without voiding the warrantee. I don't want to give up additional space to the system. I need it for my data and applications.

We need smaller, tighter, faster and with backward compatibility.

[seashellz2]

I love the new folder look. A little more crisp and professional looking.
The rather drab open folders of Tiger gave you no more of a clue than the new ones.

As for looking like 1997-Id say Tigers glossy folders look more appropriate for VISTA.

[viv0147]

I love the new folder look. A little more crisp and professional looking.
The rather drab open folders of Tiger gave you no more of a clue than the new ones.

As for looking like 1997-Id say Tigers glossy folders look more appropriate for VISTA.
Back to my Mac is fantastic I live in Wales UK my son lives in Ireland and he is very good with computers I had a few problems and he took over my Mac and sorted it out awesome technology the mind boggles.

[ariza910]

I'm disappointed that Apple has not reintroduced support for Classic applications. There are a tremendous number of older educational and small business titles that are not being produced for OSX.

The huge jump in required disk space is also disappointing. I have an 80GB drive in a laptop still under AppleCare. No way to upgrade without voiding the warrantee. I don't want to give up additional space to the system. I need it for my data and applications.

We need smaller, tighter, faster and with backward compatibility.

Isnt it just an additional 3GB of space? anyway if you want a larger hard drive you can have an apple store instal it for you, to be fair you only paid for an 80GB drive to begin with - BTO options were available for a larger drive.

I agree about Classic support, its a bummer it has been removed - Apples motivation was probably that they no longer wanted to spend the money to provide technical support or continue to make all versions of OSX compatible with classic. They also want software developers to catch up to OSX.

Older mac hardware holds up well - you can probably pick up an old 2gen 'sunflower' iMac to just run OS9 for about $200 on Craigslist.

[flyinmac]

No major complaints. Seems well polished.

Wish they would hurry up and add a new-tab button to Safari. It's the only modern browser without a simple button to click for a new tab.

I know there are many ways to open a new tab. But, I like the simple one-click button used by all the other browsers.

Otherwise, it works very nice. No complaints yet.

[Jetson]

Isnt it just an additional 3GB of space? anyway if you want a larger hard drive you can have an apple store instal it for you, to be fair you only paid for an 80GB drive to begin with - BTO options were available for a larger drive.
I for one DO NOT want to drag my iMac to the "Genius" desk to get Apple to upgrade my hard drive.

This is one area where I'm really frustrated. There is no simple way to replace/upgrade the hard drive on my iMac G5 (and later iMacs). There is no excuse whatsoever for making this so hard or impossible for customers.

Does Apple think that we've got cash laying around to simply go out and buy a new iMac when we fill up the current hard drive?

Apple had the right idea on the first iMacs - you could easily remove the back cover and after removing a few brackets, reach the hard drive to replace it. Apple even provided a webpage with illustrated instructions: http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/imacg5_20inch_HardDrive.pdf

On later models of the iMac, this is impossible. You have to somehow take off the front of the iMac, remove the LCD, cut through foil, etc. and risk seriously damaging the computer.

Apple, please think about your customers' ease of access when designing the internals of these computers. I know it's not easy but you can do it :)

[SiliconAddict]

Does Apple think that we've got cash laying around to simply go out and buy a new iMac when we fill up the current hard drive?

Hi. You must be new to the Mac. This is NOT new. Jobs upon his return to Apple basically crap canned the idea of an upgradeable Mac in any easy form. (Short of the HIGH end PowerMacs.) For god sake look at the Pismo. From an upgrade standpoint it blows the doors off the the current gen MacBook and MacBook Pros. Simply put Jobs doesn't give a crap about being able to upgrade hardware as long as its thin. I've said it before and I will say it again the man has a thin fetish. Doesn't matter how bad you are neutering the hardware as long as its small.
Seriously the Express Card on the MBP is completely fracking useless. If Apple had seen fit to add a quarter of an inch to the MBP on its first gen, not only could they have gone dual layered on the optical drive but they could have installed the full size express card and had better cooling. But no. It had to be 1" thick.

[Aaargh!]

2 Things that are 'missing'

Smart folders are gone. You can make a 'saved search' but no more rightclick -> new smart folder
Stacks & saved searched. Apparently it's not possible to make a 'saved search' (smart folder) and add that to the dock as a stack, that's a missed opportunity, that would make stacks so much more useful.

[KingofAwesome]

My only problems so far are with the stacks/grid implementation. First of all, the icon in the dock is terrible - it's a few icons pasted over each other, going in the order of the files in that folder. Make it the icon of that folder, or, better yet, let you choose that icon. I don't want my Applications stack to look like the Address Book icon.

The second problem is with the performance of grids. My Applications folder is in the dock, and while it opens quick, it looks like the graphics are stuttering. This isn't very Apple-like. Why not use a Genie effect for the grid? I like that just about every animation on a Mac looks smooth, but the grid expanding and collapsing is choppy.

But these could both be fixed in a small point release. I just hope it happens.

[Macnoviz]

My only problems so far are with the stacks/grid implementation. First of all, the icon in the dock is terrible - it's a few icons pasted over each other, going in the order of the files in that folder. Make it the icon of that folder, or, better yet, let you choose that icon. I don't want my Applications stack to look like the Address Book icon.

The second problem is with the performance of grids. My Applications folder is in the dock, and while it opens quick, it looks like the graphics are stuttering. This isn't very Apple-like. Why not use a Genie effect for the grid? I like that just about every animation on a Mac looks smooth, but the grid expanding and collapsing is choppy.

But these could both be fixed in a small point release. I just hope it happens.

Why not use the skimming technique from iPhoto/iMovie?

You can hover over a stack to see all icons, and click the one you need, or right click to reveal the stack. You can also select which icon to use as front.

[offwidafairies]

STILL WAITING FOR LEOPARD - computer arrived one week ago. NOT HAPPY APPLE :mad:

[Cassie]

I voted "disappointed" because of all this stuff Apple shoves down our throats. Stacks, Smart folders, etc. And needing a terminal command to turn off the 3-D dock? I mean it's not hard to do, but it also doesn't make sense not to include a system pref to turn it off.

I was thinking of upgrading to Leopard for Christmas, but now I'm seriously considering spending my $130 elsewhere on something I actually like.

[nerak254]

I've upgraded everything on my computer so that I can use Leopard, and now I've decided to wait a bit. I use Missing Sync and there are problems with it and no one's printers seem to work.:eek: So, it will sit in the box for a while longer.

[flyinmac]

2 Things that are 'missing'

Smart folders are gone. You can make a 'saved search' but no more rightclick -> new smart folder
Stacks & saved searched. Apparently it's not possible to make a 'saved search' (smart folder) and add that to the dock as a stack, that's a missed opportunity, that would make stacks so much more useful.


It's under "File" --> "New Smart Folder".

Seems to work pretty much as intended. Works like they do in iTunes anyway.

The dock / stack feature would be nice though.

[sweetie81]

time machine is nice :)

unfortunately it safes only every 30 mins :(

[snickelfritz]

I think Leopard is the best Mac operating system I've used.
(which goes back to MacOS 7.52)
My only quibble so far is the inability to use Smart Folders (saved searches) as Stacks in the Dock.

[PCMacUser]

I installed Leopard and instantly regretted it. It feels like it is not finished.

Dare I say it, but Leopard seems like Apple's 'Vista'. Plenty of eye candy, but reduced usability and few added benefits. Time Machine is a great concept, but the need to buy a dedicated external hard drive for backups is completely impractical for me, and therefore I haven't been able to use it.

Also, my iBook has taken a considerable performance hit, and I'll probably have to reformat it and reinstall Tiger when I get a free evening.

[flyinmac]

I installed Leopard and instantly regretted it. It feels like it is not finished.

Dare I say it, but Leopard seems like Apple's 'Vista'. Plenty of eye candy, but reduced usability and few added benefits. Time Machine is a great concept, but the need to buy a dedicated external hard drive for backups is completely impractical for me, and therefore I haven't been able to use it.

Also, my iBook has taken a considerable performance hit, and I'll probably have to reformat it and reinstall Tiger when I get a free evening.

I'll agree that it is lacking in some areas.

There are many things I've wanted Apple to add to OS X for many revisions now. One of my primary complaints about OS X, is that it is very plain / drab / depressing looking. I'd like a little more color or vibrance in the interface.

For example, the brushed metal was so gloomy looking, and so dark, that it tends to make you feel gloomy just looking at it.

The new look in Leopard is a little better. But, it's still very dark and lacks vibrance. I would love a little brighter or happier feel. And, I've suggested it to Apple with no improvement yet.

As for Time Machine requiring an external drive, that is the only implementation that I would ever support.

Consider that if you were having the backups on your internal drive, that anything you deleted would continue to occupy space on that same drive. So, why would you ever delete anything.

If Time Machine kept it's backups on my internal drive, then I would refuse to use it. If everything I deleted were essentially just moved to another folder on the same drive, then I would never regain the space from deleting old files. So, it would be pointless to ever delete anything.

[johnnyjibbs]

Also, my iBook has taken a considerable performance hit, and I'll probably have to reformat it and reinstall Tiger when I get a free evening.
Ditto on my 12" PB. I don't understand why Leopard takes up so much more resource to do the same things as Tiger. The cynic in me would say that it's a cheap ploy to get people to upgrade to Intel Macs (that would fit in with the transparent menu bar not working on G4s and G5s anyway).

Still, I probably won't do anything as drastic as install Tiger again full stop, although I'm thinking of installing a version of Tiger on my external HD so I can plug that in whenever I want to remember what speed felt like. Or whenever I want to play about with Photoshop Elements (version 2.0), which no longer runs. :rolleyes:

[stcanard]

I'm very neutral on it.

Time Machine -- its great to have a fire-and-forget backup system. I have pushed it out to my family for this reason, and this one alone.

Spotlight -- seems faster, that's useful. I'll see if it slows down over time.

Quicklook -- its nice. Will probably be handy, but for most of the stuff I am looking for a spotlight search will get me there faster.

Coverflow -- nice for showing off, can't see where I would possibly use it in real life.

Spaces -- seems like a nice implementation,but I've never liked virtual desktops. Hiding, Expose, and Command-tab switching have always worked well enough for me (and on my Ubuntu desktop at work, if I ever stick something in another desktop I just forget it's open).

Screen Sharing -- nice idea using VNC and making it simple, next time include the ability for an 8 bit depth, m'kay? I've had to install VineServer running on 5901 just so I can use it across the internet.

Stacks -- I am not a fan of removing useful functionality for eye candy that reduces the usability. Plus what's the idea of not being able to use quicklook with it? The one place where quicklook probably would be handy...

Dock -- Its on the right, pinned to the bottom so I don't get to see the 3D look to decide what i think, and with the flat look I prefer the Tiger style.

So really the only thing that stands our for me is Time Machine, and its just a slicker implementation of something I was already doing (rsync backups using hardlinks), but my script was able to do it to a remote server.

I know the under the hood stuff is nice, I will look forward to some of the app upgrades and see if they take advantage of it. That may start to change my opinion down the road.

Things I would like to see --

Time Machine backups to a remote system (wouldn't we all)

The ability to map a space to an external monitor, so if I have one the windows show there, then if I unplug my laptop they seamlessly move to a virtual screen *why* has nobody done this yet? I curse this every time I take my laptop to a meeting room.

More configurability on the VNC server -- 8bpp is a must, Tight style jpeg encoding would be nice.

A return of the hierarchical menus on the dock (make it an option for $deity's sake!)

[snickelfritz]

It's interesting that most of the new Macs are shipping with 1GB of RAM, which seems a bit inadequate, based on my experience with this system.

Choppiness in Stacks, for example, seems to be directly associated with low system RAM.
ie: If I have Photoshop running, available system RAM drops to about 30MB and Stacks are choppy. If I quit Photoshop, Stacks open very smoothly.
I think some of the complaints about performance in Leopard can be traced to insufficient RAM.

[sjk]

A return of the hierarchical menus on the dock (make it an option for $deity's sake!)
I don't have an urgent need for hierarchical menus in the Dock since I can get similar functionality from a Finder contextual menu using FolderGlance (http://www.scsc.no/products/folderglance/). A right-click anywhere on the Desktop background to access folder hierarchies is arguably more convenient than being limited to and cluttering the Dock for that access.

[PCMacUser]

As for Time Machine requiring an external drive, that is the only implementation that I would ever support.

Consider that if you were having the backups on your internal drive, that anything you deleted would continue to occupy space on that same drive. So, why would you ever delete anything.

Sorry, what I was trying to get at was the fact that Time Machine needs a dedicated external HDD. ie, you can't use that same external drive for anything else. I'd prefer it if it would a) operate on different file systems, eg, FAT32 for PC compatibility, and b) co-exist with other types of data on the same device.

[PCMacUser]

Or whenever I want to play about with Photoshop Elements (version 2.0), which no longer runs. :rolleyes:

It doesn't? Oh crap, didn't realise that. I still use PSE 2.0 as well... but mostly on my PC these days.

[flyinmac]

Sorry, what I was trying to get at was the fact that Time Machine needs a dedicated external HDD. ie, you can't use that same external drive for anything else. I'd prefer it if it would a) operate on different file systems, eg, FAT32 for PC compatibility, and b) co-exist with other types of data on the same device.

Technically, it only requires a dedicated partition.

It will use the entire partition that you provide for it's own use. And, that is why it cannot coexist with other uses.

But, you can create multiple partitions on an external drive, and use one partition for Time Machine, and the other partitions for data you wish to share or store for other purposes.

You can create separate partitions using Disk Utility on the Utilities folder in OS X. I would set a partition aside for Time Machine, and then use the rest of the drive for whatever else you like.

The intention is probably to keep you from accidentally getting your files mixed-up with Time Machine's files.

[snickelfritz]

Sorry, what I was trying to get at was the fact that Time Machine needs a dedicated external HDD. ie, you can't use that same external drive for anything else. I'd prefer it if it would a) operate on different file systems, eg, FAT32 for PC compatibility, and b) co-exist with other types of data on the same device.

I have other data on my Time machine drive.
Time Machine just installs a folder in which to backup files.

[offwidafairies]

i HATE the open application 'dot thing'. it is too hard to tell what is open. and i dont like the applications folder either. the dock is pretty. safari does not seem snappier. but it does support google chat :) the transparent dock doesnt bother me one way or the other so far. im a little sick of the desktop background as ive had it on my pc for the last couple of months ;)

i have yet to try much yet - still havent installed any of my applications. i am looking forward to checking out iWork 08 as i am a MS Office user and my sister said iWork is just integrated perfectly with everything else.... so i'll give it a go. and i think i will use mail again. i used to use it but got annoyed when i was on a different computer wanting to check mail.

time machine is still backing up. it's been a while and only has leopard so far - i have no docs or anything else yet!!

[andy721]

Gameplay is now a lot smoother in Leopard. As so as many other things ran smoothly.
:o
It's a good investment, unlike Vista you pay out the ass for the Ultimate version unlike the $109-$120 for Leopard. Also Vista has too many security issues.

[joegomolski]

I am disgruntled. My Mac Pro frequently freezes, and I have to do a hard reset.

The above does not affect my MacBook Pro.

However I have system freezes on my Power Mac G5.

And, I'm having .mac sync problems on my Power Mac G5.

So I'm waiting. Will I ever learn, that joining Apple's wide spread beta test group, after that is the release of the final operating system. Is going to mess with my head.

[archi penko]

first impressions? literally?

will it run on my TiPB 1GHz, please God say it will...

[sunfast]

I put "wow". A bit lame of me but I'm really liking Leopard and, touch wood, have had no issues

[Father Jack]

With a few small reservations, I love it ..... :cool:

[WhiteShadow]

leopard is great, very minor 'bugs' but that is to be expected in the original release. They just seeded updates to developers so in no time it will be just as reliable as Mac OSX is known.

All this hype over one trojan horse is a bunch of crap. The thought that leopard is parallel to windows 98 is just the windows users being jealous.

[Nym]

I must say, I bought Leopard and upgraded from Tiger 2 days ago and I had only one issue, my Razer Pro 1.6 Mouse's drivers are not Leopard compatible (although a new driver is in the works).

Time Machine works great, I have a 320Gb IoMega USB external HD and, after a complete format, started to use as Time Machine Backup Drive. It's fast (even on USB) and does what you expect, for example, I deleted a lot of stuff from my Movies folder after the Leopard upgrade to save 30Gb of disk space and now they reside in the Time Machine Backup, if I ever need them again I just click restore.

Spaces is nice, although it's not really my kind of productivity boost, when I'm working I usually have Flash or Photoshop open and iTunes, so Spaces becomes a little unnecessary.

I have no beef with the 3D dock in my 24" screen, I can perfectly see the blue lights under the icons and I have no problem with the screen space it takes.

Stacks are nice, too bad you can't specify that the icon representing the stack is static, I tried to create a stack out of my Home folder (it comes in handy to access your main folders from the dock) and the default icon shows the Applications folder icon, which can be confusing because I already have a real Applications stack there, I would just click accidentally in the Home stack to access the Applications one.

I like the real icons preview, nice touch.
The translucent menu bar does not annoy me, I can clearly see what the menu items are, no problem here.
Spotlight is working great too, but.. what's with the "can't copy calculator results" deal? If it's a big number, I hope you have nice memory!

Anyway, I'm tired of typing. Suffice to say, I'm pretty happy with Leopard and (apart from the mouse issue) I'm still waiting to find the first application that doesn't work in 10.5 :)

BTW - Upgrade from Tiger went without a hitch! Nice and Fluffy! :D

[Yateball]

how come, i cant show someone my cam in ichat4. seems it only works, when the chatpartner also has a cam installed?

gahhhhhh, the comma splices are overwhelming... sorry but it just had to be said.

Anyway I voted great only because I don't like the option "wow"

[marcg007]

back to my mac functionality? I'm not talking about screen sharing over iChat, I'm talking about the ability to control remotely any computer that has a connection to .mac and is running Leopard. I can do it on my home network without any problem at all but so far have had no luck going from a remote location. I spent over an hour with a Mac Genius and another almost 2 on the phone with apple care (most of that on hold) trying to figure out if I had set something up incorrectly. Even the guy at Apple care had no idea what I was talking about. He claimed he had not had a chance to work with it yet. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Marc

[PCMacUser]

Technically, it only requires a dedicated partition.

It will use the entire partition that you provide for it's own use. And, that is why it cannot coexist with other uses.

But, you can create multiple partitions on an external drive, and use one partition for Time Machine, and the other partitions for data you wish to share or store for other purposes.

You can create separate partitions using Disk Utility on the Utilities folder in OS X. I would set a partition aside for Time Machine, and then use the rest of the drive for whatever else you like.

The intention is probably to keep you from accidentally getting your files mixed-up with Time Machine's files.
I tried this today. Moved all of my data from my external FAT32 drive onto my PC's hard drive so that I could partition and format it on my Mac. This all went smoothly. Went into Disk Utility and configured it to have two partitions - one Journalled HFS+ for Time Machine, and the second one set to 'Free Space' so I could configure it for other uses. But unfortunately I discovered that the second partition MUST be HFS+ too. You can't format it as FAT32 or NTFS... so it's basically not possible to set it up the way I want and I'll have to buy another drive if I want to use Time Machine. I need a FAT32 partition so that I can access data from both my PC and Mac...

But thanks for the suggestion. (Now to copy 300Gb back onto my drive...!)

[Macintosh001]

Great!!I solved my problems with filevault installing it!!Everything in it is awesome....but what I like more is all this new aspect of the desktop,the preview of the files and well everything that has to do with this new "image" of the computer.Wiindows is lightyears apart from this.

[clevin]

I didn't have it, my first impression from screenshot

OMG, its looks more and more like Linux!

my 2nd thought

omg, this UI is DARK.

[OdduWon]

Stacks are stupid, Basicalls Just a Pretty folder that is docked. The only diff is that when you open a docked folder you open a finder window, and here you just get a shinny "finder window".

Haven't tried the new text/speech yet. As i remember it worked very well not like the Steven Hawking voice from the simple text past. Now if Leopard came with a way to create audio files from text, for studying on my ipod, that would be nice.

[wrldwzrd89]

Stacks are stupid, Basicalls Just a Pretty folder that is docked. The only diff is that when you open a docked folder you open a finder window, and here you just get a shinny "finder window".

Haven't tried the new text/speech yet. As i remember it worked very well not like the Steven Hawking voice from the simple text past. Now if Leopard came with a way to create audio files from text, for studying on my ipod, that would be nice.
It CAN do this, in fact so could Tiger... but you have to do it from the command line (or use a 3rd party application, but I know of none that do this). Basically, you use the say command, like this:
say -o ~/SomeFile.aiff -f ~/Documents/Some/Path/SomeFile.txt
Note that this only works with plain text files.

[OdduWon]

It CAN do this, in fact so could Tiger... but you have to do it from the command line (or use a 3rd party application, but I know of none that do this). Basically, you use the say command, like this:
say -o ~/SomeFile.aiff -f ~/Documents/Some/Path/SomeFile.txt
Note that this only works with plain text files.

Does this simply read the text, or save it as an iTunes importable audio file? I have seen programs that will do it, but the cost $.

[wrldwzrd89]

Does this simply read the text, or save it as an iTunes importable audio file? I have seen programs that will do it, but the cost $.
It creates an iTunes-importable AIFF file.

[OdduWon]

It creates an iTunes-importable AIFF file.

Sweet, how does on find this out? Secrets :confused:

[flyinmac]

I tried this today. Moved all of my data from my external FAT32 drive onto my PC's hard drive so that I could partition and format it on my Mac. This all went smoothly. Went into Disk Utility and configured it to have two partitions - one Journalled HFS+ for Time Machine, and the second one set to 'Free Space' so I could configure it for other uses. But unfortunately I discovered that the second partition MUST be HFS+ too. You can't format it as FAT32 or NTFS... so it's basically not possible to set it up the way I want and I'll have to buy another drive if I want to use Time Machine. I need a FAT32 partition so that I can access data from both my PC and Mac...

But thanks for the suggestion. (Now to copy 300Gb back onto my drive...!)


Not sure why it didn't work for you.

I use disk utility all the time to set different partition types on the same drives.

My external has a HFS+ and two FAT32 partitions on it.

My internal drive has one HFS+ and one NTFS partition on it.

I've done this successfully with the Apple Partition Map scheme, and the GUID partition scheme.

I've also done this with my USB flash drives. So, it works for me.

I'm not sure where your trouble came in.

[MacGary]

Im disappointed, since upgrading my imac 2.8 some how feels slower, i have had daily crashes and i couldnt turn it off for a week without holding down the power button, dashboard crashes all the time. Basically, it is like windows at the minute. Also frontrow (previously great) now looks like a rip off of media centre, and, again, is slow. One last gripe, the remote that worked great with my elgato eyeTV software now doesnt. For me it wasnt an upgrade at all. Still at least it was the £5 upgrade

[zwida]

Im disappointed, since upgrading my imac 2.8 some how feels slower, i have had daily crashes and i couldnt turn it off for a week without holding down the power button, dashboard crashes all the time. Basically, it is like windows at the minute. Also frontrow (previously great) now looks like a rip off of media centre, and, again, is slow. One last gripe, the remote that worked great with my elgato eyeTV software now doesnt. For me it wasnt an upgrade at all. Still at least it was the £5 upgrade

This may be obvious, and I hope you've already done this, but you should do a clean reinstall. There's no good reason for machine to act like this.

[!¡ V ¡!]

I'd love to be able to tell you all my first impressions but TNT seem to have lost my package !!! :mad:

Sorry to hear that, I know the feeling to wait for something new and exciting. I did not receive my copy until a few days ago. Installed it and I love it, and voted great.

The 3D shelf does not bother me at all, I see all the little details as personality of 10.5.

I cannot wait for Res-Inde to be implemented when ready. Its an exciting time. :)

[!¡ V ¡!]

I voted "disappointed" because of all this stuff Apple shoves down our throats. Stacks, Smart folders, etc. And needing a terminal command to turn off the 3-D dock? I mean it's not hard to do, but it also doesn't make sense not to include a system pref to turn it off.

I was thinking of upgrading to Leopard for Christmas, but now I'm seriously considering spending my $130 elsewhere on something I actually like.

Use a program called "TinkerTool" and the 3D Dock will be flat as represented when on the right or left of the screen.

At present I am not sick of the 3D Dock, maybe in the future I might change it.

TinkerTool has some other options that you might want to investigate. :)

[PCMacUser]

Not sure why it didn't work for you.

I use disk utility all the time to set different partition types on the same drives.

My external has a HFS+ and two FAT32 partitions on it.

My internal drive has one HFS+ and one NTFS partition on it.

I've done this successfully with the Apple Partition Map scheme, and the GUID partition scheme.

I've also done this with my USB flash drives. So, it works for me.

I'm not sure where your trouble came in.
Well that's definitely interesting. Maybe it's possible, but not as simple as I hoped. Any chance of some step by step instructions? :o Forgive me, I'm used to setting up partitions in Windows, which is very easy.

[flyinmac]

Well that's definitely interesting. Maybe it's possible, but not as simple as I hoped. Any chance of some step by step instructions? :o Forgive me, I'm used to setting up partitions in Windows, which is very easy.

It's pretty simple. Open disk utility in the Applications --> Utilities folder.

Select your drive (the line that shows the model number and capacity).

Now, click on Partition in the button bar on the right side.

Under Volume scheme, choose how many partitions you want. For these purposes, I'll choose 2.

Now, click on the "Options" button at the bottom.

Then, in the window that appears, choose one of the following:

GUID Partition Table

Apple Partition Map

Master Boot Record


Choose GUID if you'll be booting from this drive on an Intel system

Choose Apple Partition Map if you'll be booting from this drive on a PowerPC system.

And, choose Master Boot Record if you will possibly be connecting this drive to a real PC and boot from it (if it had DOS or Windows installed on this drive) or if want to modify it's partitions from Windows / DOS.

I'll choose GUID, although the process is going to be the same in the next steps regardless of what you choose (even if you choose Master Boot Record).

With your selected partition map chosen, click OK.

Now, select your first partition. Click on it's lower edges and drag to set your preferred size (or just enter the size you want in the box to the right).

From the drop down menu by "Format" Choose whether you want to format it for MS-DOS or as a HFS+ drive. Also, go ahead and type a name in the "Name" field if you care to name it.

I'll choose HFS+ (Mac OS Journaled).

Now, select the second partition by clicking on it.

Then, again choose your format type. I'll Choose MS-DOS (FAT).

Click the Apply button.

You now have once partition that is HFS+ and one that is FAT32 / MS-DOS.

OS X cannot create / write to a NTFS partition. So, if you want NTFS, you'll need to boot from DOS / Windows now, and then reformat your FAT32 drive as an NTFS drive.

Likewise, if you are using a different operating system (other than Windows / DOS or OS X), then still format that partition for FAT32 and then reformat that partition in the other operating system to whatever you like. Almost all operating systems can read FAT32 drives. So, that should work better than using the Free Space option.

The problem with Free Space, is that other operating systems cannot work with the Mac OS partition schemes. So, they'll be unable to add or remove partitions. So, you'll want to do all your partitioning from OS X, and then set any extra partitions you want to be FAT32. Then reformat those partitions later in your OS of choice.

Note, that the above methods will work for whatever number of partitions you want. I chose 2 for simplicity.


Now, one little bug.

Sometimes, if you choose the Master Boot Record partition scheme, and format your first partition as HFS+ and your second one as FAT32, Windows XP will not see your drive as being formatted for Windows. It will prompt you to format it upon seeing the drive.

To avoid that, if you use Master Boot Record, set your first partition as MS-DOS / FAT, and then your second partition as your HFS+ drive.

Anyway, this should get you started. That's how I do it.

I hope this helps.

[PCMacUser]

Anyway, this should get you started. That's how I do it.

I hope this helps.

Thanks, you're a legend!

I'm pretty sure this is what I tried the other day, without success, but I think I'll do a backup of my external drive and try it again.

[flyinmac]

Thanks, you're a legend!

I'm pretty sure this is what I tried the other day, without success, but I think I'll do a backup of my external drive and try it again.

Glad to help.

I hope that does it for you.

Just for confirmation purposes, I wanted to let you know that I actually did what I was describing on a drive I wanted reformatted anyway (as I was typing it). And, the resulting drive has a HFS+ and FAT32 partition on it.

And, when I was done, Time Machine jumped-up and asked me if I wanted to use the HFS+ partition for my backups (I said no because I don't want it running in the background all the time - I do occasional full backups).

[AppleNinja]

FRICKIN AWSOME!!!! - 6 hours at apple store and i never got bored xD

[KurtangleTN]

I think it's great thus far, I love the UI.

At first I thought the new menubar was kind of gimmicky, "Heres some eye candy!" type of deal, but really when you flip through wallpapers you feel the difference. The UI seems to adapt to the wallpaper you have, be it the space or any other. It is really awesome and amazing. Front row is really awesome, I didn't try it much with Tiger.. but this just seems like an awesome improvement.

The startup time is a bit longer then Tiger from my short time with Tiger, but that's alright, as everything else seems to run faster. I'm pretty disappointed they didn't include that alpha mouth feature (Balmer at WWDC) in photobooth though. My second complaint would be networking, I can't seem to see any of my Windows machines on the network. I've seen them once or twice in the sidebar shared, but yet I can connect manually (pain though), the final complaint is that it seems more programs then I expected aren't working (or working as well) with Leopard.

But for the most part all 3 are minor, Solid OS.

[Macnoviz]

The startup time is a bit longer then Tiger from my short time with Tiger, but that's alright, as everything else seems to run faster. I'm pretty disappointed they didn't include that alpha mouth feature (Balmer at WWDC) in photobooth though. My second complaint would be networking, I can't seem to see any of my Windows machines on the network. I've seen them once or twice in the sidebar shared, but yet I can connect manually (pain though), the final complaint is that it seems more programs then I expected aren't working (or working as well) with Leopard.

But for the most part all 3 are minor, Solid OS.

We recreated the alpha mouth effect on quartzfx.com, you can choose for George W. Bush or pope Benedict XVI

quartzfx.com (http://www.quartzfx.com)

[savanahrose]

I haven't read all of the replies on here yet but I do have to say something.
I love leopard, I think it is great, but they seemed to have done away with my favorite font. The fonts seems to have been changed to more like windows. Yuck, they were so bland and boring. Is there anyway to get more fonts? My husband and I have noticed that the resolution on my imac seems to be better with leopard. Has anyone else noticed? It seems to be more clearer.

[eric_n_dfw]

I had waited for 10.5.1 to go public as I was dubious that they could have fixed all of the bugs I was seeing in the last ADC seed - and I was right.

Been on it for a day now (I was using it under ADC for a couple of months before), and I'm pretty happy. They fixed the 802.1x security issues I was having so I can use it wirelessly on my company's WAP's now which was the main reason I had jumped back to 10.4 in September.

Safari is still buggy for me - whenever I go to an https page with my corporate proxy's enabled, it asks for my proxy authentication and then crashes when it attempts to show the page every time.

[eric_n_dfw]

another problem:
It appears that Apple still cannot get it's support of authenticating proxies working! I swear, the Mozilla/Netscape folks have never had a problem with this, but Safari/OS X's handling of proxies just plain sucks!

Dashboard prompts for proxy authentication every time I bring it up - and not just once for the whole dashboard - every widget that needs access prompts - sometimes multiple times! :mad::mad::mad:

[mlcolorado]

Unbelievable.

Although, its not new. Thats what you get with any Apple product.

[eric_n_dfw]

Unbelievable.

Although, its not new. Thats what you get with any Apple product.

Well, that's a pretty broad stroke. As annoying as the issues I am seeing are, I do think they put out more good stuff than bad.

[pubwvj]

Safari is still crashing on many web sites even in its third incarnation.
I get crashes going from Excite.com to MSNBC news as well as on Blogger.com. These are caused by JavaScript problems.

I don't like that Leopard is hogging more hard drive space. I need my drive for my stuff. There's no reasonable excuse for how much space Apple is taking up. They need their installers to seriously par the system down at the user's request in optional installs and be very upfront about it.

-Walter
Sugar Mountain Farm
in the mountains of Vermont
http://SugarMtnFarm.com/blog/
http://HollyGraphicArt.com/
http://NoNAIS.org

[Jetson]

I just received my Iomega UltraMax 500GB hard drive and installed it to use with Time Machine.

Set up was simple and Time Machine is running.

Time Machine is SLOW as molasses!

I can't believe how ridiculously slooooow this software is. After 30 minutes of running it's only backed up 400MB of 228GBs. At this rate it will take 228+ hours to back up a single hard drive.

Y O U---H A V E---G O T---T O---B E---K I D D I N G---M E---! ! !

Retrospect Express is much speedier than this.

Come on Apple, you can do better than this. Who ever told you that this was acceptable performance???

:eek:

[wrldwzrd89]

I just received my Iomega UltraMax 500GB hard drive and installed it to use with Time Machine.

Set up was simple and Time Machine is running.

Time Machine is SLOW as molasses!

I can't believe how ridiculously slooooow this software is. After 30 minutes of running it's only backed up 400MB of 228GBs. At this rate it will take 228+ hours to back up a single hard drive.

Y O U---H A V E---G O T---T O---B E---K I D D I N G---M E---! ! !

Retrospect Express is much speedier than this.

Come on Apple, you can do better than this. Who ever told you that this was acceptable performance???

:eek:
Are you using a USB hard drive, by any chance? I'm using a drive with a FireWire 800 interface, and don't get speeds anywhere near that slow.:confused:

[Jetson]

Are you using a USB hard drive, by any chance? I'm using a drive with a FireWire 800 interface, and don't get speeds anywhere near that slow.:confused:
Thanks for the comment.

I'm using a the Firewire 400 connection, so that's not the problem.

I dug around and around and finally found an article in the Apple Support pages.

Someone there said they discovered that when Norton Utilities are running (in the background) that Time Machine was horribly slow. Then when Norton was turned off, voila! Time Machine was set free.

I tried it and now Time Machine is going much faster. It's still no speed champ by any means, but maybe it will backup my drive in one day instead of ten days (it completed after letting it run all night).

This is still a problem though because you shouldn't have to turn off virus protection just to do a backup. For instance, Retrospect Express isn't affected in the least by Norton.


http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5840473

:o

[flyinmac]

This is still a problem though because you shouldn't have to turn off virus protection just to do a backup. For instance, Retrospect Express isn't affected in the least by Norton.


http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5840473

:o

Actually, that makes sense. The more background tasks you have running, the more your performance is going to be affected for any given task.

This is true with all computers. A PC is noticeably faster with no security or antivirus software running. Unfortunately, they are pretty much required in Windows.

In OS X, you should never assume you are 100% secure. But, you can generally get away without Anti-Virus software running in the background. I know it made a noticeable difference even with my tasks in 10.3.x when I quit using Norton software in the background.

[samh004]

I can't believe this is still the poll (on the front page of MR). I don't think I ever said what I voted, though I've voted numerous times now. I went for "good", it wasn't as awesome as I had hoped, but it did deliver in a few areas for sure.

[samuraikiss]

I said "wow" because it's amazing. I've had some install problems and fan issues, but I'm in the minority.

[Muzzway]

"Wow", no issues at all.

Time for a new poll...

Edit: Seriously, when is that new poll coming? Brand new poll every weekday, we haven't had a new poll for over 40 days!

[Techguy172]

First impressions were "Wow" Great system well done

[stoutboy1]

Its time for a new poll. Maybe you could poll first impressions of 10.5.1:D I like the polls we should get them a little more often. Good work on the site...

[deannnnn]

MacPolls.com
"Brand new poll every weekday..."

wtf. we are lucky if there is a new poll every 2 months...

[MacDaddy.G5]

I was blown away!

But now I'm having minor issues with performance with some of my apps. I did the basic upgrade. But I think I'd rather save my data, do a fresh install and re-install my fav third party apps.

I'll keep y'all posted!

[ttopp]

its got a few bugs that are really annoying

freezing keyboard, a few kernel panics since upgrading, apps becoming unresponsive (mail and safari espesh), mail takes forever to quit now, quick look sometimes works in cover flow mode but takes an age for the little arrow button to appear..

it is good that the gui can be altered easier now.. we can become more individual with how our os looks...

[Dagless]

Now the honeymoon period is over-

- I've turned off Time Machine. It was great and I'll use it when I have more free space on my external. It hasn't been useful for me yet, but it'll be one of those things I'd be thankful for when it found a lost file!
- Still getting wifi timeout errors on bootup.
- I find Expose manages even my messiest of window arrangements, no use for spaces.

+ it's still so fast. Spotlight hasn't slowed down like Tigers did for me.
+ breathed new life into my PowerBook! This blew me away originally, and it still does from time to time!
+ folders on the dock get my thumbs up! Especially the automatically set up Downloads folder. Very very useful.

[stcanard]

In the spirit of RaggedJimmi's post, here's the response to my fist impressions:

Time Machine -- its great to have a fire-and-forget backup system. I have pushed it out to my family for this reason, and this one alone.

Spotlight -- seems faster, that's useful. I'll see if it slows down over time.

Opinions here haven't changed. I split my external drive so Time Machine wouldn't take the whole thing (live FS resizing is nice!)

Quicklook -- its nice. Will probably be handy, but for most of the stuff I am looking for a spotlight search will get me there faster.

I use Quicklook, but not extensively. It is handy in some cases, but generally I know what I'm looking for.

Coverflow -- nice for showing off, can't see where I would possibly use it in real life.

Still true, I don't think I've actually used coverflow since I posted this.

Spaces -- seems like a nice implementation,but I've never liked virtual desktops. Hiding, Expose, and Command-tab switching have always worked well enough for me (and on my Ubuntu desktop at work, if I ever stick something in another desktop I just forget it's open).

Spaces has been the one revelation to me -- I am using it far more than I expected! Apple has come up with the first virtual desktop system I have found useful.

I'm especially fond of sticking Aperture and iMovie in their own spaces, but even in my day to day workflow I use it.

Screen Sharing -- nice idea using VNC and making it simple, next time include the ability for an 8 bit depth, m'kay? I've had to install VineServer running on 5901 just so I can use it across the internet.

Stacks -- I am not a fan of removing useful functionality for eye candy that reduces the usability. Plus what's the idea of not being able to use quicklook with it? The one place where quicklook probably would be handy...

No change here -- screen sharing great idea, poor implementation on server options :( Stacks the worst regression of functionality I think I have ever seen.

Dock -- Its on the right, pinned to the bottom so I don't get to see the 3D look to decide what i think, and with the flat look I prefer the Tiger style.

I've got used to the new look of the dock, but again, none of the eye candy.

So I've improved my impression of spaces, and really hope for Time Machine to get wireless syncing!

[ClassicMac247]

Best OS yet obviously!

[Jetson]

I'd like to see encryption on my backup drive.

Someone could just walk up and carry away my backup hard drive. At least with encryption they'd have some problems stealing my data.

[adwolfe12]

i think it is amazing...way better than tiger

[esther25]

My first impressions of Macc Ox X Leopard is good..

[RichardI]

First impression? Disappointing. I'm sure that will change, but you are asking for first impressions. I just installed it last night and Time Machine simply won't work. It just gives me an error message every time I try to run it - and, yes, I do have an external hard drive (Firewire800) connected.

Rich :cool:

[andrewface]

at first i wasnt sure...but then i fired up time machine and its worth the money alone

[Steven Ballmer]

Mary Jo, Marry Me! (Leopard driving users to Vista!)
It would be impossible for me to write this any better so I'll just quote her entire article from that wonderful bastion of Windows defense over at ZDnet.com."Apple advocates are doing the unthinkable: They’re complaining publicly about a new Apple product release.
Even typically staunch Mac backers are admitting that Apple’s new Leopard operating system is not perfect. It might even be as problem-prone (if not more so) as Windows Vista. Could Leopard go so far as to drive some switchers into Vista’s arms? Sounds crazy, but who knows….

If you’re Microsoft — especially a member of the Vista team — there’s no way you can help but gloat. Very few Softies or their loyal followers are gloating publicly. But there’s no way they aren’t enjoying this turning of the tables.

I bet some Softies are wishing Microsoft would take the low road and capitalize on Apple’s buggy Leopard release. Not just via an occasional pot shot in a blog post, but in a holiday ad campaign or Superbowl commercial.

There are so many sloagans Microsoft could use to lash out publicly at Leopard (but won’t, for fear of being criticized as the Goliath pounding David). But over a few pints of Manny’s in Redmond, you can bet there have been some secret celebrations over the fact that Apple is just as mortal as Microsoft. Perhaps a fantasy ad slogan has been conjured up, too."

This is the same woman who wrote, "Leopard Looks Like ... Vista!", "Zune The iPod Killer", "Fake Steve Ballmer Rules!", ....
... Any time, any where Mary Jo, I'll marry you!
ps - She just bumped George Ou out of my "favorite journalist" spot!

[UpQuark]

I love it, but 10.5 bugs drove me back to 10.4.11. I currently in the process of re-testing 10.5.1.

Not that their aren't any, just curious what you have been experiencing.

[UpQuark]

In the spirit of RaggedJimmi's post, here's the response to my fist impressions:



Opinions here haven't changed. I split my external drive so Time Machine wouldn't take the whole thing (live FS resizing is nice!)



I use Quicklook, but not extensively. It is handy in some cases, but generally I know what I'm looking for.



Still true, I don't think I've actually used coverflow since I posted this.



Spaces has been the one revelation to me -- I am using it far more than I expected! Apple has come up with the first virtual desktop system I have found useful.

I'm especially fond of sticking Aperture and iMovie in their own spaces, but even in my day to day workflow I use it.



No change here -- screen sharing great idea, poor implementation on server options :( Stacks the worst regression of functionality I think I have ever seen.



I've got used to the new look of the dock, but again, none of the eye candy.

So I've improved my impression of spaces, and really hope for Time Machine to get wireless syncing!

I agree - stacks is a huge waste of time and I am incredibly dumbfounded at it's implementation.

Spaces is awesome. I use it every day and have enabled it on my Mom's macbook too.

I found a terminal hack to allow finer control over screen sharing. You can set color depth etc. CHeck MacOSHints for the copy/paste script. I think that for Mac to Mac screen sharing, it is fantastic. For mac to PC screen sharing (VNCServer running on the PC) I use JollyFastVNC or COVNC.

With a couple more tiny apps, I have changed the dock to be a bit more appealing and user friendly. That tiny blue dot sucked. Now I have a black triangle and the dock background color is different - just easier to see.

THe network access is faster for me. Boot times are faster and seems more stable. But that is me. My wife's laptop is running well as is my Mom's.

Reducing the firewall functionality is also a sour point with me. I liked being able to control the ports.... huge bummer now.

However, If I recall correctly, I had issues with Tiger until 10.4.3 or so....

So, I take the good with the bad and just know it will improve greatly with time....

[Chimpy]

Not that their aren't any, just curious what you have been experiencing.

Finder kept acting erractically - my windows share would appear and disappear. I was also hit with the keyboard input bug as well on my Macbook. There were other odds and ends as well, but it was those two that drove me nuts :).

[UpQuark]

Finder kept acting erractically - my windows share would appear and disappear. I was also hit with the keyboard input bug as well on my Macbook. There were other odds and ends as well, but it was those two that drove me nuts :).

Correct me if I am wrong, but did you do an upgrade install?

[kiwikat]

i enjoy it very much.

[da2005pizimp]

at first i was iffy, but it now i think it's the best out there.

[xcapepr]

It was ok but I kept poking until I saw some things that I liked... but was also disappointed to see that still, no additional color schemes or better yet, custom color schemes are available.

The Aqua and Graphite look ok but I need to make it truly my own, or maybe its the the Vista Aero withdrawal... probably.

I also didn't like that you couldn't drag a window to another space like you can with Ubuntu and Beryl and have it do the animation and switch automatically to the other space.

[UpQuark]

It was ok but I kept poking until I saw some things that I liked... but was also disappointed to see that still, no additional color schemes or better yet, custom color schemes are available.

The Aqua and Graphite look ok but I need to make it truly my own, or maybe its the the Vista Aero withdrawal... probably.

I also didn't like that you couldn't drag a window to another space like you can with Ubuntu and Beryl and have it do the animation and switch automatically to the other space.

While I agree that the auto-change with a flip to the new space would be very cool eye candy, I think that for the average user, (lowest common denominator here) that flip/change would have been too confusing. My mom get's it.

These are the steps she follows:

Press F8 on the macbook.. drag open window from space 3 to space 1. Click on space 1 - done.

I am assuming you are using the F8 then drag drop?

I think spaces could be enhanced with user options like block rotate to the new space etc - it would be cool...

[dtklamf]

I like it cause it's apple and that makes it great.
game over

[swampfox]

At first I thought that most of the upgrades were just cosmetic, but then I was "wowed" (stupid way to advertise a OS) by Time Machine, and I thought Spaces was really cool since I am in to editing. Keep it up Apple. (and lower your prices!):D

[Tokies]

:confused: i wanted to love it.. but i cant switch....to it...

[blairwillis]

These cats are still kicking.

Finder improvements - great
Spaces - fantastic
iChat screen sharing - unbelievable

[NationunderNod]

I think the 10.5.1 (the one i have) is great. The visual improvements alone are great. Its also easier to find things. The whole thing seems to go so smoothly. Also i love the added aspect that vista seemed to copy so many aspects

[superdavid]

What's with the semi-transparent menu bar? It's not transparent at all. I heard it was toned down, but this is turned off. Anybody know how/if you can turn this feature on? Either I'm blind, or it's nowhere in the System Prefs.

1st you have to have 10.5.2 (if you don't then go to software update to get it). 2nd go to system preferences. 3rd go to desktop and screen saver. 4th there should be a checkbox that says "Translucent Menu Bar" you uncheck the box.