Why is Panther so buggy?

[scem0]

I'm kind of dissapointed. My mom gets my Dad a new computer for christmas, and I'm all excited because it has Panther.

But to my dismay, my old PC was more stable than my new iMac... It has already crashed 3 times! 2 times when it was waking from sleep. Nothing would respond, including keyboard and mouse. And it crashed another time, but I forgot why.

What about Panther makes it so buggy?

Why is it only buggy for some people? I've been reading some of the posts in here, and some people are problem free, while others are having experiences similar to mine.

Let's hope Apple releases an update which fixes the main problems.

scem0

[FuzzyBallz]

Ever heard of clean install?

[jeff.macaddict]

Yeah, man.

Wipe your hard drive, and then install and then get the latest updates, then install all your software.

[scem0]

I know I know......

I'm just saying that I didn't have to do that with my PC, or any previous mac.

scem0

[FightTheFuture]

from what i remember, people were having problems with only certain apps running on panther, or the installation of panther. whats more annoying is that this is happening on a new mac.

all computers are bought generally with tech problems. check out the support boards on dell sometime - there's a sad group.

[altair]

new imac...crashes...check your ram, might have something to do with that, especially if you installed third party ram.

Otherwise, yeah, Panther is rather buggy, in my opinion. FYI, don't turn on File Vault, then try to turn it off, but stop the 'turning off' process mid way through. It fubar'd my home folder.

[tjwett]

i was pretty happy with Panther until 10.3.2, then everything went to hell. sleeping for no reason, hangups, crashes, icons getting all messed up. hopefully the next point release will help.

[edesignuk]

*fingers crossed* other than samba not working at first (which I fixed) I havn't had any problems with it so far.

(Clean install on a DP1GHz Quicksilver)

[kettle]

Don't you think if 10.3 was that bad for everyone we would have overflowing threads of despair. Must be something done differently than most people.
hmm, my only problem is sending faxes, everything else is hunky dory, plus maybe the dialup internet connect is much less reliable.

[David Lundgren]

Check comment above: did you add third party RAM to it?

[Pilgrims Pro]

It sound to me of an isolated case, I haven't heard of or seen many problems with Panther. The only problem I have is safari crashes about twice per week.

[Thirteenva]

My first install of panther on my powerbook, I made the mistake of doing an "upgrade" install. Though i had done this type of install with both previous updates to OS X for some reason, the panther one did not go well and i had lots of issues with preferences and performance on my powerbook. I cold not install my adobe apps, i had loads of permission issues. Just awful....

I also did the upgrade install on my g5 at work, though this one has had only minor issues. Ones that may not be related to panther. Some preference problems in specific software.

I reinstalled panther on my powerbook using the archive and install and used my usual parition scheme of keeping my documents on one partition and my OS on the other (been doing this since OS 10.1) and now LOVE panther.

Seems the upgrade install from jag to panther does not go smoothly. Possibly due to the large amounts of changes made to the system. Somethings bound to corrupt something else.

[mainstreetmark]

Sounds like you got lucky with the PC and unlucky with the Mac. Why, just this AM, my dad's wireless network quit working on his factory installed XP on a Dell. Turns out XP decided to turn of DHCP and set his IP address to 192.168.0.1. And before I got tired of rebooting my factory-installed XP, it was physically locking up 3 times a day. I'd loose work. I'm not saying OSX is better in every way than XP, but I'm certainly implying it.


--
edit: i quoted the wrong post, so i just deleted the quote.

[caveman_uk]

One thing I found that turning on idisk syncing really screwed with 'Save As..' in both word and photoshop. They'd both beachball for twenty or so seconds before the dialog came up. Turn off idisk syncing and everything works peachy. So we can add that feature to Filevault in the list of flakey things...

Otherwise I hadn't noticed any more kernal panics (or lock-ups) than under Jag. In fact I haven't had a panic on either of my machines since I installed Panther.

[Maritan]

Originally posted by edesignuk
*fingers crossed* other than samba not working at first (which I fixed) I havn't had any problems with it so far.

(Clean install on a DP1GHz Quicksilver)

Hey, I seem to be having the same problem. I used to be able to connect to my backup machine (Win2000) when I had 10.3.1. I went out of the country and while I was away I upgraded to 10.3.2. Now I'm back and I'm unable to access the machine.

Can you tell me how you solved the problem? Thanks!

[titaniumducky]

I did an upgrade install and haven't had a single problem with Panther with the exception of having to use older drivers for my printer to get it to work.

[crees!]

Originally posted by kettle
my only problem is sending faxes, everything else is hunky dory, plus maybe the dialup internet connect is much less reliable.

I haven't tried with 10.3.2 but in 10.3.0 I could send a fax but couldn't receive one. Though I only tried faxing one time and didn't bother trying to figure out what the deal was.

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by scem0
... What about Panther makes it so buggy?

Why is it only buggy for some people? I've been reading some of the posts in here, and some people are problem free, while others are having experiences similar to mine.

I haven't had problems with any version of Panther - I'm running 10.3.2 now.

It would probably be more trouble than it's worth, but to really answer the question we'd probably all have to list the apps we're running (or at least the ones that launch at boot-up, plus the add-ons like MenuMeter).

I did run into one sporadic problem. I had the third-party app "SSH Agent" launching at boot-up, and my machine would lock up about once every 10 log-ins after waking up (I was logging off before putting my machine to sleep, if that's not clear). I took that app out of my startup items, and I haven't had a problem since.

[scem0]

Hmmmmm SSH agent, I'll look into that and see if that is what caused the 2 crashes after waking it up from sleep.

I bought the iMac off of eBay, and it has 768MB of RAM, and I'm betting the extra RAM is 3rd party.

I have done nothing with the computer since I got it. Here, I can list everything ive done:

Imported a ****load of CDs.
installed:
-konfabulator
-Starcraft Brood War (which crashes when about 20 minutes into a game)
-Synergy (although I deleted it immediately, because it caused me not to be able to use the 'a' key :confused: [even when I turned off the key functions], I now use the iTunes controller widget with Konfab)
-Mac OS X 10.3.2 update, but it had crashed once waking up from sleep before installing this.
-Cocoa Gestures

It had Worldbook, MS Office, Virtual PC (but no windows OS), and FC express installed when I got it.

I'm going to do a clean install and see if that fixes the crashes and the freezes in starcraft.

And I don't think I was lucky with XP. XP is very crash proof. I crashed about 4 times in the past year or more that I've used my PC. I've had to force quit a ton of applications.

I'm not arguing that XP is better than OS X, I'm just saying that I've crashed 3 times in a week with OS X and 4 times in a year with XP...

Oh and by the way, I'm trying to backup some files so I can clean install, but unfortunately when I get ~56% into a burn, it says 'error #(forgot numbers): disk cannot be used' and ejects the disk.

So, I am going to have to clear out some space on my PC hard drive and transfer the files I want to keep over my LAN to the PC and then transfer them back after the clean install.

:o Sigh... :o

scem0

[Fukui]

Before you do anything, why don't you take the extra ram out?

[Doraemon]

Originally posted by tjwett
i was pretty happy with Panther until 10.3.2, then everything went to hell. sleeping for no reason, hangups, crashes, icons getting all messed up. hopefully the next point release will help.

Same here.
10.3.2 brought major problems on my PMG4.
Mail won't launch and hangs the entire system. I have to do a hardware reset.

I'm pretty annoyed that Apple doesn't accept this as a problem. I have read hundreds of posts on Apple's discussion forums describing the same problem. Most of them - me included - also sent Apple feedback or bug reports.

I hope 10.3.3 will fix these things.

[caveman_uk]

Originally posted by scem0

installed:
-konfabulator
-Starcraft Brood War (which crashes when about 20 minutes into a game)
-Synergy (although I deleted it immediately, because it caused me not to be able to use the 'a' key :confused: [even when I turned off the key functions], I now use the iTunes controller widget with Konfab)
-Mac OS X 10.3.2 update, but it had crashed once waking up from sleep before installing this.
-Cocoa Gestures

See if it crashes as much with Konfabulator, cocoa gestures and the other extraneous stuff removed

[scem0]

I never use cocoa gestures, konfabulator or really anything but iTunes and Mozilla.

[I was just downloading them to expirement, but I won't use them till I get settled in]

scem0

[kenkooler]

Also try repairing permissions.

The results are very different according to who you ask. My Mac has crashed twice in more than two years while it has gone from 10.1.4 to 10.3.2 without any clean installs and several hacks installed.

[scem0]

Yeah, that is what confuses me so much...

Some people have no problems what-so-ever. Meanwhile I have to clean install, which may or may not fix it. :(

I had no problems from 10.1-10.2.

10.4 better fix all this.

scem0

[zellin]

I didn't have a clean install, and I don't have any problems.

[scem0]

Originally posted by zellin
I didn't have a clean install, and I don't have any problems.

That doesn't contribute to the topic of this thread in any way since I have already had a bunch of people say that they dont have problems.

I'm not saying that panther is ALWAYS buggy.

Im just asking why it is buggy for so many people.

bleh, why am I even attempting this while in the midst of mac zealots :rolleyes:.

scem0

[Matrix9180]

probably has something to do with the huge number of possible configurations people could be installing on, the quirks of one system that needs a fix that breaks 3 other things on 6 other configurations, etc... basically it boils down to, even with Macs, where there is actually a limit to the configuration, the major areas that cause problems in the PC world exist in the Mac world too (various memory issues, HD weirdness, etc). I know this doesn't "help" but the topic was a question, not a call for help ;)

[scem0]

Bah, I didnt mean to make this post. I was trying to hit the edit button and clicked quote :(.

Well, to neoelec (in the post below) - He said he sold it because he was buying a G5, he was very honest throughout the transaction.

Plus, I dont have that many problems. Only 3 crashes, two of which were from when it was waking up from sleep, which it doesn't do anymore.

scem0

[neoelectronaut]

Hmm. Maybe the reason the person was selling it on eBay is because he himself was having issues with it just as you are?

---just a thought.

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by scem0
That doesn't contribute to the topic of this thread in any way since I have already had a bunch of people say that they dont have problems.

I'm not saying that panther is ALWAYS buggy.

Im just asking why it is buggy for so many people.

bleh, why am I even attempting this while in the midst of mac zealots :rolleyes:.

scem0

Don't call me a zealot and it's Mac, not mac. :D

I'm usually the one with no problems to report, but I've had a few. It's obvious that Panther was rushed to allow a 2003 release. Jaguar wasn't much better really as very few people could actually print from the initial release since CUPS threw everything off.

You can attribute a lot of complaints to people with customisations/haxies. These break the rules and need to be version-specific to run. Many people blame Apple because these things don't work after an operating system upgrade, but since they're using illegal entrances into the operating system, they shouldn't be working at all. Remember how many people complained about Transparent Dock when 10.2.8 was released? "My dock is gone." "10.2.8 ate my dock." :D

I did two Upgrades and one of the upgrades gave me a problem with the built-in firewall. I went ahead and did an Archive and Install afterwards, but found that it was unnecessary later. A simple command would have fixed it.

[yamabushi]

Hopefully 10.4 will have the ability to customize the user interface so that third party hacks will be less of a problem. The problems with broken permissions should also be a thing of the past. When a crash happens the operating system will recover automatically and repair itself. And monkeys will fly out of my ...;) .

[sparky76]

I had huge problems with networking on Panther, but a backup to an external drive, format and clean install with an upgrade to 10.3.2 before transferring back any files worked for me. Hope this helps.

[movabi]

if its any consolation, I have problems with OSX performance issues. The finder is a piece of crap. I have a dual 1gig g4 with 1.5 gigs of ram and i have to relaunch the finder all the time. I think Panther runs on a lot of systems, but was written for the g5 in mind.

the finder doesn't like to display folders with large sums of files (30,000+). I wait minutes before i can even see files which also gives me the beachball of death and locks up the finder (application not responding). Heaven forbid, i want to move the entire contents of a folder to another... that's an instant freeze. A typical response from a mac zealot is, "why do you have that many files in one folder?" My answer is, why not? Its my machine, its my way of streamlining. The apple zealot, in a condescending tone, tells me to love or leave it. Nice. That's not a real solution, do you think? or better yet "don't copy that many files at once" -- once again, i say, "why not? it saves me time. Now I have to move files in chunks. Where i'm going with this...

Don't tell people to love it or leave it. Don't tell people they should have a way of working that doesn't show the weaknesses of OSX. People should embrace the fringe of computing. Don't tell people their ideas for features are stupid or worthless. If people have to buy an uprgrade every year, people have the right to bitch about things that bother thems and expect features that they want.

This is not the time to start pushing away loyal apple users by telling them to get a pc. They just might take you up on the idea.

[edesignuk]

Originally posted by scem0
bleh, why am I even attempting this while in the midst of mac zealots :rolleyes:.

scem0
Ah, that old chessnut, a common problem should anyone dare to question Apple around here sometimes :(

[box checker]

Originally posted by scem0

I bought the iMac off of eBay, and it has 768MB of RAM, and I'm betting the extra RAM is 3rd party.


i dunno, i would always suggest a clean install when setting up a used computer. if panther worries you, then do a clean install of jaguar instead.

just my .02


-box

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by yamabushi
Hopefully 10.4 will have the ability to customize the user interface so that third party hacks will be less of a problem. The problems with broken permissions should also be a thing of the past. When a crash happens the operating system will recover automatically and repair itself. And monkeys will fly out of my ...;) .

your port. :D

I hope that Apple finally allows customisation, before we're all dead and buried. I'm not against it--I'd like different colour choices. I'm just against using hacks to get there. I want my machine to be stable.

[Omad0n]

Sorry if this is off topic, but I have noticed a new sort of "bug" since I started using 10.3 and yes it is a fresh install, hell I even did the zero out thing for the HD first. Anyway, the problem seems to be in Camino. When you open the first tab, it creates a little bit of the next page above the tab bar, weird huh? Other than that though things seem to be going well. Oh and one other thing, AIM can't seem to do logs anymore. It keeps giving me an error of "out of memory" when I try and do logs. Go figure? so no Panther is not perfect and problems still can crop up even when you do the clean install.

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by Omad0n
Sorry if this is off topic, but I have noticed a new sort of "bug" since I started using 10.3 and yes it is a fresh install, hell I even did the zero out thing for the HD first. Anyway, the problem seems to be in Camino. When you open the first tab, it creates a little bit of the next page above the tab bar, weird huh? Other than that though things seem to be going well. Oh and one other thing, AIM can't seem to do logs anymore. It keeps giving me an error of "out of memory" when I try and do logs. Go figure? so no Panther is not perfect and problems still can crop up even when you do the clean install.

Well, if you want to blame Apple for Apple's software problems, feel free. But Camino and AIM are not developed by Apple. If they worked correctly under Jaguar but not under Panther, it's the problem of their developers - not Apple.

Certainly there are enough bugs that are Apple's fault, that we don't need to pile on them for things out of their control. :)

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by Westside guy
Well, if you want to blame Apple for Apple's software problems, feel free. But Camino and AIM are not developed by Apple. If they worked correctly under Jaguar but not under Panther, it's the problem of their developers - not Apple.

Certainly there are enough bugs that are Apple's fault, that we don't need to pile on them for things out of their control. :)

That's not always true. If you look at changes to OpenGL during Jaguar, you'd see that many games (and other 3D software) were suddenly graphically problematic after 10.2.3 was released; then, magically repaired when 10.2.5 and 10.2.6 were released and the drivers were re-worked.

It's usually a developer problem, but not always.

[1macker1]

I agree Panther is very buggy, one of the bugs i can duplicate on demand. The bugs aren't bad, just annoying.
Originally posted by scem0
That doesn't contribute to the topic of this thread in any way since I have already had a bunch of people say that they dont have problems.

I'm not saying that panther is ALWAYS buggy.

Im just asking why it is buggy for so many people.

bleh, why am I even attempting this while in the midst of mac zealots :rolleyes:.

scem0

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by bousozoku
That's not always true. If you look at changes to OpenGL during Jaguar, you'd see that many games (and other 3D software) were suddenly graphically problematic after 10.2.3 was released; then, magically repaired when 10.2.5 and 10.2.6 were released and the drivers were re-worked.

It's usually a developer problem, but not always.

You bring up a good point. I should have qualified my statement. :D I just think many people don't realize that things like the system APIs change from release to release; so often a program just isn't compatible as-is with a newer version of the OS. Also, a program crashing repeatedly is not the same thing as the system crashing repeatedly - seems obvious, but a lot of people don't seem to see the difference.

I actually run into this more when I'm helping friends with Windows problems. They'll invariably call me with the message "Windows is crashing all the time on me", and it'll turn out that Internet Explorer is choking on some page that has a flash plug-in.

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by Westside guy
You bring up a good point. I should have qualified my statement. :D I just think many people don't realize that things like the system APIs change from release to release; so often a program just isn't compatible as-is with a newer version of the OS. Also, a program crashing repeatedly is not the same thing as the system crashing repeatedly - seems obvious, but a lot of people don't seem to see the difference.

I actually run into this more when I'm helping friends with Windows problems. They'll invariably call me with the message "Windows is crashing all the time on me", and it'll turn out that Internet Explorer is choking on some page that has a flash plug-in.

On Windows, 98 percent of the time, it's the developer's fault. I don't like taking MS' side, but I've found that most C and C++ developers are very bad about checking where their memory is. Overwriting good memory (buffer overruns is just one example) or abandoning something in use is all too common.

[Nermal]

I upgraded my iBook from 10.2.8 to 10.3 and didn't have any problems at all (at least, I can't remember any! It was a while ago). But my Power Mac came preinstalled with 10.3.0 and had all sorts of crazy problems (eg. couldn't mount disk images). I had to do an Archive and Install from the Panther DVD to fix it up, but it's behaved itself ever since (except for crashing 3 times yesterday, I haven't figured out the problem there yet).

[Les Kern]

I use Panther on my 4 main Macs, the 1.42DP, the 867, the TiBook and the AlBook 15". My daughter also has it on her 600 iMac. Absolutely everything is perfect, even really old classic apps work without a hitch (Except for 4X4 Evolution for some reason, but who cares?). My secret, besides luck? A wipe and clean install, even when new.
Since I am in "the business", the few main areas where crashes start (in no particular order): Actually installing Norton, 3rd party enhancements like Haxies freaking out with various apps, bad ram, permissions, bad motherboard or other systemic bug/flaw, hosed pref file, or bad karma.
For you, my money is on ram or systemic issue, even up.
Good luck.

[Mac til death]

I haven't had any problems with Mac OS 10.1 - 10.3... The only bugs I've found are kinda trivial anyway, one small one in Safari and then a really small one in Exposé where the title overlay sometimes stays on the screen.

If its an LCD iMac, Panther shouldn't be having any problems. It sounds like either a RAM or hardware (hopefully not) problem. I just worry that you might get the short end of the stick since you got it on eBay... Best of luck man.

[Fukui]

I think we can all agree that despite how great panther is (I would never go back to Jaguar), it was obviously rushed out to make the Thanksgiving shopping spree....

One of the things that really pisses me off (only because its so obvious), is that the finder still has the same bugs since 9.0, that is, when maximizing the window when it is full of icons or whatever it manages to almost ALWAYS NOT maximize completely and leave a few pixels on the right or bottom (you can see the scrollbar on the bottom)...I know this cause I had to use 9 at someone's house and was surprised to see the exact same behavior...dissapointing.

Whoever is responsible for the finder should be fired.

[indigothomas]

I have recently upgraded both my Macs with Panther - and all was fine until I tried to open Photoshop 7. It can't or won't do it!
This is a major bug as I see it. It is also a big problem for me. Does anyone know of a way round it?

[Fukui]

Originally posted by indigothomas
I have recently upgraded both my Macs with Panther - and all was fine until I tried to open Photoshop 7. It can't or won't do it!
This is a major bug as I see it. It is also a big problem for me. Does anyone know of a way round it?
Reinstall Photoshop 7, and/or get all the updates (for photoshop).

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by indigothomas
I have recently upgraded both my Macs with Panther - and all was fine until I tried to open Photoshop 7. It can't or won't do it!
This is a major bug as I see it. It is also a big problem for me. Does anyone know of a way round it?

Okay, once again, this is not a bug in Panther! You need the updated version of Photoshop.

http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=39&platform=Macintosh

Also, if you have Macromedia Studio installed (i.e. Dreamweaver, Fireworks, etc.) you need to download their update - those apps won't work under Panther until you update them.

When you do a major upgrade of your operating system, and find some apps don't work - it is usually not the fault of the operating system. There are exceptions, of course.

Also, when this occurs, it doesn't mean your software is buggy. Software is written against a particular version of the operating system. A newer OS often means the application needs to be updated. Expecting otherwise is just plain unrealistic.

[1macker1]

If i have 5+ jpegs on my desktop and try to move them to a folder, the finder disappears and so do all the icons on the desktop. This happens 9 times out of 10. And I did the clean install.

[indigothomas]

I took the point that new operating systems are designed to fit the newest applications - and that makes sense. It was suggested by Westside guy that I upgraded my Photoshop 7 to the very latest version of the application. I have done so (to 7.0.1) but the results are the same - an error message on attempt to open Photoshop. I was so hopeful...any other ideas wise westside guy?

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by indigothomas
I took the point that new operating systems are designed to fit the newest applications - and that makes sense. It was suggested by Westside guy that I upgraded my Photoshop 7 to the very latest version of the application. I have done so (to 7.0.1) but the results are the same - an error message on attempt to open Photoshop. I was so hopeful...any other ideas wise westside guy?

Hehe, if I was wise the problem would have been solved. :D When I upgraded to Panther the upgrade fixed the problem for me, so we may be seeing two different things.

What does the error message say? Also, is it as soon as you try to run it, or does Photoshop look like it's started and then dies?

[movabi]

I think there were two updates for photoshop that were just plugins. One was and altivec and the other was dual processor. i don't know what kind of machine you have, but if its a dual processor, that might fix it.

[indigothomas]

Thanks Westside.

Photoshop gets about two thirds through opening up (racing through all its pretty pictures and miles of credits) and then before it gets to the end of the credits a dialogue box comes up saying Photoshop has unexpectedly quit and would I like to log a bug report with Apple.

I am now resorting to opening Photoshop in Classic mode (so at least I can get some work done) but would still like to find a solution that allows me to work in the otherwise majestic Panther.

[wrldwzrd89]

Originally posted by caveman_uk
One thing I found that turning on idisk syncing really screwed with 'Save As..' in both word and photoshop. They'd both beachball for twenty or so seconds before the dialog came up. Turn off idisk syncing and everything works peachy. So we can add that feature to Filevault in the list of flakey things...

Otherwise I hadn't noticed any more kernal panics (or lock-ups) than under Jag. In fact I haven't had a panic on either of my machines since I installed Panther.

When I had my Mac, ALL applications beachballed on the Save dialog. It was HIGHLY annoying to put up with. I hope Apple can find the cause of this and fix it (BTW, I was also using iDisk local sync).

[hob]

Originally posted by Westside Guy

When you do a major upgrade of your operating system, and find some apps don't work - it is usually not the fault of the operating system. There are exceptions, of course.

Also, when this occurs, it doesn't mean your software is buggy. Software is written against a particular version of the operating system. A newer OS often means the application needs to be updated. Expecting otherwise is just plain unrealistic.

Sorry for the stupid question - but why is it unrealistic to expect this. I'm not a hardcore computer program, i'm a student - i make database frontends!! But, surely when Apple are making 10.3 they're basing it on 10.2. Why do they have to make such drastic changes to the OS that means that software that worked on 10.2 doesnt work on 10.3???

Hob

P.S No-one say "And stop calling me shirly"... Come on! At least a sympathy laugh!!

[Fukui]

Originally posted by hob
Sorry for the stupid question - but why is it unrealistic to expect this. I'm not a hardcore computer program, i'm a student - i make database frontends!! But, surely when Apple are making 10.3 they're basing it on 10.2. Why do they have to make such drastic changes to the OS that means that software that worked on 10.2 doesnt work on 10.3???

Hob

P.S No-one say "And stop calling me shirly"... Come on! At least a sympathy laugh!!
Well, thats not a stupid question.
The truth is, most apps work just fine...such as photoshop (my dad upgraded to 10.3 and it worked fine), but sometimes, for some people, things do get messed up, for example, permissions, plug-ins, etc.

There are other things too, like when an app installs kernel exentions for its functionality (like VPC), these extentions could have been compiled with an older version of GCC and therefore incompatible...I hear its (the ABI) finaly has been "finalized", and changes to the compiler wont break things anymore. But this was the case with 10.0 to 10.1 and 10.2....

Also, some applications work around bugs and do things differently, and then when those bugs are fixed in the next release, application behavior can be not what the developer expected...or when apple decides to "depreciate" certain api's an app can fail or behave wierdly.

But, TBO, most apps don't need to install stuff all over, but the ones that do, are usually the ones that suffer the most because when upgrading the system instead of doing things clean, the OS provider cant possibly know all of the changes to permissions, symbolic links ect. that some of those programs and applications change, so yes, it is always better to clean install when upgrading. Especially, comming from windows, I have this conditioning where thats the only way I'll do it.

[Westside guy]

Originally posted by Fukui
There are other things too, like when an app installs kernel exentions for its functionality (like VPC), these extentions could have been compiled with an older version of GCC and therefore incompatible...I hear its (the ABI) finaly has been "finalized", and changes to the compiler wont break things anymore.

Or, you can get even weirder and see things such as in the latest Fedora Linux (nee Red Hat). Everything is compiled with gcc 3.3 - well unfortunately this is not true of the kernel, which was compiled with gcc 3.2. Took me a long time to figure out why I couldn't build the gol-darned NVidia drivers. :confused:

[hulugu]

...and I wish I knew why. I have Panther running on both PBs and my iMac and I haven't had any problems. I did a clean install with all 3, then did all the updates (when 10.3.1 came out) and my machines have all been well-behaved. I have a mix of Apple RAM and Crucial, and a mix of software, but Word has been as good as always (which is good, but not perfect, little bastard crashes three times a year).
Compare that to my work PC which locks up once daily, and this is after I nuked XP Pro which didn't work at all. Win2K is the best OS Microsoft has produced and OSX is so much better.
IMHO, Apple did a much better job with Jaguar, I do remember a few reported problems, but they seemed much less specific. I think File Vault and Font Book were rushed.
Hey scemo, a few suggestions only because they bear repeating:
make sure you test to see if that RAM is buggy, make sure the OS is cool before you install Konfabulator, check for a Starcraft update for Panther.
Also, because it is such a sore-spot for me, just because someone hasn't had a problem and defends Apple doesn't mean they should be called a zealot, I think it's an overused term thats too readily used. Apple Zealots do exist, just an Windows fan boys exists, and both annoy me to no end, just make sure to reserve the term for people who really need to be called it. Good luck scemo.