Leopard over time for me has become really slow. Despite having loads of ram, it takes forever to boot up, and launching two applications at once leads to the icons both just bouncing there endlessly. I hope they fix all of this with Snow Leopard and I'm not going to bother downloading this update.
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Apple Releases Mac OS X 10.5.8
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Download OnyX and clean out your system. Clean all the catches and repair permissions. If that doesn't work, sounds like a HDD problem.
Well I have nothing to lose really since its not like a mission critical type computer, just a backup, and I guess I could clone it back to health.
But nonetheless the amount of time was quite incredible on the 10.5.8 update.
Wow, it finally finished just as I was about to give up hope.
Double boot as expected. Stuck at the spinning wheel now for a long time.
Ok, this machine appears to be officially TOASTED.
Thank You Apple!
Although I'm still not giving up on my PowerPC Snow leopard arguments, so don't worry Intel people!
I'm like Arnold, I'll be BACK! LOL
If this were a Mac I really had to rely on, I wouldn't be joking.
Yes, I'm now holding the power button down and forcing the Mac to turn off.
PS: The machine will STILL BOOT TIGER, but NOT 10.5.8 LEOPARD! LMAO
PPS: The installer said it finished properly, there were no anomalies other than the extended install time.
I'm going to try again.
UPDATE: After turning the Mac OFF after the failed boot of MacOS 10.5.8, the PowerMac G4 867 appears to now work again, go figure. I have no idea why.
G4 WARNING... If you have large hard drives in your older Mac, 10.5.8 will re-write the drivers and remove support for hard drives larger than 128GB on older Macs even if you've previously installed drivers for those large drives! Beware!
The importance of this warning is that your hard drive could be corrupted by this and could cause you to lose EVERYTHING!
I didn't lose anything by the way, but after re-installing the driver, my G4 will probably be indexing for hours! LOL
I know there are a bunch of people here that have a problem with their Bluetooth Mighty Mouse freezing up every so often. In 10.5.7, just opening up the Bluetooth preferences caused the mouse to start working again (without the need to disconnect and reconnect to the mouse).
I had this problem multiple times a day. Since 10.5.8 it hasn't happened since!
I had this problem multiple times a day. Since 10.5.8 it hasn't happened since!
I bought the bullet and grabbed it first thing... no problems here.
But I always do the repair permissions and check the disc thing first.
There is a double boot, and it takes awhile (just enough to make you nervous) but it will come alive eventually.
P.S. I've noticed here, on the Apple forums, and almost everywhere that portables ALWAYS have more complaints with updates than desktops. With all the banging around the drive takes, ALWAYS make sure you verify the drive and repair permissions first. Crucial.Most people who have problems had drives with filesystem probs.
Why do people still persist with this 'repair permissions first' nonsense before installing updates?
When you install an update it requires your administrator password. That is because all updates are installed in administrator mode, thus overriding every single permission they meet along the way.
So why 'repair' permissions first?
Interesting. I think my iMac had the extended startup issue because i really wondered why my macbook CE had so much faster startup times than my iMac with similar specs. After updating both macs my macbook is the same as always but the imac is considerably faster. Nice one! 
That's a good point.
Personally, I always repair disk permissions AFTER an installation.
But, in Leopard, permissions are never correctly repaired, even with 10.5.8.
I have a problem on my MBP with the mouse and/or keyboard freezing up anywhere from a few seconds to a minute or two after waking it from sleep. It'll literally work fine sometimes for a minute and then the mouse just freezes. Most of the time if I unplug the hub that has the external keyboard and mouse connected to it and plug it back in they'll start working again until the next time I put it to sleep. NO UPDATE OF LEOPARD has addressed or fixed this problem including 10.5.8. I've sent them a bug report. They don't care. The laptop's own keyboard and trackpad don't have this problem, just external ones. And since they don't provide enough ports on one side, I have to use a hub (i.e. the hub might be related to the problem somehow, but it shouldn't happen regardless).
EXERCISES IN FUTILITY PART 2: REPAIRING PERMISSIONS IS USELESS
http://unsanity.org/archives/000410.php
AppleMatt
http://unsanity.org/archives/000410.php
AppleMatt
People also use the term "bloodthinners" as do doctors and companies. This however is not a correct term because it does not exist, there is no such thing as something that makes your blood thinner. The proper term for this would be anticoagulentia and stops your blood from clotting. Just because some people use that term doesn't mean it's correct. Especially if their companies, marketing is not a department that gets it right.
LOL, you're making a big fool out of yourself right now because you now show that the diagram you used is even more flawed. If you want to go that way fine but then you also need to make a difference between x86 16 bit as we had with the 386 and you have to split up PowerPC since that came in 32 and 64 bit as did SPARC
Apart from that you're just plain wrong. Intel has made an instruction set and an architecture called x86. They have evolved it from the 8086 to 286, 384, 486 up to the Core 2 Duo cpu's we now know. The instruction set has been changed, they now use the one from the 386 or the 486 (also one of the reasons why the linux kernel dropped the 386 support). It's the exact same architecture we have had for years but it only evolved into something that is able to run 64 bit stuff. Also, the x86-64 cpu's that are out there can run 32 AND 64 bit software very nicely. That's what Leopard does (Leopard is 32 bit and has the ability to run 64 bit software on top of that) and what Snow Leopard will continue (will be 64 bit with the ability to run 32 bit software on top of that). Even Windows Vista and Windows 7 are able to do both. Why? Because the Intel and AMD cpu's support x86-64 since it's just a superset to x86. That's also the reason why x86-64 is NOT a different architecture!
Nearly everyone out there although some will use x64 which is wrong since that would imply it's a different architecture which it is not (it's an extension to x86 so x86-64 is the proper term).
Ah, missed that one. Can see why they don't sell it anymore, it's not something you'd put on an Itanium machine.
PowerPC itself isn't old, IBM still uses it and is still actively developing new PowerPC cpu's and machines. Whatever Apple used is old, 3 years or even older to be more precise.
At a couple of things but the overall speed is a lot lower then the Intel Macs. The speed gains you have are not very spectacular since it makes a differences in seconds. You need to think in the amount of time it takes when you sneeze. Besides that, Leopard on those 3 year old (or even older) PowerPC Macs is slow as hell, not something you want.
When it comes down to performance I don't care what architecture my machines uses. SPARC64 is fine, x86 or x86-64 is great too and if PowerPC is the way to go then that'll do. The only thing I care about right now is the ability for me to use virtualisation on my Mac. That has become a possibility with the change to Intel's x86. If they were to switch to another architecture I need to find a solution, something like a dedicated x86 machine that runs something like ESXi 4.0.
The PowerPC stuff Apple used is now 3 years old, in 3 years a lot has happened on the cpu side. For example, 64 bit has become normal, every cpu out there has the 64 bit extension and there are 64 bit OS's for x86. Also speed has increased greatly due to multicore cpu's (as in octocore machines like the Mac Pro). You'd be a complete idiot if you ignored that development and still argued that the 3 year old PPC G5 cpu you have is still faster because it isn't. It's not about whining about old technology, it's about being real. PowerPC served us fine back then and now it's Intels turn. Most people really don't care, they just want something that works and that is also the biggest selling point of a Mac I have been hearing from the Mac people for years. In Dutch we know something called "de wet van de remmende voorsprong" (translated into English). It means that you need to keep moving forward and not stop and relax because if you do then someone else will take the lead and make you obsolete. You either go bankrupt in that situation or you need to invest enormous amounts of money to get back in the race (a lot more then it would have been if you had stayed on top).
There are still a lot of things that need to be fixed for the Intel people as well. I've seen a lot of people still complain about certain aspects as you see with every update and every new OS X version. There will always be people who are disappointed because something still isn't working or something stopped working. That's unfortunately one of the biggest downsides to IT (both hardware and software).
For example, I still have problems with AFP on my Intel Macs though smb works great so I keep on using smb on my network (the problem being it does not seem to understand permissions whatsoever, if anyone has a solution do not hesitate, just scream!). It also has the added bonus of being crossplatform so Solaris, FreeBSD and Ubuntu can also get to my shared files and folders. With AFP I have to mess around with AppleTalk and such. Also spotted a problem regarding USB, one of the USB hubs I attached to my Mac mini 2009 dropped from usb2.0 to usb1.1. I had to unplug and plug it back in to get it back up to usb2.0 speeds. In the changelog they mention something about reliability fixes regarding USB so I think this might be caused by the update. I hope and believe it was just a "one time" thing which won't happen again.
Not really. It only supported the ones that could meet the system requirements and that ruled out a lot of the old Macs. The only ones left were the highend models with the highend graphics cards. I rather have it completely killed instead of supporting half the devices, that's just lame. You get all excited you can use Leopard and then you read the system requirements and then reality sinks in and you realize you can't install it because your Mac does not meet the system requirements. Yeah, great support for those old Macs...
I tried adding pics using the photobrowser, it seems that it can add pics but it just doesn't do anything when you release the mouse button. Using the "attach" button does the same thing. Unfortunately this also happens with pdf files
I do have some mailbundles installed but removing them does not resolve the problem. Big problem if you can't attach anything to your mail. Rebuilding Mail did not resolve it, deleting nearly everything but the bundles did not resolve it, so I tried deleting every plist file there was in ~/Library/Preferences for Mail and then start from scratch (luckily it still remembered the signatures, messages, todo's and notes) and that resolved the problem finally!
First, thanks for the on topic post and the info.
Second, no thanks for the sarcasm against Apple! Is it really necessary?
Third, you should have an exact image of your hard drive before the update. Restore to that. If you don't have a copy of it, well then, I guess you just expect everything to always work and just reserve the right to get mad if it doesn't . . . ??? or what?
Finally, you should really be running Tiger on that G4. We have a G3 here in the control room where I work, and it's running Tiger and has no issues, other than just being slow due to a slow clock speed / processor. So, if you don't have an image of your drive, take this opportunity to switch back to Tiger.
Just thought I'd mention that I have had no Mail issues. Can attach files just fine. Just did a test of this.
Well, I think that the majority of computer professionals would consider x86 and x64 to be distinct architectures, and not minor variants of one architecture.
The x64 architecture's "32-bit compatibility mode" isn't proof that it's only one architecture.
In 1977 the new 32-bit VAX from Digital came out to replace the aging 16-bit PDP-11 line. To ease the transition, it had a hardware "compatibility mode" that would execute unprivileged 16-bit PDP-11 binaries. In another parallel, many of the PDP-11 instructions were identical to VAX instructions (but the VAX had additional ones - the PDP had ADD 16-bit, ADD 8-bit - the VAX had ADD 32-bit, ADD 16-bit, ADD 8-bit).
I don't think anyone will argue that the VAX never existed.
And I don't see any need for an epic back and forth on x64. Let's agree to disagree on its existence.
You cannot simply lump processor types together as one or the other. You actually have to look at their capability and configuration. A G5 Quad is a lot faster than many lower-end Intel machines even today.
Eh? Leopard installed just fine on my 2001 era PowerMac G4 Digital Audio with minimal effort. I'm using it right now on it and it's anything but slow. In fact, it feels just like my less than one year old MBP for most OS operations and even most browsing, etc. Not everything needs a ton of CPU power, you know. And the thing about PowerMacs (be they G4 or G5) is that they are expandable machines. I easily swapped the dual 553MHz CPUs for a 1.8GHz 7448 G4 (released in the last 2 years). I could have gotten a 2GHz model or a dual 1.8GHz model for a bit more. I easily swapped its ATI Rage 128 for an ATI 9800 Pro. It went from terribly slow in Leopard to extremely quick in Leopard in just a few minutes. The ATI card has full Core Image support along with Quartz Extreme. Games made just 3 years ago run fine on it (again, the machine is from 2001, barely past OS9 and in fact, this machine will even boot OS9 still; I have OS9, Tiger and Leopard all available). The point is don't tell people that PPC machines are "slow as hell in Leopard" when you don't have a clue about them. Yeah, it was slow as hell with a 553Mhz CPU an an unsupported GPU, but with a few upgrades it's perfectly fine in Leopard. Snow Leopard is more efficient and would have run better yet if Apple hadn't ditched PPC support.
For performance, it offers twice as many registers. For integers, there are 16 registers instead of 8. Effectively, though, this is much better than it sounds because 3 registers are usually dedicated. This means that an x86 has 5 "free" registers, and x64 has 13 "free" registers.
This means that the compiler has a better opportunity to keep data and addresses in the extremely fast registers, and doesn't have to use the much slower memory as often.
x64 is also a cleaner, newer architecture. Some old x86 crap is gone, but more important it guarantees a certain minimum level of hardware features. x64 has at least SSE3, and NX. If you're running 64-bit, you can depend on those features.
There's also the possibility of eliminating x86 compatibility mode in the future. In 3 to 5 years, 32-bit compatibility may be irrelevant, and the chip designers can jettision the whole compatibility layer and use those transistors for the benefit of the many.
Ahh. Thank you for this! I could never get a clear answer on *why* x64 is superior. But now I have!
I still don't notice a whole lot of a difference between running 64 bit applications vs 32 bit ones. Perhaps they're not being programmed/compiled to the fullest?
Please don't confuse my Snow Leopard on PowerPC posts with my 10.5.8 posts.
And my previous 10.5.8 problem post was an "As it happened post", so obviously I was mad and frustrated initially before the problem was solved. Hey that's life.
Furthermore, I'm definitely NOT arguing that Apple support an 867MHz G4 with Snow Leopard.
I'm just stating my installation issues with Leopard on the oldest Leopard supported Mac.
And yes that was released in July 2001 and is still technically certified by Apple to run Leopard and does so surprisingly well, but with the same bloat that affects all Leopard installations. I even installed Leopard on a 450MHz Sawtooth once, but that was so very sloooooooow.
My Snow Leopard/PowerPC argument mainly centers around late model iMac G5s and PowerMac G5s, the later of which are quite expandable and upgradable machines and both are faster than many low-end first generation Intel Macs. In fact, PowerMac G5s could have a better chance of supporting OpenCL than every Intel graphics Mac ever made since many had PCI Express slots.
The Megahertz Myth has never been denounced by Steve Jobs even since the Intel Switch.
Many G5s at lower MHz are faster than the early Intel Macs, even some at higher clock speeds.
If anything Intel has proven The Megahertz Myth to be true by making Intel CPU's more RISC-like and PowerPC-like.
This perception that PowerPC is ancient tech really needs to be put to bed. It's just not true.
Obviously, a $4000 machine 3 years old is better than a sub-$1000 machine bought 1-2 years ago. And lets not forget, Mac users tend to keep computers longer than 3 years and Apple has historically supported machines for MUCH LONGER than 3 years.
Finally, I'm sure all the Intel people would like me to stop whining about Snow Leopard, but don't hold your breath. I think Apple is making a mistake and breaking a 25 year tradition of support of 2-3 yr old machines and I intend to point it out everywhere I can when a story related to it comes up. Sorry.
PS: So far, no more 10.5.8 update problems on any other Macs, Intel or PowerPC, well except the ridiculous Disk Permissions thing that Apple never seems to fix.
What good is Disk Permissions, if you can't really even see what's even being fixed and even the things that supposedly are getting fixed, are STILL never being fixed? It's just ridiculous. I don't understand why they can't fix it. I defeats the purpose of having Disk Permissions in the first place.
It's hard to sound sincere in a post, but thank-you.
Just in-case it got lost in the mix, someone else reported after upgrading to 10.5.8 they too couldn't attach files to Mail (which they have now fixed). So it might be worth making that your first port of call after running the update if you haven't so far.
AppleMatt