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Apple has officially ceased the sale of OS X Lion 10.7 and Mountain Lion 10.8 from its online store.

os-x-mountain-lion-disc-page.jpg

The change was spotted by @ClassicII_MrMac on X, formerly Twitter. The original release of OS X Lion was available either as a digital download from the Mac App Store or via a USB thumb drive preloaded with the installer. Mountain Lion, on the other hand, was distributed exclusively as a downloadable product, delivered via an emailed redemption code.

Apple's shift from physical to digital distribution became clear upon the release of OS X Lion in July 2011, marking the company's transition to online-only releases. Lion introduced features such as multi-touch gestures, Mission Control, and full-screen apps, but it also posed a challenge for users without access to the Mac App Store. This was particularly true for those still running OS X Leopard, as they were unable to upgrade to Lion without first obtaining Snow Leopard or purchasing the Lion installer thumb drive.

OS X Mountain Lion, which debuted in July 2012, continued this trend. Mountain Lion was the last macOS version not initially offered for free. The digital-only approach was solidified with OS X Mavericks (version 10.9) in October 2013, establishing the Mac App Store as the sole avenue for obtaining new macOS versions.

While Apple ceased supporting both Lion and Mountain Lion some time ago, it continued to sell digital copies of these operating systems until now. Apple continues to offer OS X Lion and OS X Mountain Lion as free digital downloads for those who still need them.

Article Link: Apple Removes OS X Lion and Mountain Lion From Online Store
 
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I don’t know why people are cheering on the death of physical media. You’re just giving away control. I can take a CD of Office 2010 and install it on a machine and not have to worry about subscriptions, cloud updates that break things, AWS being up or down, or some bull around lawsuits or copyrights causing them to take it down or to take away some functionality. I can just use it like the way it should be.
 
These were never sold on CDs, or DVDs for that matter. This article is poorly written.
Mountain Lion was download only and Lion was available as a USB installer, but the Apple Store listing was for a download code which is no longer needed.
 
I wonder if anyone has made disk replicas for the newer OSes...? It would be pretty cool to see what Sonoma might look like on a CD, for example
I actually just made one the other day for Ventura...sort of. Needed to create a bootable ISO for a VM, and it ended up being around 13GB. At that size, it would need to be on a Blu-ray disc (or somehow split up on two dual-layer DVDs).
 
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I wonder if anyone has made disk replicas for the newer OSes...? It would be pretty cool to see what Sonoma might look like on a CD, for example
The installer for Sonoma is about 12GB,
a CD will hold about 650 MB
a double layer DVD holds 8.5GB, Double layer double sided is 17GB.

so you could fit it on one disk, but it would have to be doubled layer, double sided.

So you'd either have to flip the disk, or change to a second one (memories of stacks of 3.5" floppies with numbers on them).

So you could do it, if you found a Mac with an optical drive, but it would be really really slow, and you'd have to swap discs or flip the disc in the middle.
 
I don’t know why people are cheering on the death of physical media. You’re just giving away control. I can take a CD of Office 2010 and install it on a machine and not have to worry about subscriptions, cloud updates that break things, AWS being up or down, or some bull around lawsuits or copyrights causing them to take it down or to take away some functionality. I can just use it like the way it should be.
I agree!

At the same time, it’s so convenient to not have stacks of CDs sitting around my house and office. Also, Apple is pretty good about giving away basic software like Pages or Keynote, so many of us have no need for something like Office (I know that’s not true for everyone). There’s also some great free open source software that does the job that needs done without the hassle of CDs. How many people are really installing that 2010 copy of Office in 2023? Like it or not, software makers have done a very good job at making physical media obsolete by offering easy ways to find, download, and upgrade software without the bother of purchasing CDs.
 
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I don’t know why people are cheering on the death of physical media. You’re just giving away control. I can take a CD of Office 2010 and install it on a machine and not have to worry about subscriptions, cloud updates that break things, AWS being up or down, or some bull around lawsuits or copyrights causing them to take it down or to take away some functionality. I can just use it like the way it should be.
I get what you're saying, but these are two different things. There are software on physical media that still require subscriptions or cloud updates; there are also digital media that require no subscriptions or cloud updates.

Btw, you can still get still get standalone versions of Office today. Office 2021 has a standalone version, and the upcoming Office 2024 will also have a standalone version.
 
I don’t know why people are cheering on the death of physical media. You’re just giving away control. I can take a CD of Office 2010 and install it on a machine and not have to worry about subscriptions, cloud updates that break things, AWS being up or down, or some bull around lawsuits or copyrights causing them to take it down or to take away some functionality. I can just use it like the way it should be.
I hear you. But I recently learned the hard way that this isn't always the case.

I have an old MacBook Air onto which I recently tried to install Adobe CS3, for which I own the CDs. However, it turns out Adobe pulled the plug on its activation servers for CS3 about a year ago, making it impossible to install. The CDs are now worthless.
 
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