Lion Reviews Are Out: 'Great Value', 'Shakes Things Up', 'Very Few Bugs'

[Malligator]

The argument of the idiotic geek...if you don't like something say it's for the casual (read: stupid) user. If you think using a PC makes you a superbrain...you're wrong.

My only complaint about Lion...it's clunky without a multitouch device. I'm picking up a Magic Trackpad today.

 

[redkamel]

Ironic Gizmodo gives it a negative review..

Its not ironic...which do you think will get Giz more pageviews, a positive review of Lion or a negative review? Keep in mind the people who read it.

I was pretty sure thats why they wrote it, but I read it anyways. Its not a very well founded or written review

I skimmed Ars, and it was a nice review. Lots of bad details. For one, I already dread the UI changes, like pop up scroll bars (a pet peeve of mine) and the "expanding" new windows animation which I find startling and in-my-face on Vista.

I'll download it later today, since many people said they thought they would hate it too and ended up liking it.

I am, however, DEFINITELY using the workaround for the new "turd brown" theme on address book and ical. Why should my superior computer cal look like an ugly real cal? Only steve jobs design department knows....

 

[K42]

Yeah, I'd reinstall. Sounds like the installation broke when Lion was installed over SL. You should be fine after a fresh install. Office's installer is pretty fast if I remember correctly too.

No problem here with:
- Office 2011.
- VMWare
- Adobe CS 5.5 (Premiere, Photoshop, for as far as I tried)

Only iTunes pops up with an "unkown error (-42032). After dismissing the error dialog everything seems to be allright though. Interesting that the only application having "trouble" is one of Apple itself.

This is on an old (2006) white 24" iMac.

 

[Ubuntu]

Is there an option to turn these abominations back to how they looked in SL?

Search for LionBleacher. It's not quite SL-like but a lot nicer imo.

 

[thirteen1031]

All Good

No problems in instillation, and--knock wood--no bugs so far. Everything working fine, in fact, my little MBA is speedier than ever. I saw a marked improvement and I'm delighted.

I, personally, wasn't fond of the two-fingered scrolling, but it was easy enough to get my scrolling bar back. And once I set up the corners for where I wanted what, I'm much happier with Launchpad and Mission Control. In fact, I was one of those who didn't use spaces before, but probably will now. I like being able to swipe between windows.

Really, I think the trick to Lion is simply making it your own, and Apple offers enough choices for any user to do that. The best thing about any Apple OS (IMHO) is that it lets you "decorate" your home the way you like--keeping new options that appeal to you, going to back to old options that you like better (like me and my scroll bar). And I like that this time around the decorating options include gestures, full screens, etc.

For $29, I'm plenty happy.

 

[Jon the Heretic]

Non Starter

Lion is a nonstarter for me. The only new feature I like is the Autosave/versioning, which really is great stuff. Alas, the developers need to rewrite the app to use it so unlike the iPad, you can't just count on it working that way. Still, really a great thing to bring to the Mac.

But pretty much everything else, missing scrollbars? OK. Consistency with a mobile device where it doesn't make total sense is a bad reason---consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds. That is why Windows CE/Mobile sucked so badly---consistency with the desktop where it didn't make sense. It's a classic mistake.

I am really surprised they didn't do a better job with the scrolling. With a trackpad, like the iPad, it makes sense---with a mouse, yikes---hobgoblins again. Smart money would have been to autosense the device the input comes from --- they do that already -- but use reverse scrolling only if it comes from a touchpad. I don't have plans to buy a trackpad, so a lot of the other improvements are frankly useless to me. I like my trackball and have no plans to switch.

Mission Control sounds like a mess. I am even confused reading about it. Expect it to be radicially revamped again in 'Chesire', the next and last version of MacOS X --- where the whole interface fades away only leaving Steve Job's garish smile. <yes, I made 'Chesire Cat' release up>

While I like autosave and think it is a great new feature, it is way less useful to me than loss of Samba support for my NAS and Rosetta apps. Honestly, Lion would have to be really freaking fantastic for me to even try to live with that loss, and autosave/versioning is the only thing I really want. I don't have the money to buy a new version of Microsoft Offfice or Adobe Photoshop, and my NAS isn't even 6 months old. The hidden costs of this $29 upgrade can be staggering.

Not sure what to do when Apple tries to force me to upgrade my MacOS to sync the latest iPhone/iPod/iPad. It has happened twice to me in the past, and I did choose to upgrade, but syncing iOS devices with my Mac was important to me. I figure I have another 2 years before that, so we'll see. (Thank goodness for bootcamp).

 

[cozmot]

Yes, no bounce in Lion's Mail.
SPAM-tastic

That was the best thing about Mail. I've used it for years to fool spammers that my email address was bad. This is a completely stupid decision on Apple's part!

 

[marksman]

I am shocked that Jesus at Gizmodo would bash an apple product.

 

[nofear1az]

I am totally loving Lion... I think all the gestures are very intuitive. I love Mission Control, Launch Pad and Air Drop are both my favorite features. I was a bit hesitent about Lion until after I tried it I just am finding it so much more intuitive than any other OS I have used.

Things I am having trouble getting used to are the opposite scrolling gesture, I know I can turn it off but am seeing if I can get used to this. iPad it makes sense on but having trouble on the MacBook Air and prolly will make it worse going when using work laptops. hehe

One thing I noticed that I don't care for is when I open up Apps and close them out they are obviously still open just like all previous versions of OSX, however, if I logout or restart computer it likes to open all those Apps up into windows on my screen. I hate that. If I close an App it means I am done with it. I know I can do the command-Q thing but that's annoying when all I want to do is to do it easily from the mouse/pad. I never understood Apple's insistence that once an App is opened it does not close.

To me the red X button is no different than a minimize button. And the green + button always has been useless.

anyway, that's my only gripes... otherwise I am loving Lion and would never even consider going back to Snow Leopard. Everything is so much smoother.

laters

edit: just wanted to add that this is coming from an IT Professional who works on Windows problems at work. I grew up on PCs and got my first Mac in year 2000. Lion is by far the best OS Apple has created (disclaimer: imho).

 

[mcmlxix]

One thing I noticed that I don't care for is when I open up Apps and close them out they are obviously still open just like all previous versions of OSX, however, if I logout or restart computer it likes to open all those Apps up into windows on my screen. I hate that. If I close an App it means I am done with it. I know I can do the command-Q thing but that's annoying when all I want to do is to do it easily from the mouse/pad. I never understood Apple's insistence that once an App is opened it does not close.

Resume can be turned off.

I'm not sure what you mean by Apple's insistence that once an app is opened it does not close. Are you talking about Mac being window-centric while Windows is application-centric?

 

[nate13]

I love how the reviews bring up the price of Lion- it truly has been the best 30 bucks spent on this computer, aside from Omni products (but those are 2x+ the cost!)

 

[JRoDDz]

HAHAHAHAHAHA.... Harry McCracken!

Does he have a brother named Phil?

 

[thirteen1031]

Wi-Fi

Re: Wi-Fi over Airport

I, too, liked Airport and find it a bit jarring to see "Wi-Fi" there instead...but I totally understand. Too many people would buy a new mac and say, "Where's the wi-fi? Is it that ethernet choice there?" It really doesn't make sense to call it "Airport" when pretty much the whole world is using "Wi-Fi." The change is practical and gets newbies up and running faster.

 

[wovel]

Let me just first say that I'm extremely happy with Lion, I like the new direction and know that most of these problems occur whenever a new version of OSX is released. But there are a few bugs which should be brought to Apples attention because they are good about addressing them.

I can no longer open PDF files in browser using Safari. I have to download the file and open it using Adobe Reader, minor bug but inconvenient all the same for something used so often.

When resizing websites like MacRumors using the track pad the content becomes uncentered. When using the buttons on the browser the content remains centered in Safari. A minor bug, inconvenient though.

1Password looks like they tried to prepare for Lion. 1Password works really well on my iMac but is very unreliable on my MBPro.

Again, not major bugs that should stop people from buying Lion, but minor issues that Apple will probably address if they are brought to attention. It seems like Apple pays attention to what users are saying so I feel there is value in documenting such minor inconveniences.

Hadn't notice the PDF in Safari thing creeping back up, that is a bit annoying. Had not notice the resizing bug either. Both seem like things they will fix.

 

[mjtomlin]

Things I am having trouble getting used to are the opposite scrolling gesture,

It takes a few hours of use to get used to it. It's only been a day and for the most part, I've gotten the hang of it.

One thing I noticed that I don't care for is when I open up Apps and close them out they are obviously still open just like all previous versions of OSX, however, if I logout or restart computer it likes to open all those Apps up into windows on my screen. I hate that. If I close an App it means I am done with it. I know I can do the command-Q thing but that's annoying when all I want to do is to do it easily from the mouse/pad. I never understood Apple's insistence that once an App is opened it does not close

Wow! Not sure where to start...

Windows open and close. Applications launch and quit.

By clicking on the red button in the title bar of a window, you are not quitting the application, you're closing the window. It is up to the application to define the behavior of that action not the OS. Some applications quit themselves after all windows are closed, some present the user with what to do next, and some just remain open and let the user do whatever they want.

By using the red button only, you're leaving yourself at the mercy of the application, not the OS. If you want to Quit the application, choose Quit from the applications menu - you can still do this from the mouse or trackpad.

All the applications are relaunching themselves when you reboot, because you're not quitting them and you have the resume feature on. You can turn it off in the General system preferences.

To me the red X button is no different than a minimize button. And the green + button always has been useless.

The red button is for dismissing or closing a window.
The yellow button is for minimizing or hiding a window.
The green button is usually for zooming a window's frame to display as much content as possible. It does not mean maximize.

Because you believe it to mean one thing or another, doesn't make it so. They are what they are, and if you try to think of them and use them any other way, you're not going to get the results you expect.

 

[marksman]

i'm sure

What are you sure about? That he has coded for 30 years or that you picked a horrible example of a font for your personal complaint rant against Apple.

I can support that both are accurate claims.

 

[aggri1]

One thing I noticed that I don't care for is when I open up Apps and close them out they are obviously still open just like all previous versions of OSX, however, if I logout or restart computer it likes to open all those Apps up into windows on my screen. I hate that. If I close an App it means I am done with it. I know I can do the command-Q thing but that's annoying when all I want to do is to do it easily from the mouse/pad. I never understood Apple's insistence that once an App is opened it does not close.

To me the red X button is no different than a minimize button. And the green + button always has been useless.

I've noticed that this close-window v. quit-application thing has confused people at work who've switched to Macs. Personally, I much prefer the Mac way, because even if I close the last open window belonging to a particular application, doesn't mean that I don't want to keep working with it.

I also never use things fullscreen (even on Windows), so I cannot understand why this is a 'feature' of Lion, except perhaps for those people using tiny screens. Again, I often see recently-ex-Windows people making document windows in Mac OS X huge, often pointlessly (e.g. lots of wasted space on either side of a page in a word processor's doc' window). I can't see myself ever using full-screen mode, as I like to leave a few pixels on each side of the screen where I can whoosh the mouse to and click and get straight to one of my file browser windows (Finder or Exploder) or a text editor or whatever other window I am using often at the time. I find this much quicker than Expose or switching with the dock, and _much_ better than alt/cmd+tab...

I've also noticed that ex-Windows people use the dock to switch applications, rather than just clicking on the window they want to switch to (often because their 'maximised' window is covering up the window they want to get to).

Anyone know of a way to implement 'focus-follows-mouse' on Mac OS X yet?

I'm not excited about Lion. Can't see how it'll improve doing what I need to get done (can't see OpenOffice or Matlab ever supporting Versions, for example).

Cheers,
A.

 

[La Porta]

One thing that I like is that I can use my mouse (corded, scroll ball) with scroll ball in the "usual" scrolling way, but can now keep my trackpad the "iPad" scrolling way. This way, both of them feel natural at the same time. Bravo for letting them keep one device one way, and modify the other!

 

[cmaier]

It takes a few hours of use to get used to it. It's only been a day and for the most part, I've gotten the hang of it.

Not me. I still routinely start off moving in the wrong direction, but I'm sticking with it for now.

 

[THX1139]

Makes me laugh that almost everyone's complaining about Lion. It's only been out for 24 hours guys.
Wait a week and the majority of the bugs are gonna be gone.
Wait a month all almost all the apps you used are gonna be updated and/or you'll find new apps.

The trouble is, most bugs that people are complaining about are actually new features that suck. So, do you think that Apple is going to delete the features that make Lion feel like an iOS? Eh... no, if anything, they are going to keep adding them until they only need to have one operating system for devices and computers. I hate the direction Apple is going and that sucks because I have enjoyed Apple for almost 20 years. It's going to be hard to find a good replacement for them once they become an iToys consumer only company. Hopefully Windows will continue to improve and I can take another look at that. Buying Apple hardware and running Windows seems like it will be the only option if a person wants to stick with a true computer OS experience in the future.

Don't get me wrong. I love iOS on the iPhone/iPad... but keep it off my computer where I actually get work done.

 

[Bodie]

Comfy

I'm comfy with snow leopard and don't plan to change right now. I may partition my external backup drive and play around with Lion. But no commitments for another version or two.

 

[coldwaves]

A few bugs I have

Overall, I think Lion is doing a great job. But I have encountered several problems. I am not sure whether it is general or not.

1. Launchpad seems to include many useless folders that are just accessories to applications. For example, EndNote, Office for Mac. Some of the inside plug-in are also shown in the launchpad as application. Maybe it is the problem of the application.

2. I cannot remove most of the application from launchpad. When I hold the Option button, icon start to wiggle but only several application, like aperture, show the red button on the corner. Others don't.

3. Office for Mac works generally fine. But some function does not work. Opening the application is much slower than it is under snow leopard. Equation in word will not show properly. I guess this is probably more of a problem in the Microsoft part.

4. Some of the animations don't seem to be smooth. Full screen photobooth is not smooth. When you try to show/hide mail box in mail.app, it is not smooth either. I generally feel Lion a little sluggish as start up and opening application is not as fast

5. Thumbnails in mission control does not look as clear as they are under expose in snow leopard. Maybe it takes some time to get used to.

6. I have a general feeling that Lion is not that smooth. Maybe it is the new animation and it takes time to get used to. Generally, opening application is slower in Lion than in snow leopard. Operation in system preference is a little slower too.

Overall, the new feature in Lion is pretty amazing. I hope those small problem can be soon solved.

 

[InuNacho]

Looking at the review on the App Store it seems like a fair amount of people didn't know that Rosetta was going to be removed, or even what Rosetta was!

 

[AidenShaw]

Looking at the review on the App Store it seems like a fair amount of people didn't know that Rosetta was going to be removed, or even what Rosetta was!

So, apparently unlike Windows (and contrary to AidenShaw's suggestion) - Apple didn't include a simple scan to look for any PPC apps that were installed (and warn the user if it found any) before upgrading to 10.7.

Boundless arrogance and disregard for their users - that's our Apple.

 

[munkery]

http://www.cio.com/article/186901/Windows_Vista_SP1_Breaks_Some_Third_Party_Apps?taxonomyId=3195

http://techrights.org/2009/03/08/vista-7-fixes-nothing/

http://www.windows7news.com/2011/02/14/windows-7-update-breaks-vmware-connection/