Mac OS X Lion Roundup: Recovery Partitions, TRIM, Core 2 Duo Minimum, Security Focus

[cult hero]

A new computer is also a significant investment for some, considering the continually sucky economic climate. Given that, I'd say you're a little too quick to dismiss people's concerns.

These comments would all be valid if... IF... Lion's release suddenly rendered all unsupported hardware unusable in some fashion. My buddy still has a pair of G5 iMacs running Leopard and... they work. They work as well as they did when they were first purchased. Not a single new computer or software release made them run slower or function any differently than they did when they were first purchased.

 

[dime21]

High quality SSD drives support, and benefit from, TRIM.

Garbage collection lets the drive guess about unused space. TRIM lets the OS tell the drive that space is unused, so that the garbage collection *knows* which space is unused.

Garbage collection isn't bad, but TRIM is better. TRIM *and* garbage collection is best.

Exactly. TRIM has to be implemented in the operating system, since it's filesystem aware. When you delete a file, TRIM checks the allocation table of your filesystem (HFS+) to see which blocks belong to that deleted file, then tells the SSD to add those blocks to its garbage collection list.

 

[RMo]

First, many people here don't seem to realize that Core is a 32-bit processor, and Core 2 is a 64-bit processor. (Going from "Core" to "Core 2" is like Pentium to Pentium II, at least in terms of nomenclature. It doesn't mean "dual core," as the Core had both 1- and 2-core processors: Core Solo and Core Duo.)

I understand Apple was excited to get Intel computers on the market and ditch the aging, problematic, and toaster-oven-making G5 processors (and the outdated G4s), but I was surprised they didn't wait until Core 2.

Personally, I never expected them to support Core machines for very long, so I've always bought Core 2. Glad to know that this was a good decision. Despite the similarities in name, they're actually quite different, and I imagine this move is because they don't want to support the OS on 32-bit hardware anymore (a move which MS made in Windows Server 2008, Apple recently in OS X Server--which might actually be related to this since Lion is supposed to incorporate it--and MS, last I heard, is planning to also do for the next [consumer] version of Windows).

 

[dime21]

The days of keeping a computer for four or five years should be over. Gotta rock a new one every two years at a minimum. We need to be spending a LOT of money.

Lol what? Core 2 Duo based Macs have been out since late 2006. That's FIVE years ago. 2011 - 2006 = 5. Your math is wrong if you came up with 2.

Also, the C2D requirement is likely nothing to do with speed or performance, but rather with 64 bitness. I'm betting Lion is 64-bit only, and they're removing all the 32 bit code to save space.

 

[inkhead]

mrblack, Intel SSD don't support trim at all. Buy a real SSD if you want trim support ;-)

Seriously though intel ones have a internal system that handles something like trim but it completely sucks. That's why the next gen of Intel SSD will fully support trim (no Intel SSD available to buy supports trim)

Unfortunately Lion (at least for now) supports trim ONLY on Apple SSDs. My Intel X25-M G2 isn't supported in Lion, even though the drive itself supports TRIM. I've heard the same from people with Vertex 2 drives. Might change by release time, might not. Great way to get people to buy your SSDs....

 

[inkhead]

If your 5 year old laptop runs 10.6 Snow Leopard just fine, then there's no reason to upgrade it to 10.7

10.7 has a lot of high-end under the hood 64-bit features. The finder has 22 different view combinations, every little thing that you hated about the finder is fixed (for real this time), it's still in early beta and this is the BIGGEST update since 10.0… I can't believe the number of staggering features they haven't even covered yet. They have every little thing in it, right down to even signing PDFs by holding up a paper with your signature on it and having the camera scan it.

There's so much 64-bit goodness, that having the enormous burden of supporting 32-bit systems is extremely expensive for development. If Apple wanted to run it on 32-bit systems to make it worth the support headaches and headaches for developers you'd have to charge $300 just to cover support costs, which nobody wants.

You can buy a machine that supports lion for less than $1200… if your worried about it then you should sell your old machine on craigslist and buy a new computer…

Lol what? Core 2 Duo based Macs have been out since late 2006. That's FIVE years ago. 2011 - 2006 = 5. Your math is wrong if you came up with 2.

Also, the C2D requirement is likely nothing to do with speed or performance, but rather with 64 bitness. I'm betting Lion is 64-bit only, and they're removing all the 32 bit code to save space.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

The days of keeping a computer for four or five years should be over. Gotta rock a new one every two years at a minimum. We need to be spending a LOT of money.

Please tell me you are kidding. 5+ years out of a computer is pretty normal now days.

Lol what? Core 2 Duo based Macs have been out since late 2006. That's FIVE years ago. 2011 - 2006 = 5. Your math is wrong if you came up with 2.

Also, the C2D requirement is likely nothing to do with speed or performance, but rather with 64 bitness. I'm betting Lion is 64-bit only, and they're removing all the 32 bit code to save space.

If they are doing that to save space that need to be pretty desperate and cheap because it only effect the media it is sold on. because it is not like it one having a 32 bit kernel is going to effect how much space is used on an installed copy of Lion. It is going to install EITHER a 32 bit or a 64 bit kernal. It is not going to install both.

I see this as more of a force upgrade and not letting people keep 4-5 year old computers. For crying out loud Window 7 installed just find a 6+ year old computer when it first came out and while the computer could run it 64 bit mode it was better to install it as a 32 bit OS.

If you have less than 4 gigs of ram you gain nothing by going 64 bit. If anything 32 bit is a better choice of an OS. At around 3-4 gigs you ram you start seeing the real gains of going 64 bit.

Now Window 8 dropping 32 bit is fine but that is at least 2 years away and the last of the 32 bit computers would of been phased out by then. Core duo was the fault of the fact that intel could not figured out how to make an x86-64 cpu. Hell the x86-64 was AMD design and handy work. Intel is paying AMD money on the patents. Windows instruction set (assembly code stuff here for compilers) for 64 bit is based off of AMD's work. Apple just screwing over early adaptors.

I could complete understand if it was just for devs release they are not releasing the 32 bit part but in the mass release of Lion it would be pretty sad.

 

[cmaier]

I could complete understand if it was just for devs release they are not releasing the 32 bit part but in the mass release of Lion it would be pretty sad.

I suspect that is what is happening. We have no idea if they will add support for the old 32-bit chips later.

 

[PurrBall]

intel could not figured out how to make an x86-64 cpu

Actually, there were Pentium 4s released prior to the Core processors that were 64-bit.

 

[gatortpk]

Core Duo Macs are Technically "Vintage!"

Pretty pathetic that you would need an Intel Core 2 Duo or better to run it. This is Apple obviously wanting to sell more units. Shame. This is probably one of the contributing factors why my company is now phasing back to PC's.

Apple doesn't (barely) even use "Core 2 Duo" anymore! (At least in the MacBook Pro line as of Feb 24, and all iMacs for a while).

Actually, as of today, the first Intel Mac, is actually "Vintage"!

I'm not surprised that "Snow Leopard" was supported on Core Duo, because of PPC drop. However, it appears that "Lion" will be supported on "Vintage" Macs for perhaps a whole year before Mac OS X 10.8 (assuming a release around summer of 2013)

"Vintage" Macs are those that have been discontinued more than 5 years ago.

From: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1752 :
"Vintage products are those that were discontinued more than five and less than seven years ago."

These 15" MacBook Pro: "Core Duo" Introductions and Discontinued dates:

1.67 GHz Intro Date: Jan 10, 2006/ Disc. Date Feb 14, 2006
1.83 GHz Intro Date: Jan 10, 2006/ Disc. Date May 16, 2006
2.00 GHz Intro Date: Feb 14, 2006/ Disc. Date Oct 24, 2006
2.16 GHz Intro Date: Feb 14, 2006/ Disc. Date Oct 24, 2006

The 17" MacBook Pro "Core Duo":
2.16 GHz Intro Date: April 24, 2006/ Disc. Date Oct 24, 2006

The first three "Core 2 Duo" MacBook Pros were all Introduced on Oct 24, 2006.

So, as of today (as I mentioned earlier), the first Intel Mac ever, is actually "Vintage"! And MOST (Virtually ALL) Macs except for the Mac Mini "Core Duo" will be Vintage on Oct 24, 2006 (the iMac "Core Duo" will be vintage in September 6, 2006). The Mac Mini "Core Duo" lasted till Aug 7, 2007)

So I think dropping support for virtually all Macs that'll be "Vintage" computers within months of "Lion's" release isn't such a surprise.

I'd rather have a better Mac OS X, than for Apple to continue to support Vintage and even Obsolete (7+ Year old) Macs.

Microsoft has this major Failing. They try to support too many obsolete machines and end up with a mess. (And the Malware Industry isn't helping them either).

 

[Roller]

Erm... it's not rumored. More like fact.

...The one thing I care about regarding Lion is the rumored whole disk encryption - and that hasn't shown up yet. Hopefully that wasn't just something someone pulled out of their... hat.

Yes, it is there. From Apple: "the all new FileVault, that provides high performance full disk encryption for local and external drives, and the ability to wipe data from your Mac instantaneously."

I would love to dump PGP.

 

[Steve Ballmer]

Windows 7 64-bit runs a 64-bit kernel and will install only on an x64 system, but it runs 32-bit applications just fine. It does require 64-bit drivers. What Apple is doing with Lion is essentially releasing only the 64-bit kernel version. Apparently Microsoft is going to do the same with Windows 8.

Actually, Windows Server 2008 R2 is already a 64-bit only OS, similar to what Lion is (presumably) going to be. And yes, there are rumors Windows 8 might be 64-bit only, but nothing confirmed yet.

And while I do agree that it does seem a little harsh to restrict the OS to Core 2 Duo users and above, I understand why they're doing it. 64-bit computing is the future, and at some point you have to draw the line in the sand. Besides, it's because Lion is 64-bit only that people who can run it will experience much better speed and stability. Steve Jobs demo'd just how much better 64-bit can be at everyday tasks than 32-bit in his WWDC 2007 keynote when he was showing off Leopard.

 

[Riot Nrrrd]

Are there many developers who support PPC anymore? For new applications I'm guessing 0% are PPC. For an established application with a user base, maybe 25% of developers still actively support PPC (again, a guess).

The issue is not so much that but support for legacy apps that people still have.

I have 2 external eSATA RAID units that use the Silicon Image chipset. The SteelVine software that comes with it is PowerPC-only and runs in Rosetta on my MacBook Pro.

I have left e-mails with Silicon Image asking when can we expect an Intel (or at least Universal Binary) version of their SteelVineManager software, only to have it fall on deaf ears. If I move to a new machine running Lion, I won't have any way to control the units (e.g., invoking a rebuild on a degraded disk, checking the status of a rebuild, etc.). I am at the mercy of the vendor.

 

[Riot Nrrrd]

Yes, it is there. From Apple: "the all new FileVault, that provides high performance full disk encryption for local and external drives, and the ability to wipe data from your Mac instantaneously."

I would love to dump PGP.

I can't wait for the FDE advocates to get their comeuppance when their boot drive becomes unbootable because of a "Invalid B-tree node" error (yes this has happened to me) and they think "No problem, I'll just boot from my Disk Warrior disc and repair it ..." and Disk Warrior goes "WTF is this s***? I can't even read/write to the disk, it's encrypted."

 

[Nord]

I'm only gonna miss Visualhub.
... when I get Lion, 'cause right now I'm using a faithful iMac core duo, so...

 

[macsmurf]

mrblack, Intel SSD don't support trim at all. Buy a real SSD if you want trim support ;-)

Seriously though intel ones have a internal system that handles something like trim but it completely sucks. That's why the next gen of Intel SSD will fully support trim (no Intel SSD available to buy supports trim)

Really? Is Intel lying? http://www.intel.com/design/flash/nand/mainstream/index.htm

This seems more like standard Apple anticompetitive practice to me.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I'm using one of the old Core Duos that's losing support, but I can understand Apple's position. The new computers are switching to SSD, so they need to reduce file sizes any way they can, so they are dropping 32-bit support. Also, all Macs from the past 5 years meet this requirement. I don't remember the PC industry supporting their hardware for that long.

The PC industry has supported its hardware for quite some time, but we have Windows XP's 5-year reign to thank for that. But even beyond that, we suffered through Vista because Microsoft couldn't yet figure out a way for people running Legacy code from Windows 95/NT 4.0 to run on the Windows of the future that we all wanted, which ended up being 7. Now that they bundle the XP Mode on 7 Professional and Ultimate Editions, they can overhaul the rest of the OS and move on. Sure, people will get cut, just as we'll see with Core Duo machines with Lion, but that's how the platform evolves and an evolving platform should (hopefully) bring innovation along with it.

 

[Luis Ortega]

I've been running this for couple of hours now. Been pretty good so far

Do you see any improvements over snow leopard in the way the OS works with ram and multi-core systems or performance with pro video and audio apps?
I keep getting the impression from the ads that keep touting fluff like the launchpad and mission control and touchpad stuff that it's not going to be any benefit to those who want an OS that helps them get the most performance and stability from their hardware and software.

 

[Steve Ballmer]

Do you see any improvements over snow leopard in the way the OS works with ram and multi-core systems or performance with pro video and audio apps?
I keep getting the impression from the ads that keep touting fluff like the launchpad and mission control and touchpad stuff that it's not going to be any benefit to those who want an OS that helps them get the most performance and stability from their hardware and software.

Lion only runs on 64-bit processors, so I think there are some real performance improvements. Of course, I haven't run any formal tests so take that with a grain of salt.

 

[Hellhammer]

Do you see any improvements over snow leopard in the way the OS works with ram and multi-core systems or performance with pro video and audio apps?
I keep getting the impression from the ads that keep touting fluff like the launchpad and mission control and touchpad stuff that it's not going to be any benefit to those who want an OS that helps them get the most performance and stability from their hardware and software.

I haven't done anything heavy with it yet but at least Safari eats even more RAM than it used to! Currently eating 1.5GB of my 4GB Kernel takes a bit more RAM as well.

 

[gnasher729]

I can't wait for the FDE advocates to get their comeuppance when their boot drive becomes unbootable because of a "Invalid B-tree node" error (yes this has happened to me) and they think "No problem, I'll just boot from my Disk Warrior disc and repair it ..." and Disk Warrior goes "WTF is this s***? I can't even read/write to the disk, it's encrypted."

That's where Time Machine comes in.

 

[gnasher729]

Consider the following scenario:

1. I download an 8 GiB ISO image of a DVD to my SSD
2. I burn the ISO image to a disc
3. I delete the 8 GiB ISO image

How can GC determine whether that 8 GiB is in use (and must be preserved), or if it's garbage that can be collected?

I'd say "garbage collection" is just the wrong name. What a good SSD drive would do is find 4K blocks that haven't been modified for a while and consolidate them into 512K blocks where they are out of everyone's way and don't interfere with writing. So if your 8 GiB file initially used thousands of 512 K blocks partially, slowing down writes to those blocks, then after a while the drive could recognise that you never touch this data, and migrate it to complete 512K blocks.

 

[Tailpike1153]

These comments would all be valid if... IF... Lion's release suddenly rendered all unsupported hardware unusable in some fashion. My buddy still has a pair of G5 iMacs running Leopard and... they work. They work as well as they did when they were first purchased. Not a single new computer or software release made them run slower or function any differently than they did when they were first purchased.

Could anyone imagine if Apple had a killswitch in an OS upgrade that slagged a Mac if it weren't up to minimum spec? I will admit there are some people who have had there Macs smoked after OS upgrades. I still use my G4 when I down my iMac for upgrades or other maintainance.

 

[AidenShaw]

It would not surprise me if Apple "ported" the client applications/utilities to the server OS and dumped the client.

It's extremely unlikely that Apple has separate source code for Server and Client. It's much more likely that there's only one set of sources, and they set build parameters for "Client" or "Server" to select which one to build.

So no "porting" would be necessary, just an adjustment of the build parameters and/or scripts.

... because they don't want to support the OS on 32-bit hardware anymore (a move which MS made in Windows Server 2008, Apple recently in OS X Server--which might actually be related to this since Lion is supposed to incorporate it--and MS, last I heard, is planning to also do for the next [consumer] version of Windows).

It's "Windows Server 2008 R2" (really "Windows 7 Server") that's x64-only. "Windows Server 2008" (really "Vista V2 Server") is in both x86 and x64 versions.

For crying out loud Window 7 installed just find a 6+ year old computer when it first came out and while the computer could run it 64 bit mode it was better to install it as a 32 bit OS.

It is only "better" to install the x86 version if you can't find x64 drivers - which can be a problem if you have 6+ year old 3rd party devices in your system. Also, many systems of that vintage had 32-bit chipsets, and could only use 3.25 GiB of RAM even with an x64 OS.

If your devices are supported by the x64 version, and you have 4 GiB or more of RAM on a chipset that supports it - it's better to install the x64 version.

Actually, Windows Server 2008 R2 is already a 64-bit only OS, similar to what Lion is (presumably) going to be. And yes, there are rumors Windows 8 might be 64-bit only, but nothing confirmed yet.

Windows.Next may run on an Ipad - Microsoft has demoed it on ARM http://www.windows7newsinfo.com/smf/index.php/topic,14627.msg20365.html#msg20365

I'd say "garbage collection" is just the wrong name. What a good SSD drive would do is find 4K blocks that haven't been modified for a while and consolidate them into 512K blocks where they are out of everyone's way and don't interfere with writing. So if your 8 GiB file initially used thousands of 512 K blocks partially, slowing down writes to those blocks, then after a while the drive could recognise that you never touch this data, and migrate it to complete 512K blocks.

You've pinpointed the advantage of TRIM !

The GC that you describe will waste write cycles (that is, cause unnecessary wear on the flash) moving around data that is unreferenced.

With TRIM, those 4 KiB pages can be marked free, and if a whole 256/512 KiB block of pages is free it can be erased and put into the list of blocks available for immediate writing. (One key to good write performance on an SSD is to have a big pool of pre-erased blocks.)

When GC does have to consolidate scattered 4 KiB pages to free up blocks, it can ignore the pages marked free - saving write cycles and making it faster to find blocks to erase.

(By the way, your GC algorithm is somewhat impossible to implement, since the 4 KiB pages can't be "modified". "Read", "Write" and "Erase (whole block)" are the only operations. There'd be extra bookkeeping to keep track of per-page read and/or write times. In addition, in my example of download->burn->delete, the mostly recently written pages are the garbage - not the oldest pages.)

More info at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write_amplification#cite_note-Anand_WA-4, and OCZ has a white paper on TRIM+GC at http://www.oczenterprise.com/whitepapers/ssds-write-amplification-trim-and-gc.pdf.

 

[ghostlyorb]

Cool.. but too bad SSD costs a fortune!