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nickjalder

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 28, 2006
28
0
OK i have a really stupid question...

when people talk about OS X, what does this refer to. Is it an OS system like tiger or leopard? Or is it something else?

sorry trying to get used to mac lingo.

thanks
 

tech4all

macrumors 68040
Jun 13, 2004
3,399
489
NorCal
Cheetah (10.0), Puma, (10.1), Jaguar, (10.2), Panther, (10.3), Tiger, (10.4), and soon Leopard (10.5) are all OS X. There just different updated versions of each other.

Does that make sense? :)
 

WildCowboy

Administrator/Editor
Staff member
Jan 20, 2005
18,390
2,829
OS X has been the core operating system for Macs since 2001. Tiger (OS X 10.4) and the forthcoming Leopard (OS X 10.5) are just versions of OS X released as it evolves with new features and functionalities.
 

Eraserhead

macrumors G4
Nov 3, 2005
10,434
12,250
UK
Cheetah (10.0), Puma, (10.1), Jaguar, (10.2), Panther, (10.3), Tiger, (10.4), and soon Leopard (10.5) are all OS X. There just different updated versions of each other.

Does that make sense? :)

It's the operating system, Apple also had Mac OS 1 to Mac OS 9, these are known as "Classic" and Mac OS X is totally different from them. It's like Mac OS 1 to 9 are DOS and Mac OS X is Windows, though Mac OS 1 to 9 weren't command line based.
 

72930

Retired
May 16, 2006
9,060
4
OS stands for operating system. There used to be OS9, now there is OS 10 , called OS X (because it sounds better), every year or two-ish there is a new version of OSX, 10.1, 10.2 etc. Right now, were on OSX 10.4, called tiger, in spring 2007, well have OSX 10.5 leopard.
 

Blackheart

macrumors 6502a
Mar 13, 2004
938
0
Seattle
OS means Operating System. Mac OS X; Mac OS 9; Windows 95, 98, 2000, XP; are all operating systems.

Mac OS X (pronounced "ten", not "ex") is the tenth major revision (in theory) of the Macintosh Operating System. The less major releases are denoted as 10.0 (the original release), 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, 10.4, 10.5, etc.
 

musicpenguy

macrumors 68000
Oct 29, 2006
1,824
734
Not really because it sounds better X: Stands for Unix, OS X is a unix based operating system.
 

ero87

macrumors 65816
Jan 17, 2006
1,196
1
New York City
... it stands for Unix?? I'm not sure I buy that. I mean, it doesn't SOUND better (it's pronounced the same :) ) but Mac OSX certainly looks cooler than Mac OS 10.
 

Chundles

macrumors G5
Jul 4, 2005
12,037
493
Not really because it sounds better X: Stands for Unix, OS X is a unix based operating system.

Yeah, but the X is pronounced "Ten" - Steve said so at the launch.

Anyone who says it's "Ex" is going against the word of Steve and you know what happens when you do that.... POW! Right in the kisser.
 

MacBoobsPro

macrumors 603
Jan 10, 2006
5,114
6
I was under the impression the X was used as the roman numeral for 10 i.e. OS10 with the added bonus of X (ex) for unix.

And its 'O ess ten' damn it! :D
 
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