New User-New iMac...OSX 10.3 or 10.4 ?

[arklab]

Hi, we're new to macs and could use some advice.

I'm getting my wife a new 2.0 iMac G5 17" with the bluetooth keyboard and mouse (in fact it's it's on the FedEx truck for delivery right now).
We also bought the 3 year service contract (not wanting to lose the whole thing if ether monitor or motherboard should go out).

I am aware that this system comes with OSX 10.4 (Tiger) pre-installed.

My question (and concern) is weather it might not be better to buy 10.3 (Panther) and run it for six months or so.
Panther (from what I've read) seems stable and a gradual progression from 10.0.
Everyone seems to know and understand it.

Tiger, on the other hand, seems a radical leap forward.

It's programmers also seem to have taken a "crash" course in system security from Microsoft!
It's REALLY hard to imagine how the Dashboard "hole" could have slipped by unnoticed.

This is exactly the kind of thing we were fed-up with Microsoft about!
(Well, that and product activation)
It also smacks of the Microsoft philosophy of using paying customers as Beta Testers.

OK, <Rant OFF>

Anyway, what do you think? With a safe, stable system as our goal, would we be better off with Panther?
At least for a while?

Thanks!


PS: Oh, and can we still get Panther direct from Apple? I don't see it anywhere.

 

[superfunkomatic]

My question (and concern) is weather it might not be better to buy 10.3 (Panther) and run it for six months or so.
Panther (from what I've read) seems stable and a gradual progression from 10.0.
Everyone seems to know and understand it.

Tiger, on the other hand, seems a radical leap forward.

i think you'll find Tiger is quite stable. the only oddities seem to be in networking by VPN or citrix (in my use), otherwise it's fine. i've found it to be considerably quicker than 10.3 and the new features like spotlight are really handy. i'd go with 10.4.

 

[mkrishnan]

I dunno...people I know who've taken good precautions, including myself, have had stability issues with Tiger. 10.3.9 had a few people like that too, but the ratio was much smaller than for Tiger. If stability is important, I would say that Panther for a few months would be wise. Every release of Panther after 10.3.5 was pretty much rock solid for me, except 10.3.8. I sadly haven't had uptime of greater than 2 or 3 days at a time with Tiger, because of weird lock ups and hangs. And I took a lot of precautions to carry over as little as humanly possible from my Panther install....

 

[SteveC]

I'm not sure where (or if) you can buy Panther.

You know though, by the time you find and buy Panther, install it, and enjoy your iMac for a month, OS 10.4.1 will be out and you'll want to be using Tiger like the rest of us.

Don't let us decide FOR YOU though. I'd play with Tiger a few days, see how you like it, and then decide. Maybe everything will go fine for you. Nice and smooth, no problems... if so, stick with 10.4. If not, go with 10.3 if you want.

 

[mkrishnan]

FWIW, Panther seems readily available on eBay for $20-50. I dunno what I would do if I were you though. Steve's point, that 10.4.1 will probably heal a lot of wounds, is true. And a factory install will be slightly cleaner than even the almost clean installs of those of us who've been having trouble, so you never know....

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Actually, I believe this is a non-issue - the newest iMac G5's won't run Panther. You MUST use Tiger or later.

 

[arklab]

Actually, I believe this is a non-issue - the newest iMac G5's won't run Panther. You MUST use Tiger or later.

Emm ... exactly how do you figure that ?

 

[Macky-Mac]

i really doubt you would find any advantage in going to Panther.........too much trouble for too little gain....if there's actually ANY gain

I DONT see thread upon thread complaining about Tiger, certainly not any more complaints than there are about problems with the last versions of Panther.....not enough to suggest avoiding Tiger certainly

and so far the Dashboard security hole, if it really is a problem, that seems to be something that you can avoid by not downloading widgets for a bit until the situation resolves itself

doesn't seem to be worth it as far as I can see

 

[mkrishnan]

I DONT see thread upon thread complaining about Tiger, certainly not any more complaints than there are about problems with the last versions of Panther.....not enough to suggest avoiding Tiger certainly

Read the Tiger bugs thread ... we knew what we were getting into by adopting early, but there are definitely issues. It has *huge* potential, and I think I am going to like it much more than I like Panther (and I really like Panther) but it does have some growing pains. I think a lot of it has to do with the kernel upgrade... it isn't so obvious, but it can have huge implications.

 

[beatle888]

we knew what we were getting into by adopting early

i run tiger on a Tibook and a new iMac. both run fine. no stability problems what so ever.


and arclab's comment on dashboard....well....just dont install widgets from sketchy websites. why not just download from apples widget site until the "issue" is fixed? no need to be about it.

 

[mkrishnan]

i run tiger on a Tibook and a new iMac. both run fine. no stability problems what so ever.

I'm not saying that 100% of the people who run Tiger have issues. But I don't think 100% of the people who do have issues are having issues because they're incompetent either.

 

[beatle888]

I'm not saying that 100% of the people who run Tiger have issues. But I don't think 100% of the people who do have issues are having issues because they're incompetent either.

and i dont think that as well. you make a good point.
i hope you didnt think thats what i was saying cause it wasnt.

 

[Macky-Mac]

I'm not saying that 100% of the people who run Tiger have issues. But I don't think 100% of the people who do have issues are having issues because they're incompetent either.

every time there's a new release of the OS some people have trouble with it......go back just a few weeks/months and in these forums you'll read about the problems that lots of people had with the last couple of releases of OS 10.3.x......lots of issues with lost firewire drives, printer problems and so on. Jaguar went to 10.2.8 and Panther went to 10.3.9, and those revisions didn't reflect just new features being addded but an ongoing process of fixing bugs and conflicts.

With a major revision like Tiger there are going to lots of little things that come up for different people.......that's reflected in the various threads that posted here......what I don't see is any evidence that a significant percentage of users are having crippling daily problems

and I don't think that people are having problems because they're incompetent either.....an OS is a complicated piece of work and things go wrong with individual installations.....and yes, there are some bugs that will have to be worked out, but there are always things being fixed in the OS

 

[wrldwzrd89]

Emm ... exactly how do you figure that ?

You can't run a version of the Mac OS on a Mac earlier than the one that came installed on that Mac - simple as that.

 

[mkrishnan]

and i dont think that as well. you make a good point.
i hope you didnt think thats what i was saying cause it wasnt.

No worries, thanks for saying it though!

 

[arklab]

OK, I'm new to Mac, but not computers.
And I do appreciate all this help.

But:

You can't run a version of the Mac OS on a Mac earlier than the one that came installed on that Mac - simple as that.

Why on earth not?
You may need to format the drive first, but what you are saying makes no sense whatsoever.

Does anybody else agree that it's IMPOSSIBLE TO LOAD OR RUN PANTHER ON A NEW (05) IMAC?

It just seems like a bit much to swallow.
But like I said, I'm new to Mac.

 

[mkrishnan]

Does anybody else agree that it's IMPOSSIBLE TO LOAD OR RUN PANTHER ON A NEW (05) IMAC?

This came up in another thread, and some people suggested that the firmware blocks versions of the OS earlier than the factory install, but others said that at least in some cases, they were able to downgrade. I don't know that anyone here has gotten Tiger pre-installed and tried. It sounds insane to me too, because it would be totally lacking in credibility in a corporate setting (where IT dep'ts still routinely buy new win pcs and image win2k on them, and where there are apps that are broken on Tiger atm).

 

[wrldwzrd89]

OK, I'm new to Mac, but not computers.
And I do appreciate all this help.

But:


Why on earth not?
You may need to format the drive first, but what you are saying makes no sense whatsoever.

Does anybody else agree that it's IMPOSSIBLE TO LOAD OR RUN PANTHER ON A NEW (05) IMAC?

It just seems like a bit much to swallow.
But like I said, I'm new to Mac.

The root cause of this behavior is one of hardware. Apple includes special hardware enablers with each Mac OS release to support their newest Macs. Without these enablers, the Mac won't boot the Mac OS version you're trying to use. Since Apple ships the new iMac G5 with Tiger, there are bound to be support files specific to the new iMac G5 - these won't be present on Panther, and thus will prevent the machine from booting Panther.

 

[igucl]

I'll sell you Panther.

 

[SteveC]

You can't run a version of the Mac OS on a Mac earlier than the one that came installed on that Mac - simple as that.

That seems ridiculous. I'm calling Apple to ask. Guess what I'm also doing as soon as my iMac gets here?

Partition - Install Tiger and Panther - See if it works for myself.

I could be wrong, but whoa... I'll be shocked if it's true. I'm not questioning your credibility, by the way. lol. I know for a fact that I downgraded OSes on my previous eMac though.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

That seems ridiculous. I'm calling Apple to ask. Guess what I'm also doing as soon as my iMac gets here?

Partition - Install Tiger and Panther - See if it works for myself.

I could be wrong, but whoa... I'll be shocked if it's true. I'm not questioning your credibility, by the way. lol. I know for a fact that I downgraded OSes on my previous eMac though.

I know that attempting to downgrade will NOT work when the most recent model of your Mac product line has had significant hardware changes compared to the previous model. In lesser cases, like a speed bump update, the chances of success are higher.

 

[SteveC]

I know that attempting to downgrade will NOT work when the most recent model of your Mac product line has had significant hardware changes compared to the previous model. In lesser cases, like a speed bump update, the chances of success are higher.

Well that's exactly what we are talking about here (with the iMac). The new iMac sports changes that are simply bumps of several specs. (Processor, RAM, GPU, HD, and a few added features.) I don't see why Panther won't run on it. I'm on hold with Apple right now.

 

[SteveC]

And it's official. *Sticks chest out - proud of himself* LOL

Just spoke to THREE (3) people at Apple and they said,

"Yes, the new iMac G5 1.8 and 2.0GHz processor models will run Panther as well as Tiger."

I have a thread to go visit with someone who told me I shouldn't be saying the new iMacs will run Panther if I didn't know what I was talking about, and he went on to tell me I was wrong about it. Now, I have 3 people from Apple who back me up. Hah!

 

[wrldwzrd89]

And it's official. *Sticks chest out - proud of himself* LOL

Just spoke to THREE (3) people at Apple and they said,

"Yes, the new iMac G5 1.8 and 2.0GHz processor models will run Panther as well as Tiger." In fact, they said they would run OS 10.0, 10.1, and 10.2 as well.

I have a thread to go visit with someone who told me I shouldn't be saying the new iMacs will run Panther if I didn't know what I was talking about, and he went on to tell me I was wrong about it. Now, I have 3 people from Apple who back me up. Hah!

I doubt that Mac OS X 10.0 and 10.1 would run on ANY G5-based Mac (since they lack G5 support), as well as all versions of 10.2 except the ones made specifically for the first PowerMac G5s (same reason). I wouldn't be surprised if Panther runs on the new iMac G5s, though.

 

[SteveC]

I doubt that Mac OS X 10.0 and 10.1 would run on ANY G5-based Mac (since they lack G5 support), as well as all versions of 10.2 except the ones made specifically for the first PowerMac G5s (same reason). I wouldn't be surprised if Panther runs on the new iMac G5s, though.

I thought that may simply have been an ambitious statement by the guy who said it. So I'm with you there. It's clear that Panther will run on the new iMac G5s though. All 3 reps said so, and even checked their documentation for me, which says it supports 10.3 and 10.4, and I thought that was the case all along.