10 Reasons NOT to Upgrade to Snow Leopard Right Away
If that shiny Snow Leopard disk is singing its siren song, promising you a computing experience full of joy and love and pretty ponies for everyone, plus dazzling performance previously inexperienced by mere humans -- stop. You’re expecting way too much from what is a really nice but not earthshaking upgrade. You are going to be disappointed.
And if you’re struggling to get your upgrade-addicted brain and OMGgottahaveitnow grabby little hands under control, here are ten points to ponder.
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1: "Pioneers get the arrows; settlers get the land”: No one seems to have any idea of who said this first, but it’s become the early adopter counter argument. If you’re the first kid on your block to muck about with new technology, you will also be the first to experience the bugs that slipped by the quality assurance team. Your life doesn’t need any additional complications right now? Wait for Snow Leopard 10.6.1.
2: Bigger benefits down the road: Some of Snow Leopard’s promised performance gains aren’t going to manifest until developers fine-tune their applications to take advantage of Grand Central Dispatch, which enhances the way that software takes advantage of multiple processing cores, and OpenCL, which grabs power from your Mac’s graphics processing unit. For the full-on Snow Leopard experience, give programmers a few months to catch up.
3: Your Mac can’t handle Snow Leopard: 32-bit Intel Macs, machines with graphics cards that are more than a couple of years old, even Macs that were released more than two years ago will not magically turn into speed demons with Snow Leopard. If you want to run Snow Leopard just to take advantage of other features like the enhanced Services menu, perkier iChat, and improved accessibility, might as well wait for the likely-improved 10.6.1 release. Of course Snow Leopard WILL NOT work on any PowerPC Mac. This is an Intel only party.
4: Your favorite software doesn’t work with Snow Leopard: The majority of core business applications run fine on Snow Leopard, but some apps aren’t playing nicely with the new OS. Check the list at The Snow Leopard Wiki to see what’s not working and what’s sort of working before you upgrade. The Wiki currently lists 70+ apps that aren’t compatible with Snow Leopard, such as Adobe CS2 Suite, Cyber Duck, CuteFTP, Google Gears browser extension, TiVo Desktop 1.94, Parallels 3.0 (v.4.0 works),and others that are “sort of” working, like the Adobe CS3 Suite, where Photoshop CS3 and Dreamweaver are reportedly experiencing minor bugs. Your mileage may vary here -- sometimes bugs manifest due to a combination of issues that may not be present on everyone’s machines -- but if a program you rely on is on the “not working” list you might want to wait a week or two to see if others experience the same problem.
5: You have ancient peripherals that you respect or can’t afford to replace: Your rather mature mobile phone, that slide scanner you only use a few times a year, the creaky old printer you rely on for faxing and cranking out documents cheaply, the old camera you keep to futz around with in the rain or by the ocean… don’t blithely assume they’ll be supported in Snow Leopard. If you love it and don’t want to lose it, wait and see if the manufacturer rolls out updated drivers in the next month or two -- certainly newer products will be first on the provide-support priority list.
6: You don’t have time to do an upgrade properly: This is likely of deep concern only to geeks, the rest of you should feel free to scamper along to #7. Nerds know that getting the most out of an update involves trashing all the old crap that lurks on the computer, dumping the 9,001 applications you tried out once and never used again, checking out the health of hard drives (maybe -- thrill of thrills -- re-partitioning them), backing up data or making a mirror copy of your computer if you can’t afford more than an hour of downtime, etc. If you don’t have the time to do the upgrade right, wait until you do. Otherwise, you’ll always wonder just how good it could have been.
7. Exchange Isn’t Plug and Play: Don’t believe the hype, out of the box support for Microsoft Exchange doesn’t mean Exchange is going to work if your IT department still has to turn on Exchange Autodiscover. And don’t expect IT to instinctively understand how to get you Mac going with Exchange, especially if you work in a mostly-PC shop. If IT lacks patience, you may want to wait until the brave early adopters report back with full details on how to get Exchange going.
8: You are super paranoid (but that doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you): Snow Leopard includes some new anti-malware capabilities, warning users about programs that are included in file. Currently only two programs are blocked and both are certifiably bad news. But (put on those tin foil hats) Apple and pretty much anyone who has access to the machine could -- in theory -- upgrade the no-go file to block all sorts of applications, torrents, program hacks and cracks, etc. (Some Windows users really have experienced this when overenthusiastic malware programs refuse to download application cracks, claiming that Trojans lurk within). The deeply suspicious among us will want to wait and see how this shakes out before they upgrade (and if they weren’t worrying about this before -- hah! -- they sure are worrying now).
9: Snow Leopard isn’t a killer upgrade: Seriously, what do you expect for $29 bucks or less? Snow Leopard is indisputably the start of something really new and cool -- an operating system that wrings every last drop of power from hardware and software components. It’s an exciting glimpse into the future, but the here-and-now reality of Snow Leopard isn’t thrilling.
10: If it ain't broke, don't fix it: Happy with the way your Mac is performing? Leave it be. No, really. Hands off. Put the disk down and back away from the Mac right now. Oh, who are we kidding? Happy upgrade day, everyone!
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valereee
July 12, 2010 at 11:14am
And it's not just ancient peripherals...my HP C6380, which is just one year old, isn't supported. No way to make it work. I am livid. This is what I switched to a mac ten years ago to avoid. I will never voluntarily upgrade a mac OS again.
jblaize
March 23, 2010 at 2:18pm
First off, the primary difference between Leopard and Snow Leopard is that the kernel and many of the built-in apps are compiled as 64-bit. Without going into details of what this means, not only are these apps faster, but Apple's done a great job of making 64-bit apps more robust.Many of us have purchased an Intel Mac of some sort. And only the very first Intel Macs (the Core 1 Duo -- not the Core 2) are 32-bit. This happened within months of releasing the first of the dual core Intel Macs, so very few people are stuck with 32-bit processors. You much likelier either have the old PPC G4 processor, one of the IBM G5s, or if you have an Intel Mac, it's very likely 64-bit.One of the greatest improvements in Snow Leopard is that they FINALLY rewrote the Finder, which until now was still a Carbon piece of junk that faltered and hung and drove us all a bit nuts. It's much better now.The upgrade from Leopard to Snow Leopard was a whopping $29. Unlike other upgrades from major versions -- like say from Tiger to Leopard -- there was ZERO problems and it was utterly seamless. I was truly surprised at how transparent and effortless the upgrade was. I'm a power user, and I'd expected to have to make a lot of changes to handle the new OS.Finally, until you've tried the Exchange addition to Snow Leopard, maybe you shouldn't talk about it. For her work, my girlfriend begrudgingly uses Entourage simply because she's always felt there's no real option. Well, the fine morons at Microsoft managed to screw up Entourage 2008 so it wasn't properly handling calendar posts on the Exchange Server. So they brilliantly came up with a solution: post a new version of Entourage on the MS website and call it "Entourage 2008 Web Services Edition" and up the version number from 12.2 or whatever to 13.something. Anyway, sure, this fixed the calendaring, but now people using that POS can't receive new emails.Long story short, I took her laptop, started up Apple Mail.app, and within seconds it auto-detected the MS Exchange settings (without special Exchange Server setup). Not even Entourage could auto-detect the Exchange Server settings on either version, and so we had to manually set it up each time. But Apple Mail.app figured it out automagically, and auto-setup everything it needed for iCal as well, including being able to reserve conference rooms, etc. Apple really did an AMAZING job with their Exchange support. Don't let anyone try and scare you into thinking it won't work just because of their history with Exchange or the fact that Microsoft themselves can't seem to figure it out on a Mac.Snow Leopard absolutely rocks. It's faster, super reliable, and outside of Fink or MacOS Ports I've compiled myself, everything works flawlessly. In fact, the ONLY problem, if you want to call it that, is that InputManagers have to be 64-bit and must now live in /Library/InputManagers. But screw it... use the new SIMBL stuff that's out and 64-bit too.
lovestar
November 27, 2009 at 4:01pm
! شات دردشه شات كويتي دردشه كويتيه ، شات كويت60 شات كازنوفا شات سعودي شاات مصريه شات كويت25 شات دردشة دردشه #
benet
November 10, 2009 at 6:38pm
Every little chat Salon 1000 ah!replica watchYou are my best's buddy
213
franky
September 14, 2009 at 6:55pm
Unfortunately, I read this page after upgrading...
The upgrade CD is still in and the macbook pro seems not willing to start, ever !
Any idea ?
harleyjon
September 01, 2009 at 9:21pm
Man I feel for you bro....or who ever. I guess you must really love your job to endure the mean things people say. It's funny how we all have an opinion and that opinion seems to always put down the other person who disagrees. Our reality is often based on our own experience in our little MAC World. The only true facts of 10.6 will be seen on a massive scale as the months pass. It's kind of nice to have a stable environment that is reliable and ultra simple to use.
kadamsinco
August 31, 2009 at 7:36am
The upgrade was very smooth. Answer one question and walk away.... took about 40 minutes on my MacBook Pro and a bit longer than that on my Mac Mini. I just made sure I was running the latest version of my applications and everything was working fine. I did have to uninstall/reinstall the Cisco VPN client (but then switched to the built-in one), and Parallels 3 doesn't work, but instead of upgrading to version 4 I switched to Sun's VirtualBox, which works great. Overall a very painless experience, and now I'm set for all future upgrades from Apple and my app vendors. Oh, I also got back 20+ GB of space in the process, which was a very nice bonus.
natewsmith
August 29, 2009 at 11:16pm
Hey,
Was the first to purchase it at the apple store Friday morning!
I've never, ever had a problem upgrading to a new OS when it has first come out. Not even with any of the Windows Operating Systems.
This one by far is superior to Leopard. I've had no problems with Snow Leopard at all. Leopard was a little shaky and I couldn't wait till 10.5.1 but I haven't had any problems what so ever.
I love this new Cat. It's freaking fast!!!
willtaylorisawesome
August 29, 2009 at 5:42pm
I got it but it crashed my macbookpro but my iMac it was fine and it is pretty cool I like it more my MacBook isn't very good though If you want some new features then you should get it if you want
thedow
August 29, 2009 at 8:33am
I have been chomping on the bit since the news came out of the release date for SL. But I think I might just wait until I upgrade my macmini to 10.6, or maybe not. I'm so perplexed.......
jimlynch
August 29, 2009 at 8:29am
I disagree about not upgrading right away. My experience has been great so far. See the column below for details.
5 Reasons Why I Love Mac OS X Snow Leopard!
http://jimlynch.com/index.php/2009/08/28/5-reasons-why-i-love-mac-os-x-snow-leopard/
kadamsinco
August 29, 2009 at 4:03am
Upgraded yesterday and things are working well. I did have to make sure I was on the latest release of all my applications for Snow Leopard support (including upgrading from Parallels 3 to 4), and I had to reinstall my Cisco VPN client to get it to work again, but overall it as a very smooth transition on my 15" Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro.
cdnair
August 28, 2009 at 11:12am
dumping the 9,001 applications...ITS OVER 9,000!!!!!!!!!!!!!1!!!oneoneYeah... I caught it.
Jokotai
August 27, 2009 at 8:39pm
I happen to own one of those antiquated single-core Mac Mini's that is perhaps the most questionable of all of the supported platforms on which SL is to run. My wife is currently ranting and raving over the lack of version detection on the upgrade disc, but I'm holding firm to the ideal of waiting for at least a few weeks.
1) Wait to see if there's any complaint from another core solo user.
2) Find the $229 it's going to cost me (since I want the iLife and iWork upgrades and at least 2 of the 5 licenses)
3) Give me time to find the .dmg files of all of those apps I know and love so I don't have to wait to install them once I get my disc.
jwkessler
September 01, 2009 at 2:27pm
I have a Core Solo Mini that I retired after my mom - the original user of this machine - complained so much about how slow it was. I replaced it with a Core 2 Duo machine that ran much better. So when my Snow Leopard disk arrived I thought I'd give it a try on the pokey Mini. It turned it into a rather usable machine - much snappier performance! It may bog down again when or if I add more stuff but for now it looks useful again. I intend to use it as a juke box in my theater room. It should be fine for that simple application.
clintbradford
August 27, 2009 at 7:36pm
No, darn it - Nothing's gonna make me NOT drive an hour each way tonight to go to an authorized Apple dealer that's opening from 12:01-2:00am to sell Snow Leopard. But I think I'll install it on an external drive and boot from it, adding my desired apps as they become compatible.
danshelley
August 27, 2009 at 4:03pm
Ordered CD online last week as part of a upgrade agreement.
Now will have to wait all weekend until the new CD arrives.
Oh well, at least i will have a social life this weekend!
Brendan Bartholomew
August 27, 2009 at 3:44pm
...Mac software developers have this annoying habit of releasing apps, utilities, games and plug-ins that only work on the most recent release of OS X. So as much as we'd like to not upgrade, soon we will be forced to.
Don't believe me? Try finding useful software for any mac running 10.3 or 10.4. Not so easy, is it? It's only a matter of month before OS X 10.5.8 won't be current enough to run all the cool new stuff.
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