In all the early hype about Apple’s forthcoming iCloud service, little has yet been said about support for older operating systems, specifically Snow Leopard 10.6 which is still in wide use. As it turns out, Apple may be slipping out at least one more update to the snowy cat to allow basic iCloud sync support.
MacRumors is reporting that Apple may be planning a 10.6.9 update to Mac OS X Snow Leopard for compatibility with the forthcoming iCloud service -- or rather, part of it. A developer working in an old version of Mac OS X Tiger 10.4 happened to notice a message in his .Mac preference pane which indicates that iCloud will require a minimum of Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.9, which currently does not exist.
“You will no longer be able to sync with this machine because you've upgraded to iCloud,” the full message reads. “iCloud requires a computer running Mac OS X Snow Leopard v10.6.9 or later for Contacts, Calendars, and Bookmarks.”
The message would seem to indicate that Snow Leopard users won’t be left entirely in the dark when iCloud launches, although Apple’s website indicates that many of the features will require OS X Lion to function.
“Some features of iCloud require iOS 5 on iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPod touch (3rd and 4th generation), iPad, or iPad 2, or a Mac computer with OS X Lion or a PC with Windows Vista or Windows 7 (Outlook 2007 or 2010 recommended),” the fine print on the iCloud web page reveals.
Sadly, it appears PowerPC-based Mac users running Mac OS X Leopard 10.5 are being left in the lurch with this transition. Apple will allow current MobileMe subscribers to access their account until June, 2012, although there’s no indication that the minimum sync services for Contacts, Calendars and Bookmarks will continue to work after making the move to iCloud.
Developers have been testing iCloud over the summer and recently were given the option to transition their MobileMe account to the new service as part of the beta version, which also requires iOS 5 as well as Mac OS X 10.7.2, with an iPhoto 9.2 beta also available for testing the new Photo Stream service.
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(Image courtesy of MacRumors)
