Mac Leopard Out Tomorrow, and the Reviews Are Positive

Microsoft likes to make Windows users wait for releases. It's usually a good three to five year drought between one version of its operating system to the next, with a bunch of free updates released along the way. Apple, on the other hand, likes to drop nearly annual updates of its current operating system called OS X. Each new release brings some new suite of updates and features and sells for about $130. OS X version 10.5, codenamed Leopard, supercedes last year's Tiger release, and should be hitting stores tomorrow. That means reviews are hitting the wire today, and most seem to think that the update is $130 well spent.

Most reviews focus on the biggest new addition, Time Machine, which enables you to easily and automatically back your Mac up to an external hard drive, then use the software to recover lost files by seeing how your machine looked at virtually any time.

Edward C. Baig, who reviewed Leopard for at 'USA Today' says "recovering lost files is -- thanks to beautiful special effects -- like flying back in time." He also likes the new Back to My Mac remote desktop feature, which lets you connect to one Mac Leopard machine from any other Mac Leopard machine ... at least in theory. He did find a few occurrences where the machines wouldn't connect, however.

David Pogue from the 'New York Times' also likes Time Machine, saying: "When you connect the second drive, Leopard asks if you want to use it for Time Machine. If you click O.K., that's it. One click - that's got to be the shortest setup of any backup system in history." However, he doesn't dig the new transparent menus, which can be difficult to read when appearing over text.

Walt Mossberg from 'Wall Street Journal' echoes the complaints about transparent menus, and in his review compares Leopard quite favorably to Vista when it comes to compatibility:

"In fact, every piece of software and hardware I tried on two Leopard-equipped Macs -- a loaned laptop from Apple and my own upgraded iMac -- worked fine, exhibiting none of the compatibility problems that continue to plague Vista. My old Hewlett-Packard inkjet printer, for which Vista lacks the proper software, worked instantly in Leopard, even over the network. And, unlike with Vista, it was able to print on both sides of the page. I popped my old Verizon cellphone modem card into the test Leopard laptop and it worked, too, with no software installation or tweaking."

So, the reports are good, and the only question is whether it's worth the $130 entry point. If you're the type who is lax about backing up your files, photos, music, movies, and the like, then yes, you should run out and buy Leopard tomorrow and sleep a little better at night knowing that your iTunes collection is safe. Otherwise, the upgrades here seem somewhat minor, and you're probably safe holding off until Apple's next feline-themed OS X release, which we expect, oh, sometime next year.

From USA Today, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal

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Tags: Apple, Laptop Reviews, LaptopReviews, Leopard, Mac OS X, MacOsX, OS, Review Roundups, ReviewRoundups