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12-inch 1.5 GHz PowerBook - Flawless on Tiger; not so much with Leopard
Experiences with Leopard overwhelmingly positive
Lack of WindowShade X compatibility the holdup
Adding Folders To Dock In Leopard?
Browser comparo
External drive much cheaper in the US than in Canada
Re: Leopard Has Landed, Finally - Up And Running
12-inch 1.5 GHz PowerBook - Flawless on Tiger; not so much with Leopard
From Derek;
Charles,
Great article and I'm in the same boat with my 12-inch 1.5 GHz PowerBook. Flawless on Tiger; not so much with Leopard. To be fair, I WANT to like Leopard and it does run great on my wife's new MacBook - she has had no issues. My fans cycle on and off as well, my email is flaky, and I have sudden shutdown issues when my battery gets to about 33 percent. It's only a 75-cycle battery and this started right when I upgraded.
I will be joining you in going back to Tiger to see if things get stable again. I am not whining or moaning about any of this, just backing some of your observations. I believe Leopard is a great OS for some (most?) systems, but my particular PB is not one of them.
Hi Derek;
It's reassuring to hear that it's not just me.
I think it depends on what you do with the machine, although email is pretty universal (well- Webmail seems to work OK, or as OK as it can on 26,400 bps dialup in my case, but I need POP 3).
At this writing, I've been back in OS 10,4,11 for a day and a half, and the fan hasn't come on yet (current processor temp. 50.5° C).
Charles
Experiences with Leopard overwhelmingly positive
From j b melby
I feel for those who're experiencing problems with Leopard. As a Mac consultant, I know that with a system as complex as today's operating systems must be, there are many things that can go seriously wrong.
However, my experiences (except for Stacks - a great idea, but one that Apple should have included as an option, without getting rid of the dock hierarchical menus) with Leopard have been overwhelmingly positive. I've installed it on both Intel and PPC Macs, and it has worked like a charm. At least for me, Leopard seems not only much faster than Tiger, but also much more stable and less prone to problems related to directory corruption. Mail (again, for me - your mileage may vary) works very well. It was quite slow before the 10.5.1 update, but now it flies. I've had Safari quit twice, but otherwise it's been a gem. Compatibility with some really heavy applications such as Pro Tools has been much better than was the case in the move from Panther to Tiger. Obviously there're some compatibility problems, but I would have expected many more than I've encountered.
Just my two cents' worth!
Hi jb;
Thanks for your comment.
I agree that if most Leopard users were having the sort of experience I am with it, there would be ugly mobs storming Cupertino with tar and feathers.
However, it's not just me (see Derek's letter above). I too find Tiger a little livelier in Finder response and opening documents, etc. than Tiger even on this old PPC rig, but there's no excuse for the email problems. Back in OS 10.4.11 for now, email is working flawlessly across the board. There seems to be a serious incompatibility with my ISP's POP and SMTP servers, and Sympatico is the largest Internet provider in Canada, so it's not a case of some little fly-by-night operation.
As for stability, the OS itself seems to be fine, but then, Tiger is too. However, I've had several applications crash and the Finder lock up requiring a force relaunch. Safari 3, which is the first version of Safari I've really liked, has not crashed on me so far, but it's good in OS 10.4.11 too.
It's good to hear that some folks are having good experiences with Laopard, and I think that some of the issues that are plaguing me are related to the unhappy fact that I'm stuck with an internet connection that is slow even by dialup standards (I get 26,400 bps connections on good days), but I can't blame the excessive heat entirely on that, although I expect the modem contributes.
It sure is peaceful back here in OS 10.4.11, which Leopard has sharpened my appreciation of.
Charles
Lack of WindowShade X compatibility the holdup
From iGreg
The number one reason I have not touched Leopard yet is the lack of WindowShade X compatibilty at this time. The number two reason is I got the definite sence from my close monitering of MacFixIt that Leopard is more of a bumpy ride than recent OX versions in their early stages. So I shall withhold my $129 for a while yet. I am sure in due course Leopard will get cleaned up, and various shareware/freeware I use (like WindowShade X)will become compatible.
BTW, I checked Leopard out in an Apple Store and frankly I do not like the new dock, it is more distracting & strange looking than Tiger. I never liked any of the OS X docks and think Apple should provide a means of disabling or permanantly hiding it. Actually, one of the few things I think Windows got right was the Start menu.
Hi Greg;
You're a man after my own heart on the WindowShade X issue. I guess I'll survive this interval before Unsanity Software get WSX/APE fixed and Leopard-compatible, but it's definitely a challenge, and taking a lot of the fun out of using Leopard in the meantime.
I've never been a fan of the Dock, and am still not, although I do like the aesthetics of the Leopard Dock better than previous iterations. JUst a matter of taste, I guess.
You may be already aware of this, but you can configure the Dock to automaticallly display/hide on mouseover by checking a box in the Dock Preferences panel.
Charles
Adding Folders To Dock In Leopard?
From Kevin Shaffer
Hi there:
I've not upgraded to Leopard yet, and don't know if I'd like the way it is set up to handle things in "stacks" since I use the folder/file method of previous Mac systems.
Even putting a folder (symbiotic link) icon in the Dock isn't supposedly an option in Leopard. Or if it is, there are new rules(?)
Another way (at least in Tiger) to make an access point to a folder, in the Dock, is to drag the folder into a web browser; then drag that new page's address onto the desktop. *You can add web urls to the Dock; will this work in Leopard, too? If this allows a folder (alias in form of web page link) in Leopard, that'd help keep desktop clutter in a minimum w/o stacks.
(*)In Tiger, this makes an alias in the form of a web URL which opens the folder and other contents are as usual inside it. If you find this works in Leopard (and the saved original folder's location may need to be on the hard drive before dragging it into the Browser of choice; I used Fx <http://2.0.0.9>2.0.0.9) let me know. [I've just upgraded my desktop iMac G4 1.25 17" machine to Tiger 10.4.0 and then 10.4.11; plus the extras to make that all work.] Seems to do OK; now both my G4s are on Tiger.
Best regards,
Kevin
Hi Kevin;
I have upgraded to Leopard, and I hate Stacks and revile Apple's decision to drop suport for normal folders in the Dock.
Stacks is not a satisfactory or reasonable substitute - not even close.
Provisionally, I've reverted to using folder aliases on the Desktop, although that seems a bit kludgy.
I'm hoping that some satisfactory third-party solutions to this shortcoming will materialize.
Charles
Browser comparo
Re: Which Gecko Browser Will Suit You Best? - Firefox, Netscape Navigator, Camino, or SeaMonkey?
From marydad
Hi I found another good browser review
http://www.browsers-review.com
External drive much cheaper in the US than in Canada
From Michel Paris
Prices as of NOV 21, 2007. How can we put pressure on Apple to "adjust" it's Canadian prices ?
Michel Paris
Montréal, Canada
Re: Leopard Has Landed, Finally - Up And Running
From Guy
"Well, the actual install was a bit of an anti-climax in the sense that is went absolutely smoothly."
That's _exactly_ everything in the world you would ever hope for in an operating system update ...
.. anticlimax
Guy
***
Charles W. Moore
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