Apple: Snow Leopard release in Q1 2009

Oops. Jordan Hubbard, Director of Apple's Unix Technology Group, made a boo boo. The slide above was pulled from the deck presented last week at the LISA (Large Installation System Administration) conference. Up until now, Apple had only been willing to say that OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard would be ready "in about a year" -- that was back in early June at WWDC. You just know that this will have Steve fuming given Apple's tight control over information. One thing is perfectly clear: the race is on for both Redmond (rumored to be shooting for a mid-2009 Windows 7 launch) and Cupertino, nobody wants to be second with their next gen OS release.

[Via MacRumors]

Read -- Presentation [Warning: PDF]

[Zeth Ethereal @ Nov 19th 2008 3:29AM]

-looks around for iEye- hmmmmm.... where is he? ~_^

[nerdtalker @ Nov 19th 2008 4:32AM]

Perhaps he's sleeping? You know, considering the late hour and all?

[ybd @ Nov 19th 2008 7:14AM]

Don't be ridiculous, he probably took a bathroom break

[Josh @ Nov 19th 2008 7:41AM]

Nah i'll be he's got a neural link that's linked to the Engadget RSS feed so when apple (scratch that - any) news appears on Engadget...

[mm @ Nov 19th 2008 8:22AM]

He's usually lowest ranked, so that's probably why you missed him.

[fistpittingnork @ Nov 19th 2008 8:53AM]

Leave "Lowest Rank" out of this

[adrian @ Nov 19th 2008 8:55AM]

That's a false release date setup.

[High Ranks make you sterile @ Nov 19th 2008 9:04AM]

Mid-2009? Oh no, too slow...

I'll already be running Jaunty Jackalope... April baby!

[digitallysick @ Nov 19th 2008 3:31AM]

Its on! i can't wait, thats far sooner than i had imagined? I haven't heard of any really amazing features in snow leopard as of yet

[AVG @ Nov 19th 2008 3:45AM]

You can't wait, yet there's nothing cool in it that you can think of? Let me guess, you're already a Mac user.

[who? @ Nov 19th 2008 7:33AM]

You can wait, since there's never anything good in your updates? Classic Windows user.

[AVG @ Nov 19th 2008 7:40AM]

Incredible how totally irrelevant and stupid a "reply" can actually be. Way to go "who?"

[matt merritt @ Nov 19th 2008 7:58AM]

@AVG


Pot, meet kettle.

[ArcticFox @ Nov 19th 2008 3:33AM]

I dont think they give a toss which is out first, they are both competing for different markets.

[kyle allen @ Nov 19th 2008 3:40AM]

computer users and... snow leopards?

[Kelmon @ Nov 19th 2008 5:16AM]

That's a fair point. Microsoft needs to get Windows 7 out in order to stem defections and bad publicity but I don't think Snow Leopard itself will make much difference to the situation, whether it is out first or not. In order for Snow Leopard to have any real impact on Microsoft it would need to be the equivalent of Windows 95 (i.e. a bit of a revolution) but while details of it are sketchy beyond Apple's marketing blurb, I highly doubt that it will be revolutionary. Frankly, it's unclear at the moment as to whether we'll notice the difference between it and the existing 10.5.

[titanium man @ Nov 19th 2008 5:23AM]

I bet Redmond is hoping that Apple will show a touch ui for a tablet mac (with snow leopard) so they can copy its features in windows 7 multi touch. That is why they have said that the multitouch features may change greatly in the future beta release. I think windows 7 is ready for beta , but they are holding out just in case Apple shows something touch related .

[Mark Anderson @ Nov 19th 2008 7:53AM]

@titanium

MS have already demoed screen multi-touch you fucktard.

[Sergio @ Nov 19th 2008 11:27AM]

To the diehard Windows user or the diehard Mac or the Diehard Linux user:

Which one comes out first, I could care less, Im still sticking to my good all faithful OS Brand and flavor.

For that I thank Microsoft, Mac and Linux.

Greets!

[TitaniumMan @ Nov 19th 2008 12:20PM]

@ Mark Anderson :
I know they have. You should learn how to read.

[Mark Anderson @ Nov 19th 2008 7:06PM]

And you should learn how to make a relevant comment.

Actually, on second thoughts, just kill yourself already.

[Homer @ Nov 19th 2008 3:34AM]

Mek O Ess Tan

[erhan @ Nov 19th 2008 3:36AM]

This is ridicules. Why so many OS changes?
This is not Linux. People get pissed when they buy a new mac to find out that a month later, their mac OS is outdated and needs an upgrade.

[Level 5 @ Nov 19th 2008 7:40AM]

@ethan - I agree with you, not sure why so many people voted you down. Especially where in the Mac world, every couple releases, you're going to require a new Mac. It's been said 10.6 won't support PowerPC Macs anymore. So, let me get this straight; my girlfriend has a Powerbook G4. She got it in late 2005. This means in order to enjoy the newest OS X release, she needs a NEW Mac. Her fully loaded 15" Powerbook in 2005 was over $2000. What the shit? So to get Snow Leopard, she would need to pop at least $900 for a Macbook White since she needs a laptop for school. She saved the extra for the Powerbook for its larger screen. If she wants a 15" Mac notebook, bam.. $2500.

What does this say to a Mac user like her? Don't bother upgrading. Yeah they're OSX86 but she's not that savvy, and I'd rather not get stuck with babysitting that machine (I've gotten into OSX86, which is no fun if you break something).

Vista is much the same way (requiring new hardware), however MS has stated Win7 will run BETTER on hardware that chokes on Vista. If they keep their promises, even netbooks will be able to enjoy it. Even if this weren't true, the cost of entry for a Dell or blah-blah grey box is much more reasonable than a Mac.

I miss the Apple of olde, when it was an "everyman's (woman's too!) computer" as opposed to a premium segment.

[Charles Miller @ Nov 19th 2008 8:02AM]

@Level 5

Did this comment come out of some kind of automated Apple-flame software? It seems devoid of any relation to reality.

1. Snow Leopard is, by all reports, a transitional OS upgrade that adds some interesting new architectural features and removes a bunch of bloat. Your girlfriend is unlikely to miss anything if she skips this particular upgrade. By the time the next OS X update comes out her laptop will likely be five years old, which isn't a bad run by anyone's standards.
2. You say this happens "every couple releases", but the current version of OS X's minimum requirements are an 867Mhz PPC with 512MB, something you could have bought in 2001.
3. What was this "everyman" Apple of which you speak? The Apple II?

[matt merritt @ Nov 19th 2008 8:05AM]

@level5

What does this say to a mac user like her?

Well it could say that shes batshit unlucky because Apple changed their hardware architecture right after she bought her laptop and after all, that's what this is all about.

Does it suck? As the owner of a G4 xserve I can honestly say it does, but lets face it - it's not all that surprising considering the obvious upgrade path says "go x86". You can't really be shocked that eventually Apple, which announced that Intel was becoming it's main processor provider, would eventually choose to support only their processors.


Which isn't even the case, because PowerPC chips will be covered under pre-Snow Leopard releases still.

[Level 5 @ Nov 19th 2008 8:51AM]

@Charles

Why does everyone fling these accusations of fanboyism around? Let's get to the facts.

1 - I agree that a 5 year laptop is a good run. As a matter of fact I have a 2001-spec Gateway notebook that happy cranks XP and Ubuntu. That wasn't the point. The point is, if she wants Snow Leopard on a laptop that meets her needs, it's a $2500 cost of entry, compared to having what may be LOWER specs for Win7 than for Vista. That's what I consider streamlining.

2 - Minimal requirements are something NO ONE should go by when running any sort of software. Minimal requirements in my 25 years of computing mean this: It will run, as the program will not give you an error before it's executed. Just because it WILL run doesn't mean it will run WELL ENOUGH for you to be productive in said software/OS/etc. Ever tried running Vista on the minimal requirements for Home Basic? You'll be rummaging for that XP cd (and find it) before it can even launch Excel.

3 - Although I figure you have, it sounds as if you have NEVER used Leopard from your response. Leopard DOES NOT have much bloat. What's really bloatware in Leopard? Now compare to Vista, which is loaded with crap that hasn't been updated since Win 3.1 (notepad, calulator, charmap). Now if you're speaking about Apple and MS's effort to streamline their kernels and core OS mechanics, than that is a different story.

4 - Everyman's computer. The original Mac. Where was the PC in 1984? DOS. Woo fun.

[Charles Miller @ Nov 19th 2008 9:10AM]

Every marketing message from Apple about Snow Leopard has said the same thing: Snow Leopard is a transitional release consisting of mostly low-level improvements. So unless your girlfriend is really passionate about Exchange support, there's no compelling reason to upgrade.

Just because a piece of software exists, you don't have to run it. As I said, your girlfriend has another year or so before she really has to worry about switching to Intel.

The removal of bloat in Snow Leopard is pretty well documented: one of the goals of the release was to have the OS use less space on disk, and the gains they have been showing go much further than you would see just from removing the PPC binaries: for example the size of Mail.app shrunk from 287MB to 91MB. Apparently this is largely the result of removing a bunch of redundant data from nib files.

http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2008/06/23/ten-big-new-features-in-mac-os-x-snow-leopard/ (grep for "think small")

As for the original Mac, it cost $2500 on release ($5000 in today's inflation-adjusted dollars). Not exactly the "computer for everyone" even back then.

[EEaudio08 @ Nov 19th 2008 10:49AM]

I don't understand why anyone would NEED to get every new OS that's released. I got my Blackbook in December 2006, and I still have no regrets of not upgrading to Leopard. The only downside is that I can't run the iPhone/Touch SDK. Besides that, Tiger is still a rock solid OS.

I understand wanting the capability to run the new OS, but with any computer you buy, you have to accept that something better is going to come out at some point.

[bogtooth @ Nov 19th 2008 10:21AM]

Just a comment at Level 5, while trying not to come off as a fanboy... Your experience with running "bare minimum" requirements has been the same as mine - for Windows. However, I have an old G3 that I still use from time to time, and every major upgrade of OS X has run snappier on it than the last. Some of the new features don't necessarily run as well, but if you use it as you'd been using your previous version, my experience has been that it runs better. Sucks about your girlfriend's PPC, but a lot of us got a bit of the burn from the transition... On the other hand the switch to Intel really has benefited the new computers...

[itguy05 @ Nov 19th 2008 12:38PM]

"If she wants a 15" Mac notebook, bam.. $2500."

Guess I must be dreaming as I bought a 15" MacbookPro Late 2008 at the end of October for $1999. From Best Buy......

[Joseph @ Nov 19th 2008 12:24PM]

I sold my Powerbook G4 on FleaBay for $1200 a year ago, I then purchased a macbook pro for $1649. 2.4ghz Santa Rosa from apples refurb store.

The G4 Powerbook purchase was a mistake by me and by your girlfriend. The towers were boasting G5s then dual G5s then dual core G5s and none of that tech made it into a notebook. That is a long time w/ out a significant update. So, don't think about the fact that she bought it in 05, think about the fact that the tech was from 03 or 04.

next - It is my understanding that Snow Leopards only new feature is going to be exchange support. That most of the upgrade is going to just speed up processes on x86 hardware.

This predates your GFs laptop but when OS X came out, it was a dog. Then X.1 came out and it was faster. Jaguar was even faster and added new features. Panther was even faster and added even more new features. This was on G3/G4 putes. When I upgraded my Mac Pro from Tiger to Leopard, it got faster. Specifically FP, allocating ram and UI according to xbench. all of that to say, I don't think your statements are universal, just a bit bitter because your GF was justifiably burned with old tech. This was apples bad for not moving to intel when IBM couldn't put a cool cpu in a laptop.

[erhan @ Nov 19th 2008 2:54PM]

I am trying to say, why doesn't apple wait until they have a significant difference.
Instead of changing the OS every 8-9 months, why not every 2 years.
I'm sure they can wait on the innovation. Just cause they ass one thing doesn't mean a new OS is needed.

[kyle allen @ Nov 19th 2008 3:39AM]

just so long as the new macos has a flying toasters screen saver, im happy.

[gad get @ Nov 19th 2008 4:01AM]

Macos?

[Chris @ Nov 19th 2008 4:20AM]

Mexican Tacos... oh wait.

[kyle allen @ Nov 19th 2008 5:23AM]

MacOS, there, happy?

[Carl @ Nov 19th 2008 3:40AM]

Thinking about spending money on that new macbook. Does this mean I should wait, anyone?

[Jakob @ Nov 19th 2008 3:46AM]

"nobody wants to be second with their next gen OS release." Perhaps they do? That means time for last-minute changes and features for whatever the competitor is lacking.

[Uncontrol @ Nov 19th 2008 3:48AM]

I haven't really heard anything about Snow Leopard that makes me want to care about it or pay for it.

[oki @ Nov 19th 2008 4:23AM]

it has a special name for it but essentially instead of apps having to be programmed to support multi core, the operating system will split up the work load onto as many cores as you have and regulate it so playing itunes and rendering a video wont affect each other, but still use the avaliable "horsepower", or cpu cycles, at least in theory thats what snow's newest feature, just suppose to be a overall performance upgrade. which sounds awesome


i talked to a microsoft developer the other day (i work at a retail store in renton.. pretty close to those boi's from redmond) he told me the real name of windows 7, i forgot what he said it was but it was pretty sweet, but something they were suppose to do is just like what tiger has done, actually have windows 64bit run 32bits apps and drivers with out haivng problems so its backwards compatible which for me and prob for alot of gamers is a great thing! i hate multibooting

[nicko.dvz @ Nov 19th 2008 4:39AM]

@oki: it's 'Windows 7'. that is all.

[Kelmon @ Nov 19th 2008 5:20AM]

I'm rather hopeful that Apple will spill the beans on what it is during MacWorld in January. If they can demonstrate that it will dramatically improve performance of my current applications then I'll be interested, particularly if the price is lower than usual (hey, I can dream). Aside from that, full Exchange support will be nice out-of-the-box since that saves paying for MS Office.

[AVG @ Nov 19th 2008 7:25AM]

Wow. Lying to look cool on Engadget. A new low for anybody.

[AVG @ Nov 19th 2008 7:26AM]

Oh, that was for Mr. "I talk to MS developers about top secret information but I can barely compose a grammatically correct sentence" Oki.

[gad get @ Nov 19th 2008 4:01AM]

Give it up already!

[gad get @ Nov 19th 2008 4:05AM]

Sorry, that was a reply to a spammer who then got deleted.

[swingin' dick hero @ Nov 19th 2008 5:48AM]

Give it up already!

[7on @ Nov 19th 2008 9:51AM]

Never gonna give it up

[swingin' dick hero @ Nov 19th 2008 10:24AM]

Nachos.