Rist spends he rest of the article trying to illustrate that wildly overblown conceit.
Mainly, Rist seems upset that Apple is telling people to buy Macs instead of OS-limited PCs. How appallingly galling of Apple’s marketing department!
Supposedly Ollie’s Mac is crashing with Leopard even using the the same software he had under Tiger. Perhaps you should update your apps and haxies, Oliver?
Our Macs have crashed exactly zero times since we installed Leopard on the night of its release. But, of course, we know what we’re doing. We don’t try to install new OSes with things like interface hacks running all over the place. We repair permissions first. We disconnect external drives. You get the drift. Basically, we follow the directions. Some people don’t; perhaps so they can complain later. We’re also not trying to invent some nonsensical angle in an attempt to garner hits.
Anyone who tries to equate Mac OS X Leopard with Windows Vista either hasn’t used both or is a fool and/or a liar.
Rist spends interminable pages trying to invent issues that utterly fail to back up the ludicrous headline (“Leopard is the New Vista, and It’s Pissing Me Off”) that PC Mag has plastered on this obvious FUD festival. Simply look at the independent reviews in the related articles below to see that Rist is one very lonely voice in the wilderness; likely mumbling to himself while squirting into the wind with his deeply-discounted Zune.
In the end, Rist looks the fool and PC Magazine looks even worse for publishing it, but we all know from whence the bulk of the butter for their bread comes, now don’t we?
Full article, Think Before You Click™, here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers too numerous to mention for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: Now, before you think that we think that Leopard is perfect, we want to say something about Stacks, which Rist actually grazed with one random sentence in his steaming manure pile. Mac OS X Leopard’s Stacks’ default curving fan is ugly and virtually useless. The optional grid view is better looking, but just as pointless. Of course, users of former versions of Mac OS X who are now on Leopard know that what we’re really bemoaning is the loss of hierarchical folders in the Dock. What a stupid backwards step Apple made here! Where users could simply drag their drives to the right side of the Dock and “Boom!” in previous Mac OS X versions, now they just get an ugly dead end. “Stacks. An ugly dead end.” Some slogan. So, Apple, what was the goal, to make the Dock much less useful? To force users to go through the new Finder to see the snazzy new Cover Flow view? Seriously, what’s the point?
Here’s hoping Apple fixes this (a third-party fix would be nice, but Apple should restore the lost functionality themselves) in a future Leopard update as soon as possible.
So, after one full month of living with and poring over all aspects of Leopard, our biggest complaint by far is the loss of hierarchical navigation from the Dock. That’s a world apart from Windows Vista sufferers’ myriad ongoing complaints a year after release.
I just wish I could reverse sort (or better yet select Sort By name/kind/date ascending/descending) in Column View.
If by “FUD-slinger” MDN means “Truth-teller” then the MDN MAC zealots are finally on to something. And what’s this “equate” stuff? Vista has no equal and it is leaps and bounds ahead of Apple’s overpriced, only hyped by hippy fanboys and game-challenged train wreck Poopertino call an OS. OS X Leopard (I call it Pussy) might someday grow up to be Vista’s distant cousin, but don’t count on it. Redmond is at the top of their game. Nice try, Apple.
Your potential. Our passion™
After erase and install, run the disk utility (it will take a long time the first time) or install the applications afresh.
The installation disk has a utility that corrects permissions on a user’s home folder, but it does not correct groups.
I don’t mind Stacks. It’s nice to have a change once in a while. Cover Flow in the finder is something that I don’t absolutely need, but I use it once in a while for fun.
The thing about Cover Flow is that you may not find it useful, but if that’s the case… Don’t use it! I’m sure there are plenty of people that would find it very useful for their particular tasks… That’s why there are four view options.
Here’s the third party solution to the Stacks vs. hierarchical dock issue:
http://www.brockerhoff.net/quay/
Give him a “polite” email. oliver_rist@ziffdavis.com
I’m thinking Stacks was introduced to make it simpler, especially for people new to Mac. The older folder system may have been better for advanced users, but it kinda reminds me of the Windows Start Menu… Column expanding into another column…
I like stacks, but only in grid mode. I put a bunch of application alias’s in separate folders in the dock. Gives me more space on the dock. I would like to adjust the size of the icons though.
While this article is obvious flame-bait, don’t forget the gist is directed to say “Tiger rocks”, something to which I applaud and can’t disagree.
Leopard is in no way comparable to Vista but has caused a larger than normal amount of crashes, lock-ups, drop-outs, and incompatibilities than Mac users have become accustomed to. Tiger went through the same growing pains. For this reason I have bought a copy of Leopard but have not installed it as it is clear from many forums it is not completely stable yet. I do believe Apple has pushed it out the door a bit early hopping to capitalize on the debacle surrounding Vista, but any Mac newbie would find using it, even with these faults, a major improvement over Windows.
I don’t know why anyone, including Mac Daily News even bothers to comment on it. If he really did have that many crashes, it’s only because he’s futzing with the System or (I suspect), he’s using cheap non-standard RAM. Of course, there is also the possibility that he’s lying through his teeth.
Who cares?
I’ve been running Leopard on an ancient PowerBook and a brand new iMac since it came out. It’s stable.
Just ignore him. He’ll go away. Or Daniel Eran will get him!
John Davis
You’re sounding an awful lot like the local Windows IT guy (see: “Nick Burns”). Macs are supposed to be above having to “know what you’re doing” or risk hosing your machine. That’s half the reason for abandoning Windows.
Hmm I’m 50/50 with you on this. While no OS install process is completely foolproof, Apple does need to brush up installer to make it as foolproof as possible.
That said, Installer needs these:
1. FULL system check before installing. Disk check, permissions fix, full memory check, full hardware test (ok maybe skip the screen/pixel tests), compatible hardware check.
2. ONLY do a fresh system install, don’t try to “upgrade” it like MS does.
3. Leave the haxies behind. Give the user the option to move over other existing items (accounts, preferences, mail, fonts, etc).
4. Have the system do a first-startup self-check to make sure install was complete and successful. Methinks half the problems are from mid-install power-downs and untrapped install errors.
#1 and #4 might take a good amount of install time, but since it’s something you generally do ONCE, isn’t it worth doing right?
MDN’s take on Stacks and Leopard is like living in Indiana. Life is so great here that the only thing we can find to complain about is having to observe daylight savings time.
Actually there is one other thing to complain about. It is nearly a 3 hour drive to the nearest Apple store in Indianapolis.
Is this article really any better than the one it’s referencing?
The Rist article is over-the-top and doesn’t represent the experience the majority of users I’ve spoken to or read about have had. However, this MDN response is really just spreading FUD in the other direction.
Why does it always have to be Windows is better or OS X is better?
They both have their place, and they both have their fans and their detractors. This being Mac Daily News, I would expect it to defend Leopard. If it was Windows Daily News, it would probably defend Windows Vista.
Some of the issues he brings up are valid. I have had problems with accessing my Windows based network with Leopard, but a reboot always solves it. I don’t like it and it might be something to do with my particular network setup, but it worked without issues under Tiger.
That’s not enough to make me dislike it though – there are far more things to like in my case.
Instead of bickering back and forth, I’d like to see the tech community at large put their time and effort into more productive things, and let people make the choice they want without having to defend it.
Evel Knievel R.I.P.
I agree. The stacks are ugly and useless. The grid? Just as bad. I don’t want to have to hunt for an icon, which the grid forces me to do.
Can’t wait for a hack/fix/pref for this.
Leopard’s miserable “stacks” feature gives new meaning to the phrase “worse than useless.” What was Apple thinking???
I don’t mind Stacks, but Cover Flow is not quite there yet. Some images show up pixellated, and some are truncated. One thing I found out not to do, try to view a folder of images on a CD using Cover Flow. The SuperDrive went spastic, took a restart to stop it.
So far Leopard’s stable on my G5, but sluggish on my G4 Powerbook, so I stick with Tiger there (dual boot). It’s only .1 though, give it time. I didn’t even install Tiger until it was .4
This is this start of 10.5.x.
When Tiger came there where many similar issues…
Point being – it got POLISHED as updates came.
EXPECT Leopard to glow as time goes on.
I do.
Sorry, the criticism is deserved. Leopard promised a lot more than it delivered and delivered a lot of extras that are a waste of time.
You negative Windoze cultists are all the same! Posting all this negative stuff on a Mac enthusiast site! And, clearly, someone has hacked into MDN and left a Take™ that MDN would never post! Climate Change? Is that what’s causing these polar shifts?
Personally, my favorite new Leopard feature is Quick Look. Time Machine (mostly) works, too. Lots of smaller features, including new Mail features and others elsewhere, I already miss when I have to use Tiger on other computers. I know Apple needs to fix a variety of features and stability issues. But, overall, I would be unhappy if I had to give up Leopard. By the time all tweaks are done, this will be a dynamite OS. Even as it sits, it already is.
Haven’t caught the return of the real Zune Tang® before today. Happy to see it back! (Or her, as the case my be.)
And, wow!, obviously I missed the unchecked-by-default change in notifications at some recent article I failed to read! Wow! Life is good again!
I think the author was trying to state that Leopard has some very frustrating flaws, but he states them in a less than eloquent manner…
I’m certainly frustrated that 95% of the time that I switch locations (which I do frequently and always worked flawlessly in Tiger), my machine freezes and needs to be restarted… This is really frustrating as I’m a Mac tech and my major client has a wireless network for employees to use for personal web browsing and a wired network for company use… There are limits on the wired network, so I frequently use the wireless network, but then need to get on the wired network…
I, also, don’t like some of the appearance changes, but they don’t really affect my work… Stacks would work better if all applications were packages (not in folders), but even Apple breaks that rule with iWorks… The transparency of the menu is kind of odd looking and I don’t like the new dock on the bottom at all, but I keep mine on the right (and I don’t like the new look on that version as well either, but it’s much better than the bottom dock).
Just need to clarify–I think Leopard’s great. Haven’t had a single crash running on two Macs, one a G5 and the other a MBP.
Have to use XP at work, and not only is my company not going to “upgrade” to Vista, it is ditching Windows and moving to Linux.
Nitpicking Mr. Rist’s post on its merits is rather a waste, as it has none. The article is a turdburger.
Actually, the article was more about how Tiger was much more stable and user friendly than Leoptard. I happen to agree with the guy. He was making the analogy to Vista in that Apple should own up to the flaws in Leoptard.
I made the mistake of buying Leopard the week it shipped. After 21 years of owning a Mac I should have known better, but I bought it anyway. The search features are much better, however, I hate the translucent menu bar, and the stacks feature. I see little that justifies the upgrade. Rist was right. Tiger was a much better upgrade. I guess we will be waiting for 10.6 now to fix Leopard. If some folks think that the Rist article is fear, uncertainty, and doubt, well too bad. Also, it is time to bury this crappy phrase FUD. It has nothing to do with reality. People are entitled to an opinion. It may not be what someone wants to hear, but it is a different viewpoint. There are many people that think Leopard is not all that great. It will be ok for folks not to like Leopard. There will be a tomorrow.
In the meantime, hopefully Apple will fix the flaws in Leopard. The biggest fear I have is that Apple becomes as arrogant as Microsoft and denies the flaws, and then calls the flaws a “feature”. Let us all hope that Apple keeps making neat stuff.
IMHO Stacks works nicely for some things, and to be able to have a bit more control over it would be nice. Like the arc fan thing is gay. Just make it go straight up thank you. And the fact that the download folder keeps changing makes it hard to find quickly (sometimes). And make the hierarchical navigation an option too. I think there is a lot more that can be done with it, and combined with all the old features, it could be really powerful.
The problem is, in Tiger I had alias’ of all my important folders in the dock. Now, the stack thing makes it a PITA to get to what I want… I have to make more clicks (just clicking on the “Show In Finder” button is an extra step from before).
Ok, enough ranting.
I agree… coverflow in the finder is not a favorite for me… but not a problem like stacks is LOL.