We have received multiple independent tips — some even from trusted sources 
— that Apple plans to release Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard on Friday, August 28, 2009.
Please note that Apple’s official release date has not been announced and the company’s website states, “Mac OS X Snow Leopard is scheduled to be released in September 2009.”
UPDATE: 9:17am EDT: John Gruber over at Daring Fireball is hearing the same date, too.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Judge Bork” for the Daring Fireball heads up.]
I’m thinking of getting myself a Mac Mini to replace my aging G4 Sawtooth. I use it as server for music and movie files but it is starting to struggle.
Problem is I need a good external drive to store the data (up to 1 TB). Preferably one with swappable drives. Can anyone recommend one?
Rumours are that Sonnet’s Express/34 cards (and others based on SiL chips) will be incompatible w/ 10.6 – and that SiL has NO intention of bothering w/ a compatibility update.
If you – like me – depend on such a card to manage storage or whatever, CONTACT SONNET & TELL THEM TO PRESSURE SiL!
@DD from Belgium
Excellent post, mirrors my experience regarding friends and new comers to the platform as well.
@chew: thx…
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”wink” style=”border:0;” />)
(just makes me feel happy to see al these friends and colleagues now becoming even more friends due to the fact that I helped them into their first steps in the Mac realm, and that they’re all so happy about it – Lots of happiness going on here..:
@ DogGone
I’d skip the 1TB drive and go with a 1.5TB as the prices are so close. The New Seagate Externals are good and a 1.5TB on sale is about $129.00 or less I recently picked up 2 of them for $99.00 each.
You might want to check this one out.
Seagate 1.5TB Free Agent
I’m sure if you look around that you can find it cheaper.
Cool I just bought a Amazon Gift Card to apply to my Snow Leopard Pre-Order with 2-Day FEDEX Shipping! Total is $37.98!
Giving some love to MDN, used their link to purchase the Family pack for Snow Leopard, can hardly wait!
PPC apps run the same as before, BUT, you have to check the Rosetta box in the installer
@Lord Smugly
The PPC population is still significant. It’s Apple’s fault – they make such a sturdy product, they keep going and going like that damn bunny.
<Microsoft haters, don’t read any further>
MS Office 2004 is better than 2008 – it didn’t have the damn ribbon – and is PPC only. That alone is a reason for Rosetta.
Like or not, iWork does not beat Office for word processing or spreadsheets.
@ DogGone
I’ve only had good luck with OWC, aka macsales.com. They frequently advertise here on MDN, usually at the top of the page; click on their ad and send MDN some love. Their live, US based support is as good as Apple’s!
I’ll wait until 10.6.2 until the worst of the bugs are sorted, and then wait 4 weeks for the .2 update bugs to find workarounds.
Does anyone know of the upgrade from Tiger is the same as the upgrade from Leopard?
I’m waiting till OS XI 11.1 Sabertooth Tiger when all Bugs will be obsolete.
@Yours Smugly,
About 20%.
On a separate note, I hear that there are a few bugs in this release, including one involving the installer, that may be “show-stoppers”.
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=pt&u=http://macmagazine.uol.com.br/2009/08/13/leitor-que-ja-esta-com-o-build-10a432-do-snow-leopard-envia-screenshots-e-informacoes-pode-nao-ser-o-gm
@Cubert: “I hear that there are a few bugs in this release”
I’ve been using Snow Leopard for a couple of months as my main OS, I haven’t encountered any “show stopping” bugs yet. The only thing I’ve noticed is, while the over all performance is much improved, there are times when the system hiccups. More than likely this is due to the code being a debug release.
@qka
I’ve used OWC for over a decade and wholeheartedly agree that they are great.
@ Demon
1.5tB is a good idea. My current internal drive of 750GB is almost full.
I really want swappable drives – maybe an enclosure with 4 drive spaces. Probably with FW, USB and eSATA. I am debating about setting up the drives as a RAID so that I can add capacity as I go along. I already have 2 SATA internals with over TB of space so I would like to use those in a new setup.
Michael,
I believes ya. Just saying what the MacRumors article said.
Now, I need to upgrade my PowerBook to take advantage of the new cat.
I hope you folks are not expecting a huge difference in user experience. Snow Leopard will not look very different from Leopard. Most of the visible changes are in the Dock. All the other goodies are +under the hood+. Well worth $29 (probably worth $129), because your Intel Mac will run more efficiently. But for day-to-day user experience, it will be mostly just like Leopard. And Leopard is already pretty damn good in terms of user experience.
What exactly is SL bringing to table when it comes to new features…is it just a trimming of the os? Which is very good and nice and all that but is it something in there that will make it feel like an upgrade? Something that’s going to make me (just bouht a new MBP and are still very satisfied with the speed) want to upgrade.
Anybody knows?
Well, I’m thinking of getting the Box Set and not the $29 Upgrade Because I want to avoid installing 4 operating system.
Unfortunately, I have to Slop my Mac a Few GB to install Windows on it for School Related reasons. I can never Install Windows with the Boot Camp software that came on my 10.5 Leopard Leopard Disc. It creates issues that somehow confuses the Windows Setup that it doesn’t give the option to install NTFS format No Matter how large the partition. It will always make a Fat32 Format even over 32GB. And if I choose Fat 32, I get installation errors ( Even if I partition below 32GB.) I can only install Windows using The BootCamp Beta software which was used in Tiger which I still have.
My only way to Get Windows installed is to Install the Original Tiger 10.4.7 OS. I disable my network during the whole time using Tiger and I manually set the time to October 2006. I can then Install BootCamp Beta v1.2. When I use the beta, I have no issues at all installing Windows.
Then I can Install 10.5 Leopard Once Tiger and Windows are running. And Later load the Drivers from the Leopard Disc into Windows.
Imagine if I took the Upgrade disc which only works When You have Leopard Installed. Thats 4 OPERATING SYSTEMS I WOULD HAVE TO INSTALL. TIGER>WINDOWS>LEOPARD>SNOW LEOPARD. Thats just murder!!!!!!
At Least with the Box Set, I can avoid 1 OS Install (10.5 LEOPARD). The Box Set 10.6 Snow Leopard will be a completely Fresh OS and not installed over 2 older OS’s.
@ Allyas
Most of the truly significant improvements are in the underlying technologies. But you can see the visible and user-facing changes here
http://www.apple.com/macosx/refinements/
Snapper sez: “Does anyone know of the upgrade from Tiger is the same as the upgrade from Leopard?”
Read the following MDN article “Apple Snow Leopard easier to install….” I don’t know how Apple enforce this, but you must own Leopard to use the $29 upgrade to Snow Leopard. Otherwise you go buy Leopard now, then upgrade, OR you wait until Snow Leopard is out and buy the $169 Mac Box with Snow Leopard, iLife and iWork (which is actually a nice deal if you don’t already the i stuff).
Im already running 10.6, as for the comments of waiting till 10.6.2 hah!
this is far more reliable and snappy than 10.5, and im only running on a dual, dualcore mac pro… so i can only imagine how delightful it will be on a dual qaud
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” />
good game apple! <3 your work.