“Apple’s decision to end support for OS X Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6) is reasonable — but it’s the kiss of death for a large segment of the Mac resale market,” Jonny Evans writes for Computerworld. “You see, Snow Leopard was the last version of OS X that ran on early edition Intel Macs. It was introduced in August 2009 four years after Apple announced the transition to Intel processors in Macs.”
“Macs running Snow Leopard still account for around 25 percent of active Macs. The implication is that these users are still using older Macs, and are on Snow Leopard to run OS X on them,” Evans writes. “Why? Two reasons: one is Apple; another is Adobe.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The real reason is Rosetta. Mac OS X Snow Leopard is the last OS X version that’s able to run PowerPC-only applications. Even four and a half years later, an eternity in the tech universe, it’ll still take quite some time for Snow Leopard use to drop off as it normally does for other unsupported OS X versions.
Related articles:
Apple’s OS X Snow Leopard is not dead – March 5, 2014
Apple signals end to Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard support – December 17, 2013
Mac OS X Snow Leopard stubbornly rejects retirement – February 7, 2013
There are also kerberos and CAC card standards that the lions and Mavericks can’t deal with.
Rosetta
AND
The fact that so much in 10.7 Lion is AWFUL, most particularly the Finder. Gawd I hate it.
Thought you were still rocking Windows XP
*cough* For those times when I pine for my childhood bed of nails, I crank up old XP in Parallels and have a nostalgia nightmare.
MacDailyNews Take: The real reason is Rosetta.
Partially.
Snow Leopard was OS X before it was larded up with bullshit “features” like Facebook integration.
I’m still running Snow Leopard because it’s on an old MacBook I’m using as a iTunes Server that my AppleTV can recognize and still see via Home Sharing. I’ve recently upgraded the HDD to a 1TB 7200 rpm one to hold my music and movies. Hopefully, I can get a newer Mac in the future that I can install Mavericks on.
First off Apple hasn’t stopped support of SNOW LEOPARD. It is still for sale. The recent Safari Vulnerability was related to OS X 10.9.X Mavericks. Read Peter Cohen’s article at imore.com that explains it clearly.
http://www.imore.com/snow-leopard-vulnerable-attacks-has-apple-really-abandoned-it-0
Snow Leopard like every version of OS X before and after it had some issues, but given time many were fixed, yet many never were. I was forced to upgrade Filemaker just to be able to PRINT from Filemaker in Snow Leopard.
Quicken is a sore point with me. Intuit’s CEO is on the board of Apple and Intuit just doesn’t seem to even know the Mac exists. Why haven’t I switched, because I have over 25 years of business information in Quicken. I have had it since Version 1.0 for the Mac. Also, up until about 3 years ago it was included with Macs. My last iMac I purchased was a 24 inch from December of 2008 and it was included with it. The Quicken 2007 version that was released to work with OS X 10.7.X and higher does the job. Has a few quirks and I really don’t think that Intuit even cares.
I just wish I could have Snow Leopard that worked with iCloud and some of the new software that requires 10.8 or 10.9.
Like many others I am starting to wonder if either Apple, Microsoft, Intuit, or any of these players in this Computer World really know how the average user does work.
I still run Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard on my iMac G5 and par of the reason is for apps like AppleWorks, which iWork failed to fully replace.
The REAL reason is bc it was the last non buggy OS.
Since then Lion was so bad, that they stop updating it and told everyone Mountain Lion will be better…then…
Mountain Lion was soo bad that they told everyone to just upgrade to Maverick.
And I’m sorry, it’s a BAD sales pitch when you have to say “Our crappy software isn’t working right? Upgrade to our New crappy software”
I love Snow Leopard. Hell yeah Im still using it. I understand there are newer versions out, but the way every one bitches about them … why would I even risk it when I don’t need to.
I will eventually HAVE to upgrade. Maybe. Someday. For now, I’m going with what I know works for me and my workflows.
Why?
Because it’s the best version of OS X ever, that’s why!
Most changes to OS X since have been worthless.
PowerPC computers still working, but not with the new os x, with ubuntu for power pc.
I admit that the major reasons I haven’t upgraded are the (dis-)improvements to the UI, Gatekeeper, and the fact that I can’t stand MS’s “ribbon.” Since I’ve almost entirely moved to LibreOffice, though, that removes one consideration. Now just need to be sure of a way around the other two.
Os Snow Leopard is far the best os x ever made! No Os later meets the snapping and clean working with apps and finder. I worked on Panther, Tiger (btw are the second best, but only for Power PC architecture), Leopard, Moutain Lion and Mavericks but still I find 10.6.8 the overall best.