Apple confirms: Lion arriving on July 20th

bbloke

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In Apple's quarterly earnings call, it was announced by Peter Oppenheimer (CFO) that OS X Lion will be launched tomorrow (July 20th). The upgrade will be available via the Mac App Store.

Now to see how the servers bear up under the strain! ;)

Although I'm curious to play with the new OS, I'm going to wait a little while to see whether there are any major bugs or any crucial software incompatibilities. RoaringApps currently have a site detailing OS X Lion application compatibility.
 
Yah, I sure hope Apple is ready for a couple million 4 GB downloads 24/7.

I'm just curious if Lion is worth buying if you already have the Golden Master of OS X Lion? After all it is the golden master and should have all of the features in the final copy, right? I'm guessing that it should still update like the retail version.
 
That's what I thought, but surprisingly my copy should be down in around 10 minutes time. About 35 minutes total so it might be worth giving it a go now.
 
That's what I thought, but surprisingly my copy should be down in around 10 minutes time. About 35 minutes total so it might be worth giving it a go now.
I live in a small Welsh village with a max 2Mbps ADSL broadband connection. So I am figuring three days maybe? ;)
 

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So the download itself costs $29, but if you want to have it on a flash drive you pay like 40 extra bucks. Meaning they charge you $40 for like a 4 gig flash drive. I feel like most people would rather have their friends download it then copy it to a flash drive and install off of that.


Oh and the one major thing that really annoys me is the info at the bottom of each window is missing! I liked to know how many items where in my folder there were so that I can compare new and old versions. I also liked having quick access to seeing how much space is left on my drive. I have searched far and wide to find a setting for it, but I can't find it!
 
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I have searched far and wide to find a setting for it, but I can't find it!

With a Finder window open, select "View > Show Status Bar" and/or "View > Show Path Bar."

If you're talking about the info below each icon, then that would be "View > Show View Options, then click 'Show Item Info'".
 
So... How many people here have gone ahead and upgraded to Lion? Did you perform a standard upgrade or did you try a clean installation? What things do you like and what things do you not like?

I'm still holding off for the moment. I like exploring new software, but I'm being cautious as my machine is vital for my day-to-day work and I'm seeing mixed feelings about the new release, including some people wanting to revert to Snow Leopard.
 
I did, on day 1. Three computers upgraded, two share a MobileMe account:

1) 2.0GHz Mac mini (~2010)
2) 1.6GHz MacBook Air 11" (~late 2010)
3) 2.4GHz MacBook 13" (~2010)

All upgraded perfectly. I love the new Mission Control and four-finger Spaces swipe on my Magic Trackpad. It's breathed new life into this trackpad, and I now feel comfortable taking my laptops with me and forgetting the USB mice at home. This is how a trackpad should have interacted with an OS all along.

It seems slower than Snow Leopard. Dock animations are choppier. Some program launches and dialog boxes are animated as if the window is flying at you from a point in space, making the process feel a tad longer.

I'm putting an SSD on my wish list for my Mac mini -- I think that, coupled with a RAM upgrade to 8GB, would make this a very formidable machine, and would complement Lion nicely.
 
I did a straight clean install, I never trust an upgrade. So far everything has run flawlessly. Of course I have a backup if anything goes wrong though. The one thing I'm waiting for is iCloud. I have that annoying button under the MobileMe preference panel that says upgrade to iCloud, but the link just goes to a dead page on Apple's website (which of course makes sense because there is no iCloud yet).
 
I wish Apple would stop chopping and changing their colour schemes. We still have elements of aqua blue, but now we have a greyish start screen, Mission Control takes us to a grey mottled screen and the Finder icons have gone grey. Why not the folder icons too? It looks a bit messy to me.
 
Thanks for the thoughts. I agree, Rhisiart, I'm not too keen on some of the fiddling with the GUI and the resulting inconsistency. It also seems the "traffic light" buttons on windows have become smaller for some reason. Hopefully there won't be any more of the vertical arrangement, like we had with iTunes.

It was a shame that Front Row has disappeared. I will admit I don't use it much, but I like having it available. On a totally different subject, I've been told that, on new MacBook Airs, iDVD and iWeb are no longer present. That may indicate the future of iLife or of Lion.

I've briefly played with a few machines running Lion but, for now, I'm staying on Snow Leopard. I'm also monitoring whether a clean install is really needed, as some people recommend on various forums, or whether a straightforwards upgrade is sufficiently robust these days. I'm still watching this space and will decide if and when to make the jump!
 
It was a shame that Front Row has disappeared. I will admit I don't use it much, but I like having it available. On a totally different subject, I've been told that, on new MacBook Airs, iDVD and iWeb are no longer present. That may indicate the future of iLife or of Lion.

I've seen the same thing with iWeb and iDVD, I think Apple mentioned the denis of those a while ago? I don't really care too much for iWeb anyways. It didn't seem very powerful. I always preferred RapidWeaver over it anyway. However, for iDVD, I'm going to keep it for as long as I can. It always comes in handy, plus it's the cheapest most reliable DVD program that I know of.

FrontRow was nice, it was always clean and elegant. I used to use it all the time, but the lack of AVI or MKV support was frustrating. Although, with music, FrontRow was great though. I did start using the alternative to FrontRow, Plex, and I have been pleased with it and will not miss FrontRow.
 
I've been told that, on new MacBook Airs, iDVD and iWeb are no longer present. That may indicate the future of iLife or of Lion.

On the contrary, I think the only thing that the lack of iDVD and iWeb indicate is the future of those two products, and those two products alone. I do not think that the non-inclusion of those two products, in any way, indicates the future of Lion or iLife.

iLife is still iLife, regardless of the future of iWeb and iDVD. Lion is still Lion, and in no way is affected by the non-inclusion of those two pieces of software.

I think the non-inclusion of iWeb and iDVD simply signals a future where burning DVDs (much like burning music CDs) doesn't have much of a future due to the digital streaming nature we are heading toward (iTunes movie rental/purchases, Netflix, etc.). Similarly, iWeb signals a future where everyone is not making their own web pages -- but rather integrating with larger, monolithic websites like Facebook, Twitter, and the like, to share family photos and videos. We no longer set up personal web pages -- we simply use larger social networks and services to accomplish the same thing. Which is why we now have Facebook integration with iPhoto -- we can publish movies and photos to the web just the same -- we just don't do it to our own, personal website... we do it to Facebook, instead.
 
On the contrary, I think the only thing that the lack of iDVD and iWeb indicate is the future of those two products, and those two products alone. I do not think that the non-inclusion of those two products, in any way, indicates the future of Lion or iLife.
I perhaps should have been more careful with my wording. My initial thoughts were about whether this indicated the future direction of iLife products, but my later thoughts were about how that, in turn, would relate to Apple's plans for the Mac platform, specifically for OS X and available applications.

I think the non-inclusion of iWeb and iDVD simply signals a future where burning DVDs (much like burning music CDs) doesn't have much of a future due to the digital streaming nature we are heading toward (iTunes movie rental/purchases, Netflix, etc.).
That may well be true, yes. This did cross my mind but, then again, there is the option of an external SuperDrive, so why not provide iDVD for those who may purchase this (or provide it with the purchase of the drive)?

Similarly, iWeb signals a future where everyone is not making their own web pages -- but rather integrating with larger, monolithic websites like Facebook, Twitter, and the like, to share family photos and videos. We no longer set up personal web pages -- we simply use larger social networks and services to accomplish the same thing. Which is why we now have Facebook integration with iPhoto -- we can publish movies and photos to the web just the same -- we just don't do it to our own, personal website... we do it to Facebook, instead.
Ah, I can certainly understand what you are saying and think you're largely right, but don't see why iWeb would be affected by the choice of hardware in this instance. Both MacBook Pros and MacBook Airs can connect to the internet and so the hardware differences would be less relevant here than for the exclusion of iDVD, I feel.

To see if it is simply about timing, I looked at the current MacBook Pros (released earlier in 2011, but newer ones come with Lion pre-installed and have a small change to one function key) and the Mac mini. The MacBook Pros come with iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iWeb, and GarageBand, so they still have these, two programs. Perhaps they have to be included, if they were included in the specs of the same system earlier in the year (potential problems with removal of functionality, etc.)? With the Mac mini, only iPhoto, iMovie, and GarageBand are included. The Mac mini does not have an optical drive but obviously can connect to the internet, and so the omission of iWeb is noticeable again.

Put together, it looks to me as though it is not about the specific hardware, but about how Apple sees the future, indicating that iDVD and iWeb will be dropped from iLife in future. I certainly could be wrong, we'll just have to wait and see! ;)
 
http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/software.html

I don't see anything that would indicate that iWeb and iDVD are included on the newest MacBook Pros that ship with Lion.

In fact, I think that all Apple computers that ship with Lion lack these two, specific iLife applications.

I think the dropping of iWeb and iDVD coincides (and is not coincidental) with the release of Lion, and that going forward, we can say goodbye to iWeb and iDVD -- I believe, partly for the reasons I listed above, and partly your reasons as well.
 
http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/software.html

I don't see anything that would indicate that iWeb and iDVD are included on the newest MacBook Pros that ship with Lion.
Either Apple is only showing some of the included software or else there is an inconsistency here. On the Tech Specs page for the MacBook Pro (http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/specs.html), it currently says:

Software

  • OS X Lion (includes Mail, Address Book, iCal, the Mac App Store, iTunes, Safari, Time Machine, FaceTime, Photo Booth, Mission Control, Launchpad, AirDrop, Resume, Auto Save, Versions, Quick Look, Spotlight, QuickTime, and more)
  • iLife (includes iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iWeb, GarageBand)

In fact, I think that all Apple computers that ship with Lion lack these two, specific iLife applications.

I think the dropping of iWeb and iDVD coincides (and is not coincidental) with the release of Lion, and that going forward, we can say goodbye to iWeb and iDVD -- I believe, partly for the reasons I listed above, and partly your reasons as well.
Yes, this is what I suspect too. The timing of the loss of iDVD and iWeb coincides too neatly with the new hardware and Lion. I'm expecting iLife and new hardware will go this way in future, as it would seem to fit with Apple's current direction. Just in case we misunderstood each other earlier, I was not predicting the demise of iLife, only the reshaping of it for the future.
 
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