Apple Says New OS X ‘Mavericks’ Will Be Offered for Free
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blogs.barrons.com
Question is though, what about support. You have a 3 year old Mac of some flavour and upgrade to this OS, what about issues you may have.
ANother aspect would be that by in effect making this level of OS available to all supported models out there warranty wise, they make life in supporting systems a little bit easier and very likely will drop support for the other older OS's on these models quicker. Again making life in support easier in many ways as well as making developers lives a lot easier. Especialy if they can target toward the a single denominator OS wise and take advantage of all the features without working towards only features common to the previous flavours.
Either way a good move. Though can bet there will be somebody on the older flavour of OS who will have some essentual application that they must have which has issues. But time will tell.
Good move on many levels I'd say by Apple.
Whatever they're planning, getting everyone on board is obviously an important part of that.
I think the biggest thing over the last two keynotes is the iWork update - MS have been ridicuslously slow in the one area they could have won, which was bringing Office to iOS. I'm pretty sure this is the nail in the coffin.
You just wait...
This seems to be really powerful. I've been surprised, during the last two demos of iWork, at the lack of oohs and aahs in the audience when things like (last time) the web-based editing, and (this time) the collaboration on live documents were demo'ed.
On the other hand, once upon a time Apple made you pay for software which also run upon hardware only they made and sold you. Back before Snow Leopard, that was $129 per user (though installable on an unlimited number of machines)
You can buy a single copy or a family pack for five computers.
http://www.amazon.com/Mac-10-4-Tiger-Family-Pack/dp/B0007LW1...
http://www.amazon.com/Apple-Mac-10-4-Tiger-VERSION/dp/B0002G...
There were no measures to technologically limit one's ability to perform multiple installations from a purchased OS X install disc. You could buy two different Tiger installers and they'd checksum the same, and there were no serial numbers to be entered. It was an honor thing.
I'm reasonably confident the OS didn't actively try to detect that it was running in a VM, but VMware Fusion (and presumably other such software) would prevent you from installing the OS.
There was a relatively simple work around (a hack) that allowed you to install in a VM. I think it was as simple as touching the right path.
Edited to add: You are correct, the technical restriction was on the VMWare side, but IIRC it was because of legal threats from Apple. Apparently earlier versions of VMWare would run SL without any problems, but the VMWare version I had would not not and I couldn't get a copy of the older version.
I greatly respected this trust and always bought the family pack for my Macs.
Yes, the licenses were per-user, if you as a person owned and used 20 macs, you only needed a single license.
Apple also sells one-on-one sessions if you are so inclined or need longer sessions than what the genius bar can help you with.
If you have an Apple store nearby you can walk in and get help. There is a limit to what they will do, my anecdotal experience is that most people with software issues get them fixed in a few minutes without going to repair.
But if you don't you are SOL with a >3 year old product.
Here are the timelines for AppleCare: http://www.apple.com/support/products/mac.html
In Australia, it's two years from last service. Potentially, you could have a never-ending warranty if it's replaced every 2 years.
If you get someone to DL it for you and burn it to disk/USB drive, you can probably also install it on Macs with older versions, since you'll just boot up in it..
So, it is free for everyone, but, only distributed easily to Snow Leopard and thereafter users.
I have a Macbook Pro 5,1 and only about three weeks ago did I upgrade to Mountain Lion from Lion. I typically wait a couple of point releases to make sure all the beachballs are resolved.
I do need real multi-monitor support though...
(and here's hoping that the download doesn't take TOO long. almost 2 days estimated right now :( )
They sell you that too.
https://itunes.apple.com/app/os-x-mavericks/id675248567?mt=1...
If the display driver is at fault, grandparent wouldn't even see a mouse cursor.
I don't know anything about 'properly cleaning the kernel caches', but it's clearly not a problem since grandparent was able to continue by rebooting.
It would be a pretty big feat if the adoption rates for Mavericks came anywhere close to the adoption rates for iOS7.
That's been the traditional criticism against Apple and Mac seemingly forever. (User of Apples since Apple II+ and original Macintosh.)
Apple has always attempted to strike a balance between longevity and progress, especially on Macs (5-7 year lifespan, usually). iOS is faster-moving, and gets the shaft more often (2-3 years, sometimes less). The latter will hopefully get better as the mobile hardware catches up to desktops; most of the forced upgrades have been due to low RAM or other hardware deficiencies.
Just because it's "free" and you can update systems that are on Snow Leopard, doesn't mean it'll update all systems on Snow Leopard. For those paying attention, Apple killed off quite a bit of hardware with 10.8. Those certainly aren't upgradable to Mavericks.
For any cocoa/obj-c dev that's dealt with constant deprecated API's on Mac, they know exactly what I'm talking about.
By your own admission that's not "in order to compel you to upgrade to the newer." That's because the newer hardware is required to make it work satisfactorily.
AirParrot has additional features like sending only one specific application window to the ATV and control over quality.
Beamer lets you seamlessly stream any kind of movie format you want and also gives control over subtitles.
Both work all the way back on 10.6. I don't suppose you could give me any advantages of Apple-branded AirPlay Mirroring huh?
http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/07/mountain-lion-airplay-m...
Tried Airparrot - quality was terrible in comparison.
The problem was with Mountain Lion, because it required 64-bit EFI (or something) which older models don't have.
If it won't run Lion/Mountain Lion, it won't run Mavericks either, unfortunately.
Also note that some features (e.g., AirDrop) aren't available on older machines running Mountain Lion, even if the basic OS runs. I don't know if that's been changed for Mavericks.
With that in mind, I can understand Apples motivation to move the whole line to 64 as soon as is possible.
I don't really understand how you can be confused.
OS X upgrade revenue is now such a minuscule piece of the pie that it probably doesn't matter anymore.
Yes, 129 for single-user and 169 for family (5-user).
And these are not so old days, Leopard was 129 and that was in 2007. Snow Leopard and Lion were 30, and ML was 20 (in USD, IIRC $129 translated to 129€ but ML is "only" 18€)
Well you can install Mavericks on machines from 2007, that's money from quite a long time ago.
Or "Nixploration."
OS is not necessarily tied to a single machine.
I have an external hard drive with all my documents, projects, music, movies, etc. on it. What's absolutely essential is recopied to my hard drive each time. It's kind of addictive to dive into a new operating system and learn it every so often. That's why there's a term for it - distro hopping.
It's good for some things. It gets you very good at doing rote computer tasks because you do them over and over in slightly different environments each time - install homebrew, update ruby, install rvm, configure common programs, tweak preferences and small aspects of the OS, etc.
As a result, I can wipe my entire hard drive and bring it back up to my workflow speed in less than 3 hours on a linux distro I roll myself via Arch.
All that said, I like OS X, so I'll be sticking with Mavericks for a while now.
Of course they make money from it. That's very naive of you to think that they don't.
Microsoft should be terrified. Both of their cash cows are getting rapidly commoditized.
It's the same reason iOS is coming into corporate environments: people want to use it.
iWorks is never going to be a threat to Microsoft in corporate environments, really. But the fact that Apple's customers don't need Microsoft at all just as Microsoft is taking a big step into consumer devices is probably an issue.
[0]http://blogs.forrester.com/philipp_karcher/13-10-17-office_p...
Windows 9 might be free for the same reason -- the new features are in apps and services, and the OS is a compatibility layer than needs to keep up.
For example, hypothetically: Office 2014 is expensive, Win 9 is free to provide access to Office 2014 Viewer or whatever.
This is why Windows 8.1 is free and I will assume the next iterations of Windows will be. Windows now has an app store and they are banking on getting as many people into that ecosystem as possible. While they may lose money in the OS purchase, that isn't where the bulk of the money is made anymore.
It's all about money.
What on earth compelled Nokia to launch their new Windows-tablet on the same day?
I can't imagine buying over an iPad, but I could see where it might appeal to more MS oriented folks.
For the Apple Fanboy: Apple wasn't even aware Nokia was releasing anything, because honestly, it's windows mobile so who cares, and this is pure coincidence.
For the Msft Fanboy: Apple releases a sad, incremental improvement in hardware that isn't their primary focus anymore in an attempt to keep the attention off of a rival.
I sincerely doubt Apple gives one tiny hoot about Windows tablets when it comes to timing their announcements. A flagship Android tablet maybe.
Every sold Android phone is putting few bucks in MS pocket.
http://www.itworld.com/open-source/372628/microsoft-makes-bi...
http://allthingsd.com/20130718/microsofts-making-more-money-...
Edit: Sarbanes-Oxley, not McCain-Feingold. I had forgotten.
> No. FASB changes revenue recognition principles in 2010 to allow this type of update.
http://www.inc.com/guides/2010/11/how-to-comply-with-new-rev...
Apple mentions their adoption of the rules in this press release (scroll down to "Retrospective Adoption of Amended Accounting Standards"):
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/01/25Apple-Reports-Firs...
That is how they've been able to give customers free iOS upgrades all this time without having to defer any revenue from the original sale of the hardware. They are apparently now applying the same practices to OS X software.
The promotion has long since ended.
Not only will Apple get some good press for this (barring any major technical snafu) but they'll glean some additional community goodwill and drastically reduce the number of legacy OS X versions in the wild.
I will give that driver support for wifi cards may make some computers more awkward than others. It's very rare these days that any common device other than a wifi card or a just this week released graphics card causes problems any more.
(As an aside, how do you escape asterisks here?)
Sources: http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/09/02/windows-8-jumps-pa...
http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share....
In terms of period that's equivalent to giving 8.1 free to all W7 users (both SL and W7 were released mid-2009)
Apple could (and now indeed does) give away their software for free and still make a decent living. Their software wont run on any hardware they haven't already made a profit on, so there's no significant "piracy" risk either way.
That said, Windows 8.1 was a free upgrade for everyone already on the Windows 8 bandwagon (and thus in need for some overhauls).
The idea that they would charge for these smaller OSX updates is bizarre, and the price point has been in the "we need this for accounting" range in the past.
Not true at all. Maybe if you're using old or unsupported hardware.
At most you'll need to set your BIOS to Optimized Defaults.
Trying to run OS X on non-Apple hardware makes the old days of "cumbersome" Linux-systems look like kindergarten-stuff.
I'd hardly say it just runs.
The best I had was a system which booted (incredibly slowly) and for which I could never get wifi working.
YMMV, but you have been warned. Even with good documentation, there is absolutely no guarantee you'll get anywhere at all.
Their recommended builds are excellent, even if you were only to use them for Windows.
It's literally build the computer, put the required software on USB drive(Unibeast). Boot computer, format drive, install OSX. Run Multibeast. Voila. Keep usb drive for when you update.
You mean EFI? Because Macs don't have any special hardware inside, and especially not any "authentic Mac" chips.
Something Microsoft would love, love, love to change about themselves. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface
Windows 8.1 is about as equivalent to OS X 10.9 as you can get and it was also free.
What exactly is the "boot to the face" here?
I'm willing to wager that Apple never charges for an OS update again. I'm surprised they've taken this long to make the leap. (Of course, Microsoft makes more from OEM licensing than upgrades, but it's still a blow to their value in the consumer headspace.)
FULL DISCLOSURE: Apple employee.
I'd like to burn a bootable DVD, and load it up as a non-networked offline install. Is such a thing even possible?
> Bootable DVD though? Really?
For some heavy-duty discussion on the withertos and wherefores, take a quick gander at a recent thread, over here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6532642
Remember that part where GCHQ stormed the offices of The Guardian, and took an angle grinder to one of their laptops?
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/20/nsa-snowden-fil...
Of course, Schneider uses Windows, so to each his own.
Just sayin'...
sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/WHATEVER_DISK –applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app –nointeraction
sudo "/Applications/Install OS X Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia" --volume /Volumes/Mavericks/ --applicationpath "/Applications/Install OS X Mavericks.app"
Works great, much faster installs than a disk.
edit: Un-tested by me, but I've heard this is how you do it:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=18081307&postcoun...
Very interested to see if Microsoft will follow suit.
And what? Make it up in volume? Unless Microsoft's Surface sales take-off, they can't afford to give Windows away for free apart from what are essentially service-packs like the 8.1 update they just released.
http://www.tannerhelland.com/4273/microsoft-money-updated-20...
Just chiming in conversationally (not refuting anything), but Windows original ascension was entirely based on piracy -- Microsoft did nothing to stop home users from thieving Windows as it lubricated its use for business (and business could much more easily be convinced to spend, if not at the outset, once the infrastructure was in place and they suddenly worried about a disgruntled employee turn them in).
And of course, Microsoft knows (and controls) the ecosystem more than anyone. Microsoft should be able to monetize users beyond just the operating system, but they are proving totally incompetent at doing that with home users.
There's also a huge difference in what each update adds when compared to 8.1 . Where 8.1 tries to fix all the initial issues with W8 (missing start button anyone?), Maverick adds serious new features (1+ hour of battery, compressed RAM).
The free iWork suite is a direct attack to MSFT Office. Giving it away for free will pay long term in decreasing market share for Office. Office H&O is $220. Buy a Mac/iPhone/iPad and you get that for free.
Pioneered?
Android updates have been free since day one.
Does this mean I can run the new OS in a VM to check out the Apple ecosystem? Or is this only free (as in beer) to people who have an existing paid license for a previous Apple operating system?
EULA: "[you are free] to install, use and run up to two (2) additional copies or instances of the Apple Software within virtual operating system environments on each Mac Computer you own or control that is already running the Apple Software."
(1) Practically speaking if you have a machine capable of running this legally, you also have an existing paid license for MacOS, so this is mostly a theoretical difference.
All I want to do is browse the Internet.
I could buy 3 Chromebooks for the price of that Macbook Air. Or 1 Chromebook and save money.
Which is fine, but beside the point.
This doesn't mean the honda is overpriced, correct? Your entire comment is a non sequitur.
Looking at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbook_air, in terms of specs it blows away even today's Macbooks -- two years later!
Moral: If you're looking at the higher end of the performance/price spectrum because you do things like gaming and compiling large programs like the Linux kernel, Macbooks aren't just overpriced, they're underpowered.
> hot
Only when you're actually running a game or using all the CPU cores.
> feels cheap
I don't like spending money unnecessarily. I regard my laptop with pride. Not just because it's a practical tool for day-to-day work and play. Not just because the specs give me bragging rights. But also because it's a symbol of how good I am at bargain hunting.
Your MacBook is tiny, insubstantial, and would make me feel like a sucker if I'd shelled out an entire grand for it.
To those of you saying Apple h/w is overpriced, find comparable spec'd machines to compare with and you'll find it's not as horrific as you claim. i.e. weight, battery, screen, power
But it's enough for you to get absurdly combative and trollish?
You are comparing an ultraportable with a luggable.
Perhaps you should try and least make fair comparisons.
> fair comparisons
Okay, here goes: In 2010 I bought an Eee PC. It has great battery life, a small screen, and less-than-stellar specs. It's very light and portable. It's perfectly fine for email, web browsing, document editing, or even light development work.
It was less than half the price of the notebook.
As far as performance goes, my 2011 11" Macbook Air was my primary development machine for a year (in both Xcode and IntelliJ/Scala). That Air also sported better battery life than any of the Eee PC line. It was more expensive, sure, but $500 is not very much when I'm using the machine for 6+ hours every day of the year. It was also more capable than that Eee PC and ran an operating system I found actually enjoyable to use (versus merely tolerable in the case of Windows or Linux); I have no problem paying $200-$300 more simply because of the feature that is OS X because for me, it's better.
And I haven't even touched on the build quality, which--in rather stark contrast to your attempted handwaving of an Air being "insubstantial" in another comment in this thread--is fantastic and makes me feel happy to use it, makes me enjoy working with it more. (Form is not superfluous. Pleasing form makes interacting with the computer more enjoyable, much like a well-designed tool in my shop or my kitchen.)
There's an app for that. It's called Safari and it comes on the $299 iPad Mini. What is your argument, again?
My PC runs Ubuntu Linux and I can't think of anything I would need a Mac can do for me that my PC can't.
> so I've been kind of interested to see what Apple machines do that PC's don't.
They run OS X. The hardware is nice, too, but if that was the only selling point I would probably buy cheaper and more powerful PCs.
> But I don't want to pay premium prices for iGoods.
Then don't. We don't all have the same preferences and usage patterns. If using Apple stuff doesn't hold any benefits for you, that's totally fine and reasonable. Contrary to many Apple users, I do believe their hardware is quite expensive. The question is if it's worth it. For me, that answer is "yes" at the moment, though that may change.
> Does this mean I can run the new OS in a VM to check out the Apple ecosystem?
I'm not sure if you can legally check out OS X in a VM, but technically that option has been available for some time. However, I don't see why anyone would. Doing actual work inside a VM is bound to be painful.
However, I found—at least with Parallels—you can't just take an existing hard drive image and use that: you have to create a new virtual machine, install Mountain Lion from scratch on it, then use OS X's Migration Assistant to move everything over.
It'll download as an application: "Install Mac OS X Mountain Lion.app". If the installer automatically launches, just quit out of it. Right-click on the application, select "Show package contents", then navigate to Contents/SharedSupport. In there, you'll see "InstalESD.dmg": that's the Mountain Lion image.
You should be able to use that image directly in Parallels et al, but if you really wanted physical media, you can burn that image to a disc or create a bootable flash drive using Disk Utility. If you go the flash drive route, you'll need to use the GUID partition table.
I might be doing this myself. Google "iAtkos ML2 VirtualBox" to find the settings for VirtualBox that will work.
iWork is more than good enough for many MS Office use cases. If you work on documents that you often don't need to exchange with co-workers, then you don't really have any barriers to switching. Obviously, financial analysts with their massive models in excel aren't going anywhere anytime soon, but real estate agents like my mother and others like her have few reasons not to switch.
Next time someone goes to upgrade office, they are going to have to compare an expensive software license with putting that money into a brand new computer instead and who doesn't love having a fresh new computer.
I guess it's more seen as a push to avoid maintaining old software at high costs, and limiting fragmentation, by migrating as much people as possible. I guess the longevity of Windows XP must be seen as a scary thing. Also on a psychological level, the users get used to upgrade without too much fear. The company can retire the products sooner, flip the technology faster.
... except before... I think it was... System 7.5? All new OSes used to be free for Mac and Apple II.
This is a quote from the Verge's liveblog of an Apple guy. Note he said "Mac", which made me think of it.
Even for free, I'm weary of upgrading my OS. Too scared to take a performance hit.
1. in a literal manner or sense; exactly.
2. used for emphasis or to express strong feeling while not being literally true.
Words are literally defined by how they are actually used by humans over time. If I hold up a sign saying "Free Donuts", no one is going to think I mean that pastries should be liberated. To unnecessarily cling to the word "free" when it has a more obvious secondary meaning is to tilt at windmills; there is no shortage of synonyms.
The two meanings are quite common in the english language, it's not a pedantic invention of the FOSS community to make this distinction.
As for OSX, this update (like many in the past) has several features which rejuvenate older hardware. It does the opposite of what you claim.
I understand the why - the chipset/cpu is 32bit, and Mavericks is 64-bit only. Bit of a bugger. The user won't notice though (My wife)
I'm sure the upgrade experience would be better than my Windows 8 -> Windows 8.1 experience of last week. The best way to describe that would be train wreck.
From what I have been able to find, the CPU is perfectly 64bit capable but Apple has simply chosen not to release a compatible UEFI for it.
Some enterprising folks have gotten things to work but it's veering into hackintosh territory.
One downside is that paid software upgrades provide a useful feedback mechanism. It must get over the 'is this worth $100' bar to sell. I think this is probably important for iwork also. Between creating revenue vs enhancing the mac's value & pulling users deeper into Apple-land, I think the right decision could be to go free. OTOH, that would absolve iwork from having to be good enough that users choose to pay money for it.
Still, free OS upgrades seem like the right choice.
As with a mobile OS, the services layer on top of the OS seems as important as the operating system itself. With so much of the value in owning a Mac being iLife, iWork, iCloud, maps, iTunes, the Appstore and so on, could Apple open up OS X in the way Android is open (by which I mean for inspection more than contribution and just the core, not the services)?
Seems against their culture but this takes away one of the big reasons why they wouldn't.
Base SDK = 10.9
Minimum Deployment Target = 10.9Yes i am naive like that.
Is it their software which is so costly, or is it the hardware upon which that software runs?
Can anyone point me to an ISO of this?
The competition is already free and Apple has still a high security prison as far as the lock-in effect of its technology is concerned, so they're still safe.
Switching models to compete with the Windows model is a mistake they were lucky to make once and live to tell about. They will not make that mistake again.
If you're looking for competition against Microsoft, look to Google. Both of these companies aren't hardware companies at their heart, and both want manufacturers to bundle their OS.
I'd say that if Microsoft had an ally, it would be Apple today (only in the sense that Apple doesn't care for Microsoft's business).