Tag Archives: OS X

By Staff | Published: February 27, 2009

Mac OS X 10.5.7 enters beta; broadly seeded to devs

As Rumors has recently reported, the development of Mac OS X 10.5.7 has been proceeding at a slow but steady pace…and in the past few days, has crossed over into “beta” status with a new build that has been seeded to the full developer community.

Seeded to devs in a full distribution Apple Developer Connection (ADC) release earlier this week, Mac OS X 10.5.7 build 9J22 weighs in at a hefty 400MB (770MB for “Combo” version) and continues to grow in size at a blistering pace — particularly given the relatively small number of builds that have been made of 10.5.7 to date (a mere 22, apparently).

As usual, the OS X Server variant of the 10.5.7 package will be significantly larger and is expected to end up close to a full gigabyte in its Combo version. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Response
By Staff | Published: February 10, 2009

Mac OS X 10.6 “Snow Leopard” – First Sneak Peek

Even as Mac OS Rumors worked to prepare our first in-depth look at developmental “alpha” stage builds of Mac OS X 10.6 “Snow Leopard” earlier this week…the first builds (10A250 and later) seeded to third-party developers in quite some time and the first to be nearly feature-complete hit the grapevine like a shock wave. We have modified this first Sneak Peek to incorporate some of these reports, notably on the most recent 10A261 seed, and will be posting smaller more frequent Snow Leopard updates in the days ahead.

To begin with, let’s review the straightforward nature of Snow Leopard’s mission: eschewing “innovation” at the user level for primarily under-the-hood upgrades, Snow Leopard is a one-year project that Apple has embarked on to catch up with its backlog of ambitious architectural and technological plans for the Mac OS X operating system. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software, Articles | Also tagged , , , , , , , , | 16 Responses
By Staff | Published: February 4, 2009

OS X 10.5.7 nearing beta phase; supports new macs, bug fixes

Despite somewhat less hands-on time that we usually like to have in our first sneak-peeks of developmental Apple software — particularly system updates — we are taking a look under the hood of Mac OS X 10.5.7 which is fast approaching the ‘beta’ phase when it will be seeded to third-party developers for testing & feedback. Interestingly, our examinations turned up not just software dirt, but hints of what’s to come for the iMac, Mac Pro & even Macbook Air.

As the introduction and subject-line suggest, the late-alpha builds of Mac OS X 10.5.7 that Rumors has been able to explore through source reports, “batphone” streams, and limited direct hands-on usage by our Silicon Valley team thus far have all brought us to one conclusion. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Responses
By Staff | Published: January 28, 2009

iStat for iPhone review

App Store link

To start off, we would like to thank Bjango for making such a nice application and for allowing us to take it for a test drive. We think they have a real winner here that could be of use to many people for different purposes. Those who manage servers day to day will be glad to have a nicely presented and easy to use view of their servers statistics on the device they already carry around every day (you DO carry an iPhone everywhere you go just like us, right?). While the server daemon is OS X only right now, Bjango tells us that a Windows and Linux server daemon are a definite possibility for the future, and we think their success with this app will skyrocket once a Linux daemon is available since many IT admins use Linux on the back end. Read more

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Posted in 3rd Party Software, App Store, Articles | Also tagged , , , , | Leave a comment
By Staff | Published: January 26, 2009

The Mac’s 25th Anniversary — Founder’s Column, Part 1

25 years ago this past weekend, an upstart development team within Apple Computer brought to market a cheaper, faster, better alternative to Steve Jobs’ pet project the “Lisa” (named after his daughter).

Though Jobs’ own feelings about the Macintosh were mixed, he undertook a famous event to introduce it to the world with a unique, historic advertisement (“1984”) and a demonstration that blew away the crowd: the very first Mac 128K seen in public spoke to the crowd that day, using a first-of-its-kind speech synthesizer technology developed specifically for that first Mac — a technology that has been a unique strength of the Mac platform ever since.

This weekend, even as the moment of the announcement event’s anniversary passed us by, the Rumors team was watching an amazing film called Welcome to Mac. Read more

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Posted in Apple Hardware, Apple Inc., Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Responses
By Staff | Published: January 25, 2009

Quicktime 7.6 released; major update includes big changes

This week, Apple released Quicktime 7.6 in a major update which includes not only numerous security and bug fixes as well as considerable performance improvements. Other changes & new features follow below.

From Apple’s release notes, some of the new features include….

Video: Improves single-pass H.264 encoding quality / Increases the playback reliability of Motion JPEG media

Audio: Improves AAC encoding fidelity / Audio tracks from MPEG video files now export consistently

Application Support: Improves compatibility with iChat and Photo Booth

In our tests, framerates of Photo Booth videos are considerably improved, particularly under heavy CPU loads….and similar advances have been made with hardware-saturation scenarios for h.264 transcoding as well as many other resource-intensive functions.

All in all, we’re very impressed with QT 7.6 and can’t wait to spend more time hands-on with it; if you have experiences, bugs, or other feedback about Quicktime to share, please post to the comments, email us: rumors@macosrumors.com or contact us on the social networks — we’ve just opened a new Twitter account at http://twitter.com/macosrumors ! Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , | Leave a comment
By Staff | Published: January 13, 2009

Latest WebKit nightly build includes built-in update functionality

As of the current nightly build (39852), WebKit — the developmental version of Safari, available for public testing — has added the capability to update to the latest build within Webkit.app itself, obviating the need for third party software like NightShift.

The Rumors team has been a very active part of WebKit development/testing since its very first day — just as we are known throughout the industry for being prolific beta testers of both hardware & software.

(If you are a hardware and/or software developer with a developmental, beta, or pre-release product you’d like us to help test — and with your explicit permission, review for our readers who are very interested in such technology — please contact us as soon as possible: rumors@macosrumors.com to make arrangements!)

We do of course use other browsers, notably Mozilla Firefox, for various purposes….but have always been passionate supporters of Safari/Webkit and its underlying technology. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , | 6 Responses
By Staff | Published: January 9, 2009

Conflicted over the lack of an Apple netbook while Sony announces one?

As we watch with a certain degree of envy the announcement at CES 2009 that Sony is introducing a new 8-inch display based “netbook” Vaio ‘lifestyle PC,’ many in the community are experiencing a duality of appreciation and frustration at Apple’s apparent disinterest in this space. But it may be with good reason.

Already, the iPhone and the Macbook Air nicely bracket the netbook product space.

Between the two, one really doesn’t have much need for such a device…..but nonetheless, when one looks over the specs of the new Vaio Lifestyle PC and its elegant little industrial design, it’s hard not to feel a little bit envious that Apple didn’t do it first.

Specs like these: 1.33GHz x86 processor, 1600×768 (!!!) pixel 8-inch 16:9 widescreen display, built-in micro webcam, two USB 2.0 ports, combined display/network breakout port, audio I/O ports, SD and Memory Stick slots, and a built-in 60GB hard drive or 128GB SSD drive. Read more

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Posted in Apple Hardware | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Responses
By Staff | Published: January 9, 2009

Microsoft seeks to steal Apple’s thunder, Windows 7 Beta @ CES

Xerces affiliated bloggers & tech-TV anchors attending CES 2009 are streaming the news back to Rumors HQ that Microsoft has made a strong, headline-grabbing announcement at the opening of CES with Steve Ballmer’s announcement of a Windows 7 Beta to be made available for download tomorrow (Friday, January 9th).

LAS VEGAS, NV (Xerces Media)
Xerces-affiliated reporters and long-time source/contributor “Tron” are in attendance at CES, and though many have called this year’s Consumer Electronics Show a ‘hollowed-out shell of its former self,’ this news promises a rather more headline-grabbing show than many pundits seem to have expected.

Tron, only minutes out of the Ballmer speech and battling spotty connectivity due to the crush of wireless-access density in the area of the CES show floor, will be sending us updates throughout the week & week-end from CES as the bulk of Xerces’ remaining reporting teams are on their way home from Macworld. Read more

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Posted in 3rd Party Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Responses
By Staff | Published: November 18, 2008

Mac OS X 10.5.6 update may be released within the week

According to reliable sources, OS X 10.5.6 will be released to considerable excitement — well justified, based on our hands-on experiences with the update that will be posted shortly — within the next few days. Details to follow. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , | 3 Responses
By Staff | Published: August 19, 2008

iPhone Software Update 2.0.2 Released

Late Tuesday evening, Apple released version 2.0.2, a relatively modest update officially containing only bug fixes but unofficially including a number of non-bugfix tweaks to several major components of the onboard operating system as well as its bundled applications in at least three confirmed instances — Settings, Mail and Safari.


Stay tuned for a full “0-day” hands on review from Rumormongers’ Labs to be followed by Reader Reports from our best sources across the globe…..for now, some early vital stats on iPhone 2.0.2 which represents a “quick” release of key functional & security changes which couldn’t wait for the massive and impressive 2.1 release due in roughly two to three weeks’ time….

Although a parallel release for the iPod Touch is expected shortly including all non-phone & non-mobile-data/non-GPS related code — primarily security fixes in the core software, Settings, Mail and Mobile Safari — the releases for the two devices are expected to be synchronous for version 2.1 which will be a fully free update for both devices, provided you are already running the version 2.x.x software package. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
By Staff | Published: June 9, 2008

Live Keynote Updates STREAMING

Click through to the full page for streaming updates from WWDC 2008! Read more

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Posted in Apple Events | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Responses
By Staff | Published: June 8, 2008

Apple is not dropping Carbon support, PowerPC code


Since the Intel switch, everyone has been waiting for Apple to set a hard deadline for support for PowerPC based Macs. Some have significant numbers of PowerPC machines in use and want to be able to continue using them with new OS X releases in the future, others are clamoring for Apple to go Intel-only.

While it is a given that Apple will eventually drop support for the last PowerPC based macs at some point with a future release of OS X, it is unlikely this will happen as soon as 10.6. Apple does set arbitrary but hard cutoff points for older hardware, but those are specific machines lacking certain features. For Apple to cut support for PowerPC hardware would mean cutting an entire architecture out of the operating system. Read more

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Posted in Apple Hardware, Apple Software | Also tagged , | 3 Responses
By Staff | Published: May 29, 2008

Apple releases 10.5.3, Security Updates

Mac OS X 10.5.3, a massive update weighing in at well over 400MB and containing even more changes than 10.5.2 (itself sporting the largest changelist in Apple software update history) has been released along with a separate package for Tiger users containing only the relevant security updates.

Coming almost exactly when predicted by the grapevine, 10.5.3 and these Tiger Security Updates are packed to the gills with fixes and new functionality that many readers have been clamoring for since before Leopard had even shipped….

From the 10.5.3 release notes (http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1141):

General

*Fixes a font issue that could result in Helvetica Narrow being used in applications instead of Helvetica.

*Addresses an issue with stuttering video and audio playback in certain USB devices. Read more

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Posted in Apple Software | Also tagged , | Leave a comment
By Staff | Published: January 29, 2008

iDevice gaming “set to explode,” say game industry insiders

The sheer number of companies actively planning or already executing projects with target platforms like the modern day iPod Nano, iPhone/iPod Touch, and even AppleTV is much bigger than public perception seems to acknowledge. We’ve recently talked with a number of our friends in the gaming industry — from die hard Mac developers now focusing on “Cider” (DirectX –OpenGL abstraction layer, allowing “Windows games” to be developed once and deployed simultaneously on OS X) development, to console companies and newcomers to the gaming world, virtually everyone is very excited about the future of game-style entertainment on Apple devices.

Cute little arcade games like those we see on the Classic iPods are all well and good, but a modernized Breakout with 3D graphics can only keep you amused so long; even Bejeweled gets old after a while. Read more

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Posted in 3rd Party Software | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment