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OS X Businesses Operating Systems Apple

Mac OS X Panther 10.3 Reviewed 401

Posted by simoniker from the like-it-like-it-love-it dept.
JigSaw writes "OSNews posted a (constructively) critical, but also favorable review of Mac OS X Panther 10.3. The article discusses the new features, what works great and what's still sour, and it also includes a plethora of screenshots." The review's conclusion suggests Panther is "...a worthy operating system, easy to use, easy to set up, easy to get pleased by it. It just works."
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Mac OS X Panther 10.3 Reviewed More

Mac OS X Panther 10.3 Reviewed

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  • fix outstanding bugs? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by SuperBanana ( 662181 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @05:53AM (#7227890)

    Will it fix the massive bugs introduced into Bluetooth that have yet to be fixed?

    How about the problems with remote filesystems? Put your powerbook to sleep with any volume mounted, even read-only with no files open, and you'll basically have to restart(not even a umount -f will unmount the volume) because almost every app will show a spinning pizza of death.

    How about the bug that exists in most G4 powerbooks, where changing the volume level too quickly under "heavy load" causes the balance to shift?

    Every OS X release has been rather half-baked, although Apple is certainly doing better now than with 10.0 and 10.1...but it's still irritating that several bugs which affect me on a day to day basis will require dishing out another $100+, when I just bought a $3,000 laptop 2-3 months ago(my fourth powerbook, eighth mac, btw.)

    • Re:fix outstanding bugs? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The spinning pizza of death problem is still there with the remote volume mount. I gave it about three minutes before I rebooted yesterday. The volume may have eventually re-mounted, but past experience just made me give the powerbook a three finger salute. It is without a doubt the biggest pain in the ass for mac users. The audio bug seems to be fixed. I did notice after the install of the GM build that I got that "white noise" sound when the finder loaded, but that has since not returned. All in all thou

    • Re:fix outstanding bugs? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Rosyna ( 80334 )
      Every last one of these was fixed for me in 10.2.8 except Bluetooth (that broke, but panther fixed it).

      And the problem with remote volumes will "resolve itself" after 2-20 minutes of inactivity. I haven't yet tried it in panther. Guess I should.

      The volume thing was definitely fixed with 10.2.8 because it used to annoy the hell out of me and I'd almost rue and lament (but not regret) the times I would change the volume.
      • And the problem with remote volumes will "resolve itself" after 2-20 minutes of inactivity. I haven't yet tried it in panther. Guess I should.

        This annoying problem has been fixed in Panther. Now it just brings up a dialog box asking if you want to disconnect or retry. I think these are the options anyway.
    • Every OS X release has been rather half-baked

      Yeah, because neither Microsoft nor Linux has ever released a major version that didn't have odd bugs to fix afterward.
    • Putting my powerbook to sleep and changing networks used to cause problems for me, but that was a long time ago, and even when I'm forgetful and still have a remote mount that no longer exists, I can still get out of it with a combination of "sudo umount," and by relaunching the Finder.

      I don't know if you're working with Kerberos tickets or something, but I've never had problems with mounts when on the same network, whether they were AFS, DAV, SMB or NFS mounts. Put the machine to sleep for hours or days,
    • Every OS X release has been rather half-baked

      In comparison to what? On a purely theoretical level, I agree with you. There were plenty of bugs and bits of weirdness. But even 10.0 seemed more polished than any Windows or Linux release I've used. And I'm not Mac zealot or apologist either -- I still use all these operating systems daily and think Apple makes loads of boneheaded decisions.

      I do wish there was an even _more_ polished OS, but isn't OSX the best there is for the time being?

      Cheers.

      (Oh --
  • (he said with karma to burn)
    What have you done with the Eugenia we all know and love - you know, the damning with faint praise, lak of spel cjekr, unmitigated beos - er, bias - er, well, you know...

    Ok, couldn't resist. I take back all the flame emails - not because it's a favorable-to-Mac review, but because she's far more even handed and objective than ever. Brava, Eugenia!
  • She has some complaints about the dock, but one of them just didn't make any sense at all:

    Another personal gripe I have is that I can't change the color of the Dock and I can't place apps beneath it without resorting to hacks

    What is she talking about? You don't need to hack the dock for apps to exist beneath it!

    • What is she talking about?

      She has no idea what she's talking about. The only thing more embarassing than her reviews is the fact that Slashdot continues to link them.
    • How do you know that you can do this, have you seen the version she is talking about? She did post a picture of what she used to be able to do and says she can't anymore. That is to say, she is specifically saying it is broken in the new release.

    • More importantly, why is she putting apps under the Dock in the first place? Sounds like a pretty stupid thing to do IMO.
    • You don't need to hack the dock for apps to exist beneath it

      you misunderstood her. she didn't mean that apps couldn't exist beneath the dock (ie visible because the dock is transparent and the window shows through it). she means that with the dock on the side of the window, she wants apps to be stuck to the side of the screen physically underneath it, ie closer to the bottom of the monitor, with the dock centred on the side of the screeen.. ie below it in the Y direction, not the Z direction.

      hth.

      dave
  • One of the biggest differences between Windows and Mac OS X, in my opinion, is that Microsoft always tries to retain as much compatibility with previous versions as possible while Apple doesn't. I noticed that with Jaguar and I noticed the same with Panther: about 10-20% of the third party applications just won't load anymore, or they will crash on load. I understand that this policy has dsitinct advantages, but that's a lot of incompatable apps (out of 7,000 available for OSX) and while most of these will
    • That's one person's estimate of how many apps have been broken. I'd like to see that backed up with something more reliable than one person's gut reaction.
    • There are FAR more apps on the PC that crash under XP, just don't work, or are just poorly written. On average, a 3rd party app for the Mac is written with higher programming/compiling standard. And take note, 3rd party apps ARE NOT Apple Apps.

      Besides, one of the programs, I believe this guy was talking about was a Haxie that Panther addresses.

      Also, I only use respected 3rd party applications. Adobe, Microsoft, and my favorite shareware (Graphic Converter from Lemkesoft) all come out with INSTANT updates
      • here are FAR more apps on the PC that crash under XP, just don't work, or are just poorly written.

        Given that there are just plain orders of magnitude more applications for PCs than for Macs, that's not surprising. It's not, however, a general indictment of the relative quality of Windows XP to Mac OS. And at least MS doesn't charge $129 for patches.

        • And yet it's still cheaper to buy the mac OS:

          http://simplest-shop.com/Macintosh--1-229660-so f tw are.html

          Let's see
          X.1 Sept 28, 2001
          X.2 Aug 23, 2002

          That puts 11 months between those two releases

          And assuming the earliest release of X.3 in sept, that would be 13 months from the last release. And 16 months in december.

          By contrast:

          Windows 2000 , Feb 17 2000
          Windows ME released Sept 14 2000

          That would be 7 months

          Windows XP Oct 25 2001

          That would be 13 months

          And lets compare prices:

          Mac OS X $130 always (
        • And at least MS doesn't charge $129 for patches.

          What do you call Windows98 SE? The Microsoft Plus Packs? The differences between 10.2.x and 10.3.x are much larger than either of these. This is not a "patch" but a mid-sized upgrade. I will be buying the upgrade as it is worth the money.

          And as someone who supports both MacOS (9/X) and Windows, there was for more apps that broke (or needed major playing with the compatibility settings) than have broken on me going to the 10.3 beta I am running. And the only
    • Not to be a Microsoft basher, but I feel obligated to point out that MS HAS broken that many applications. Ever heard of forcing us all to a kernel switch? *coughxpcough* Ever heard of even more legacy compatability leaving in Longhorn?

    • Re:Another 'I dont understand' (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MarcQuadra ( 129430 ) * on Thursday October 16, 2003 @07:33AM (#7228279)
      I can still run HyprCard 1.4 (released in '87, I believe) on a brand-new G4. That says something. That's an app compiled for a DIFFERENT ARCHITECTURE goddammit!

      My dad runs ClarisWorks 3.1 on his G4, and that app is at LEAST a decade old.

      If developers write apps that aren't up to spec or link against stuff that Apple doesn't promise will be there next year I hardly see how it's Apple's fault.

      When the 68040 came out it crashed TONS of apps because developers were using self-modifying code that got mangled in the (then new to Mac) L1 cache. Apple had been telling folks for YEARS not to write code like that because it would bite them later, but some didn't listen.

      I think the responsibility lies MOSTLY with the application developers who want you to buy a new copy of their product whenever Apple releases a major update.
      • I can still run HyprCard 1.4 (released in '87, I believe) on a brand-new G4. That says something. That's an app compiled for a DIFFERENT ARCHITECTURE goddammit!

        I can't stop laughing! You really hit the nail on the head... it's just the way you said it... it cracks me up.

        I've always thought that Apple did a great job with backwards compatibility. When I bought my Apple IIGS back in the day (ok, my parents bought it for me), it was able to run most if not all of the software that was available for earlier

    • This has been true for a looooong time, but seems to be swept under the carpet. If MS broke this many applications, the linux and apple zealots would be gloating like the DNC at Rush Limbaugh.

      This doesn't make sense to me. I still run some ancient applications. I can't think of any major applications that have "broken" with a Mac OS release. The only things that typically break are user-interface hacks that typically use undocumented tricks to mess with the system menus, dock, and the like--but I don't e

    • What she means is 50% of stupid UI hacks that rely on undocumented API's get b0rked when the OS gets updated because Apple has changed the undocumented API's.

      The API's are undocumented for the simple reason that they will change (And they often change between point releases, 10.2.6 broke a bunch of these hacks, as did 10.2.8).

      If all you do is use the stupid hacks to amke stuff loook pretty, don't bitch when they break because they weren't following the published API's (Which are quite stable).

      Considering
    • Not really true. Atleast not really true historically. Remember the Fat binaries ? Apple actually supported two different architectures with the same binary , without the user even having to know about it. It true that if they dint do that they would have been dead right now, but still its a histrorical counterexample to the arguement.
    • Notably missing is any mention of what apps are broken. Personally my experience has been the opposite. There's only one program I've tried that ran on my old Mac IIvx (68030, not even PPC) that won't run in OS X (using Classic, of course). That one requires the monitor to be either 16 colors or B/W, and I haven't figured out how to do that since the minimun seems to be 256 colors.

      Oh well.

      To be fair, I'm exluding things like utilities and OS hacks/enhancements that tend to be problematic in any kind of up
    • Remember too, that if Apple had its way back when OSX was first released, there would be no Carbon apps at all.
      The broken apps are those that are Carbonized and Cocoa apps are unaffected. Apple is appeasing the programmers by offering the gradual migration path from OS 9 API's that they demanded when OSX was first announced as a development project. These same developers dont seem to be making much of a fuss about the bumps encountered along the path of migration. The end users complain without understan
  • I've read dozens of OS reviews like this, were all you get is a review of the install and a quick tour of the new features - only here there's Eugenia's inevitable comparisons to BEOS. Deeply exciting I'm sure, but somehow I suspect better reviews will appear within the next couple of days.
    • Yes, the daddy of all OS X reviews are from Ars Technica [arstechnica.com]
    • You know, in 2000, comparisons with BeOS were pretty fair. In 2001, too. Now, a whole new generation of folks is coming around and they're wondering why someone is going on and on about the BeOS and it's about as annoying as the die-hard Amiga fans and the OS/2 whackos who just won't accept the sad fact that their platforms, however great they were (and may still be), are gone. At least with BeOS, though, there's still some interesting ideas that haven't filtered out into the "real" world completely as o
  • My understanding is that HFS+ is case-preserving. For people switching from Linux/BSD and used to a case=sensitive fs, are there options to get case-sensitive (you can install ufs but you'll lose journalling)

  • For those who've bought macs recently... (Score:5, Informative)

    by jason.hall ( 640247 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @06:34AM (#7228011)
    Apple has an Up-To-Date [apple.com] offer to buy v10.3 for $19.95, for those who've bought a Mac on or after October 8.

    However, I bought my new 15" Powerbook a few days after it was announced last month (around Sep 18 or so) and plugged my serial # in for kicks. Lo and behold, I qualified!

    I've heard rumors it's unofficially extended back just for certain systems....
    • That's good to hear. I ordered a new PowerBook just before they released the new ones. When I placed the order, I specifically said `I don't want to get a Mac and then find Panther is released the next week'. I was assured that it was `unlikely to ship much before Christmas', so I went ahead (I wouldn't mind upgrading the OS a few months in). My new Mac still hasn't arrived (although it has shipped), and Panther is due to be released in about a week...

      If I don't qualify for the $19.95 upgrade, then I wi

  • ftp upload ? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by selderrr ( 523988 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @07:23AM (#7228205) Journal
    can anyone confirm/deny that Apple has expanded ftp support in the finder ? (preferable expanded to sftp also)
    Right now, the jaguar finder has built in read only ftp, which plain sux

    I know : there are many excellent ftp clients available, but being able to mount a volume over ftp as with the iDisk would be extremely user-friendly.

    • Re:ftp upload ? (Score:4, Informative)

      by ThesQuid ( 86789 ) <a987.mac@com> on Thursday October 16, 2003 @07:47AM (#7228374) Journal
      Nope. Still read-only, and zero sftp support. Tried that just yesterday. On the upside, it's MUCH more stable and doesn't hang when disconnecting or coming out of sleep.
      From the help file:
      To connect to FTP servers, type the DNS name or IP address for the server like this:

      ftp://DNSname

      Note: From the Finder you connect to FTP servers with read-only access. To copy files to an FTP server, use another program such as Safari.

      That last one threw me for a loop. Safari? What the heck...?

    • >can anyone confirm/deny that Apple has expanded ftp support in the finder ?

      It's still read-only in the Pre-release version of Panther that I have.

    • You might also want to check out WebDAV [oreillynet.com] which they are actively supporting. Apache 2 needs an extra directive [lyra.org].
  • I've been using it for about two weeks now, and I'll say that hands-down expose' is the best thing to have to get people's attention when you want to show off a computer. I'm in China, where Macs are a rare breed, and when I show people expose' their eyes practically pop out of their heads. It's worth it just for that.

    By the way, how do I type the accent mark in a slashdot posting? Safari lets me enter it, but slashdot strips it.

  • How about we wait another 8 days [apple.com] before we start talking about problems with Panther. This is more of a what to expect page but I am SURE the beta the author used will be a LOT different then the final product. Geez!

    Seems like the author just needed something to talk about since the beta has been available for some time and what to expect was well documented in MacWorld like 2 months ago! [macworld.com]

  • I've been using a preview version of Panther for a month now and I must say that Expose [apple.com] is the greatest GUI innovation in ages. It looks cool in demos, but it's even better when you actually use it. I much prefer it to virtual desktops as a method to organize windows.

    • I still think the jelly look of Mac OSX is horrible (not when I first saw it, but it's for some reason not growing on me), but the Expose feature do look great. :-) I never got into using virtual desktops either (too much work organizing stuff into desktops IMHO), so that feature looks nice.

      Let's just the feature ripped off by Microsoft and shoved into Longhorn in 2005/6. :-)

      • Re:Expose! (Score:5, Interesting)

        by phillymjs ( 234426 ) <slashdotNO@SPAMstango.org> on Thursday October 16, 2003 @07:52AM (#7228408) Homepage Journal
        Let's just the feature ripped off by Microsoft and shoved into Longhorn in 2005/6. :-)

        Actually, it has been claimed [winnetmag.com] that the reason Microsoft is keeping a tight lid on the Longhorn GUI is that they already had a feature just like Expose and Apple somehow stole it. Riiiiiiiiight. Anyone care to provide proof of that? I find it highly dubious that while Expose has been being demoed for months now at every Apple event pimping the forthcoming 10.3, it was only very recently that Microsoft said that it was a feature filched from them and they have in fact been demoing something like that for years. I dunno, I've seen quite a few Microsoft demos, and read about still others. I saw video of the USB BSOD at the Win98 demo. I heard about their pointless "flapping Windows" feature in their knockoff of Quartz Extreme. But I've never heard a peep about their version of Expose, and considering the reaction it got when Apple demoed it and how useful people working with Panther betas seem to find it, you'd think someone would have heard something of Microsoft's.

        ~Philly
        • I think that for OS X's gui expose will be really useful. However, in windows xp, the taskbar pretty much takes care of all my windowing needs for me. I usually work will all my apps maximized anyway so switching is as easy as finding the right button on the task bar. If something like expose was put in windows I don't think I would really use it.
  • I didn't want to wait another week until the release, so I grabbed the build claiming to be 7B85 that's been floating around on BitTorrent, and put it on a spare G4/350 I've got lying around.

    I like the new installer, it's a little more informative about its progress. As for the OS itself, the GUI feels significantly faster, even on a creaky old 350MHz machine without the benefit of enough VRAM to use Quartz Extreme. They seem to have really tightened up the code quite a bit-- for shits and giggles, I ran x [xbench.com]
  • One big problem we were having with 10.2 was that our our Mac users could see our broadcast CUPS queues from the linux printserver, but when they tried to print to them it sometimes came out garbled, and with PDF's would hang the Mac Printcenter and sometimes the CUPS queue too. It was a while ago, but it had something to do with extra imbedded MAC only filters for imbedding PS images into PDF... getting vauge with time. Anyway it came down to Apple teaking CUPS out of compliance with the CUPS "standard."

  • WMV support in OS X (Score:5, Funny)

    by Rinikusu ( 28164 ) on Thursday October 16, 2003 @08:53AM (#7228682)
    quote from Eugenia: /* why not be able to enjoy Red Hot Chilli Peppers or Linkin Park videos as the average Windows user can at 300 kbps? :P */

    Because the word "enjoy" does not immediately come to mind when the words "Linkin Park" are uttered, you can safely say you "enjoy" them just as easily as the typical Windows user by not watching them at all.

    Jesus.

    • Not to mention the fact that it's Microsoft's responsibility to port WMV and not Apple's. MS has announced that they're working on WMP 9 for OS X but it probably won't be out until Windows Media 10 with an all-new, all-incompatible set of codecs comes out for Windows.
  • The author states in the article "I installed clean on both my Macs, because upgrading wouldn't work on my 12" Powerbook (Jaguar "had errors" the installation was insisting). That was not a big deal for me as I don't have any important data on my Macs, but it may be troublesome for people who who are trying to install on their primary machine."

    Then he goes and gives "Installation" a 10 out of 10. What gives? This actually is a big concern for me though. I don't want to have to do a clean install of this

    • This actually is a big concern for me though. I don't want to have to do a clean install of this OS. To save all my data, reinstall all my applications, etc.

      You can do a clean install of just the operating system and still keep all of your data. It's called an "archive install". [apple.com]

      As for the Applications you'll either have to reinstall what doesn't come with Mac OS or you can probably just move them to your local Applications folder (~/Applications/) before the install and then move them back to /Applica

    • Panther, like Jaguar, has a "Archive" installation option, where it saves the previous OS files to an archive file, then installs the new OS clean. Applications and home directories are preserved. This gives you the benefits of a clean install without having to reformat.
  • Argh, please tell me 7B85 is not 10.3.0. NFS is buggy in this build. mounts get stale and won't even unmount, "permission denied". Also if the automounter hangs and you kill it you're soon going to be without any disk access, even local one.
  • Interoperability with Windows is even better now. Samba seems to work really well. There is Exchange support, and VPN access to Windows networks is there too. On the third disk you will also find a package with support for Common Access Cards. ?

    huh? really? exchnage?

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