Download Snow Leopard for Mac 10.5 Updated

Download Snow Leopard for Mac 10.5

Sneaking in a few days earlier its promised September release, the melody-up for Mac Os X Leopard costs $29 for current Leopard users, and packs just plenty punch to be worth your coin. Apple is careful to point out that Snow Leopard isn't a complete organization overhaul, only rather a collection of hundreds of smaller refinements to brand Leopard run more gracefully. Hidden among smaller tweaks are some technical improvements that result in a smoother, easier-to-apply Leopard with plenty for Mac fans to be excited nigh. The user interface and everyday tasks feel faster in full general, although we didn't notice a noun improvement in awarding performance.

Even if you're not a current Leopard user, the $169 packet that includes Snow Leopard, iLife, and iWork is a steal for the system upgrade and 2 of Apple'due south major software suites, not to mention the long-pined-afterwards inclusion of Microsoft Exchange compatibility. Finally you will exist able to connect with Exchange Servers (without using Microsoft's Entourage), but only if your company is using Microsoft Exchange 2007; many still aren't. Snowfall Leopard is offered on a single install deejay--there are no carve up, tiered pricing structures to worry almost--and yous're getting every feature and technical enhancement available in a single install. Unfortunately, for those on PowerPC systems, Snow Leopard only works with Intel Macs.

Installation
Installation of Snow Leopard is dead elementary and (according to Apple) up to 45 percent faster than Leopard using a newly designed installer that asks only 1 question during the process. On our exam automobile, the process took almost an hour, including two automated restarts. The default setting installs Snow Leopard without tampering with any of your saved files, music, photos, or documents. Generally nosotros had no problems, but on i test machine we needed to reinstall the OS when it had trouble rebooting. Fortunately the new installer is designed for safely reinstalling the OS in the event y'all run into any hiccups during your initial installation. On our second endeavor, the Os installed perfectly on our test machine and no files were harmed. PowerPC Macs are no longer supported with Snow Leopard, however; you will demand an Intel-based Mac to install the latest Mac Os.

Those who desire to do a "Clean Install" (starting fresh by deleting everything for minimal conflicts) even so tin, simply different installations in previous versions of previous Mac OS 10 that offered the clean install as a primary option, yous'll need to use Disk Utility to first erase the book, and so run the install. Apple explained to us that not anybody knows what a clean install is and frequently chose it, not knowing that they would lose their files. We're happy with that answer, as long as people all the same get the choice in some form.

Apple also claims that Snow Leopard uses 7GB less space than Leopard because of better file compression paired with selective driver inclusion. According to Apple, Snowfall Leopard will locate any missing drivers on the Web for you. We had no need of whatsoever special drivers during our tests.

New technologies
Apple says a few new technologies in Snow Leopard get in worthy of the upgrade alone, with several features that Apple says will heave performance. Considering all new Macs come up with 64-bit multicore processors, multiple GBs of RAM, and loftier-powered graphics processing units, all the major applications in Snow Leopard--including the Finder--have been rewritten in 64-bit to take full reward of the hardware. (The 64-bit technology allows application developers to allocate more than retentivity to complete tasks and so that the software runs faster and more smoothly.)

Apple has besides added what it calls the Grand Central Dispatch that manages data sent to multicore processors in an effort to maximize performance; Apple tree says the GCD will speed up any application task, from processing images in Photoshop to playing your favorite games. The addition of the GCD also takes away the need for software developers to spend as much time managing multicore processors.

Some other new technology in Snow Leopard is OpenCL, which allows software developers to tap into the ability of whatever onboard video cards (or GPUs, for graphics processing units) for full general-purpose computing without the add-on of enormous amounts of code. Like the GCD, these are improvements that will mainly affect software developers. But hopefully it will mean more and better-performing software for users in the future.

To put some of these claims to the test, we decided to pit Mac Bone X 10.5.8 Leopard against Mac Os X 10.6 Snowfall Leopard to see how these new technologies affected overall functioning.

In our anecdotal tests of performance within the Snow Leopard user interface (UI), the operating system seems faster and more than responsive than with Leopard. Finder, Stacks, Expose, launching apps, and other everyday processes feel snappy. We didn't, still, notice whatever improvement in application performance.

Overall, we saw only a 2.five percent slowdown in application performance from Leopard to Snowfall Leopard on our more processor-intensive functioning tests, including our multimedia multitasking examination, in which we measure the fourth dimension for QuickTime to finish converting a curt film while iTunes is performing its ain conversion of MP3 into AAC format in the background simultaneously. Equally this falls inside our typical margin of error (5 pct), we saw no significant difference with application performance when moving from Leopard to Snowfall Leopard. (See the lesser of this review for operation charts.)

New features

Expose
Snow Leopard includes a number of user UI improvements intended to make working with Mac Os Ten easier and more than efficient. Expose, Apple tree's system for visually finding the window you want on a cluttered desktop, used to be relegated to the Role keys on your keyboard. Snowfall Leopard now makes Expose accessible from the Dock; simply click and agree on a Dock icon to see thumbnails of all the open windows in that awarding. Striking the Tab key lets yous bike through the preview thumbnails of each open application. Using Expose in the Dock is very natural and elegant, making us wonder why this wasn't already a feature in Leopard.

Click and hold on an application icon in the Dock to bring up total thumbnails of open up windows in an awarding.

The Dock
In add-on to using Betrayal to find the right window, yous now likewise accept the ability to elevate files from one application to another using the Dock. Let's say y'all want to add an image to an e-mail, but your desktop is full of open windows. In Snowfall Leopard yous tin get to the image, drag it to the Postal service icon in the Dock, and your email window volition spring-load, allowing yous to drib the paradigm into identify. Though the ability to drag and drib files in this way is prissy, we're not sure it's much easier than attaching an image by browsing through your folders. Notwithstanding, if you know the image is already on your desktop, it's probably the faster method.

Stacks
Stacks got a much-needed upgrade equally well. In Leopard, Stacks only listed a sure number of files and applications requiring you to go to a Finder window if your app wasn't listed. Similarly, if you tried to open a folder in Stacks, you lot were sent to the Finder. In Snow Leopard, Stacks comes with a scroll bar then icons are still easy to read and anything tin be launched out of the Dock. Folders are at present accessible within Stacks likewise, and so y'all'll be able to navigate to files within folders all without leaving the Stacks Window. These changes make Stacks much more useful than before and probably should have been bachelor when Stacks was introduced.

Now you can scroll through your applications and documents (and even open up folders in Stacks) without being sent to the Finder.

The Finder
While the Finder itself saw little in the way of interface tweaks, the way files behave in the Finder makes it easier to use. A zoom slider has been added to the lower right of Finder windows so y'all can zoom in on icons. An enhanced icon view has been added, letting you preview multipage documents and fifty-fifty play QuickTime movies without e'er leaving the Finder window.

Preview now lets you preview well-nigh any file, fifty-fifty if it was created with software you don't have on your difficult bulldoze. This means common file types from Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, and even PDF files can all be previewed without owning the programs they were created in. Every bit an added bonus, Preview in Snowfall Leopard provides accurate text selection to multicolumn PDF files using artificial intelligence to infer the layout of each page. This means that Preview recognizes that there are multiple columns in your certificate so you can select the text yous want from any column.

You tin can now flip through the pages of multipage PDF documents using the arrows that appear over PDF docs when you mouse over.

Safari 4
Safari 4 has been widely available for some time, but it offers a couple of new features when running in Snow Leopard. Safari four already includes Top Sites for viewing all your favorite sites as thumbnails for like shooting fish in a barrel admission and full history search, which lets you view your history in a Cover Flow-like interface. Merely in Snow Leopard, Safari is now crash resistant. This means that if a plug-in crashes, information technology won't crash the whole browser. Simply refresh the page to try to load the plug-in again. Also, Safari checks to see if a site you are visiting is known to be fraudulent, is distributing malware, or is known to be a phishing site, and then warns yous if information technology is.

Height Sites, which was already available in Safari four, lets you navigate to your most viewed Web sites quickly.

QuickTime X
QuickTime X, Apple tree'due south media player, got some major tweaks in Snow Leopard. Now, when you play a picture and move your mouse outside the window, the interface fades abroad quickly to give you a more than immersive video-viewing feel. When watching a movie, you can click the new Share button to convert your flick for iPod, iPhone, or Apple tree TV, and QuickTime converts the video to work best on your chosen device. You also tin can now tape video from your Webcam, audio, or but the activeness on your screen with a few clicks. Those with the iPhone 3GS will recognize the new trimming feature in QuickTime Ten, letting you catch simply the video content y'all want.

QuickTime X probably received the near interface tweaks in the Snowfall Leopard update. The cleaned-up interface and autofade features expect great (like most things Apple), but information technology's more than of an aesthetic improvement than anything else. The recording features for video, audio, and screencast capturing are the big wins here and used to be offered simply in QuickTime Pro. It's proficient to meet these features volition exist able to be used past a wider audition in Snowfall Leopard.

Trim your videos easily past clicking and dragging kickoff and end points of the prune.

Exchange support
One of the principal roadblocks for Mac users in a primarily Windows workplace was the inability to connect with Microsoft Exchange servers. Most Mac users used Microsoft Entourage or available open up-source options equally a work-effectually, but it was never as smooth as connecting from a Windows machine with Microsoft Part. Snow Leopard now supports Microsoft Substitution Server 2007 out of the box so you can easily connect using Apple'due south Mail app, grab global address lists in the Address Book, and create meetings with contacts using iCal.

Apple did more than only give yous the power to connect, nonetheless. Mutual tasks similar creating meetings, for example, are incredibly easy with intuitive controls. iCal lets y'all view work events and personal activities all in the same window (with easy controls to include or non include the information you desire). The Apple Accost Book works seamlessly across Postal service and iCal and so you can quickly bring up global address lists, add together people to a meeting (including predesigned groups), and invitations will automatically exist sent to each attendee. Equally an added bonus, if some attendees take scheduling conflicts with your proposed meeting time, iCal will automatically figure out the earliest available time that everyone is free. These are features already available in Microsoft's Outlook for Windows, simply in Snowfall Leopard the process feels much more than intuitive.

File Quarantine
According to Apple, File Quarantine has likewise been refined in Snow Leopard. Offset introduced in Mac OS X ten.4 Tiger, File Quarantine checks for known malware signatures, and in Snowfall Leopard, volition now brandish an warning dialog if information technology finds a known offender. The dialog will tell users to move the offending file to the Trash. For instance, a artificial version of iWork circulated on the Spider web a few months ago that contained malware. That particular malware is now automatically detected by File Quarantine in Snow Leopard.

Apple says that File Quarantine will exist automatically updated via Mac Os X'due south software update equally new malware signatures are establish in the wild. We had no mode to test these features, but we are happy to see that Apple is taking strides to defend against malware as more than people switch to Macs and the danger of new malware becomes more prevalent.

Universal access
Commencement with Mac Bone X x.4 Tiger, Apple included VoiceOver to help people who are blind or with impaired vision to better understand and interact with what is happening onscreen. Apple continues to help visually impaired users in Snow Leopard by adding gesture back up on multitouch trackpads with easy-to-acquire gestures to perform specific functions. We had mixed results with these features depending on the Web folio nosotros visited, but more often than not we institute the features to exist useful. The trackpad acts as the viewable surface area on the electric current window and so you can tap to have Window elements explained to you lot or swipe to movement on to the next item in the window, for example. New features in Snowfall Leopard are particularly helpful when Spider web browsing, with options like Web page summaries to explicate the diverse elements on a Web page you haven't visited before, making it easier to get the data you desire.

More than than 40 dissimilar Braille displays (including wireless Bluetooth displays) are supported in Snow Leopard right out of the box, allowing visually impaired users to plug in and starting time calculating immediately.

Other refinements
Some of the smaller refinements in Snowfall Leopard are worthy of note, affecting many of Apple'south cadre apps. iChat is now compatible with more routers, making video chat accessible to a wider range of users, and iChat Theater now offers 640x480 resolution, using just one-third the bandwidth it used before. New Chinese character input via the trackpad predicts which characters you're creating and offers likely subsequent characters to speed up the process. A new text commutation feature in applications similar iChat, Postal service, and TextEdit lets yous create shortcuts for phrases y'all use oft. The Services menu in Snow Leopard has been rewritten to include only the services relevant to the application or content you're viewing. Core Location technology locates nearby Wi-Fi hot spots to find your location and automatically resets your time zone so wherever you are in the globe, your Mac will be gear up to the correct fourth dimension. While all of these are small refinements, each make your Mac easier to use with smart features non plant in other operating systems.

Conclusions
Mac OS X ten.six Snow Leopard is not a complete system overhaul and is instead a refinement of the current Leopard Bone--some take gone and so far as to call it a "service pack." We think the interface tweaks to Expose, Stacks, the Finder, Mail, and iCal make Snowfall Leopard more than but a service pack and worthy of the $29 upgrade price. We don't like that PowerPC users are unable to use Snowfall Leopard, but we sympathise that subsequently iii years with Intel, Apple is making a decision to go on moving forward with this technology.

The largest of the feature enhancements are probably reason enough for Intel Mac users to spend the money on Snow Leopard. Added enhancements such equally video, audio, and screen recording in QuickTime X were once but available to those who purchased QuickTime Pro (which was about $30--the aforementioned equally this system upgrade). Just the killer feature addition for Snowfall Leopard might be Exchange back up out of the box--not fifty-fifty Windows vii comes with Microsoft Commutation support without buying Microsoft Part.

Overall, we remember that Snowfall Leopard did almost everything Apple says information technology gear up out to do: it refined and enhanced Leopard to make information technology easier to use. Though the system performs well in everyday employ, many of our tests betoken it is slightly slower than the older version of Leopard in more than intensive application processes. Still, nosotros highly recommend upgrading for all the new features and Microsoft Exchange support.

iTunes encoding (in seconds)
(Shorter bars betoken better performance)

Photoshop (in seconds)
(Shorter bars bespeak amend operation)

QuickTime multimedia multitasking exam (QT7 on ten.five.8 and QTX on 10.6) (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

iTunes multimedia multitasking test (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Cinebench
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

System configurations:

Unibody Apple Macbook Pro / Core 2 Duo 15.iv-inch
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.53GHz; 4096MB DDR3 SDRAM 1066MHz; 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT; 320GB Hitachi v,400rpm

Apple MacBook Pro / Cadre Duo fifteen.iv-inch
Intel Core Duo ii.0GHz; 2048MB DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz; 256MB ATI Radion 1600, 100GB Toshiba 5,400rpm