How many people using Panther as Primary OS?

vaultingat · July 6, 2003 8:52PM

I was just wondering how many people are using Panther DP as their primary OS. Do you recommend it? I realize that it's not yet meant for regular use by consumers but I was looking for more pragmatic reasons. How many of you have had serious problems?

~felipe

spart · July 6, 2003 9:03PM

Should have made a poll.

10.2.6 here. Panther feels a lot more polished than the early Jaguar builds, but not that much more. Plus there's the Window Manager instability...

buonrotto · July 6, 2003 9:04PM

My understanding is that it's nowhere NEAR being ready for day-in and day-out use. There are just too many small bugs, crashers, and potential for major data loss and computer scrambling. I would assume that not even devlopers would trust it for everyday use.

mcq · July 6, 2003 9:12PM

Agreed, this should be a poll.

Not sure if you mean to replace Jaguar with Panther... or to have Panther on a separate partition... regardless I will do a repost of what Brad reposted in the Panther screenshot thread regarding replacing Jag with Panther (just for others benefit if nothing else):

Quote:

If you have to ask, then this is not for you.

Seriously, folks, how many times do we have to go over this? Releases like this are meant for developers who routinely back up their data. Releases like this are not meant to run full-time for mission-critical applications. You should only install these builds if you know what you're doing and by that I mean you know all the risks involved and you know how to salvage your computer if things go horribly wrong.

Will it break apps? Maybe.

Will it be unstable? Maybe.

Will it be feature incomplete? Maybe.

Will it cause random problems? Maybe.

Will it kernel panic regularly? Maybe.

Will it corrupt your hard drive? Maybe.

Will it accidentally erase all your data? Maybe. (cue story about iTunes installer)

Will it report data back to Apple without your knowledge? Maybe.

Will it expire and leave you unable to access and encrypted data through FileVault? Maybe.

Now that it's noted... if you're thinking of running this as your only OS, back up all your data first so that you have something to revert to in case it gets hosed. It is a relatively stable preview and decent enough that one could test it out, but you never know what may or may not happen. Certain programs may not run properly (see other threads discussing Camino/Moz/Firebird)

If you know what you're doing, then back up your data, and pick how you want to install it, I'd suggest a different partition or different HD. Also, IIRC you will not be able to upgrade from Panther DP to the released version of Panther. Personally, I'd never trust a DP of anything to be good enough for primary usage, but that's just me.

dog almighty · July 6, 2003 10:45PM

¬_¬

Still on 10.1.5.

bauman · July 6, 2003 11:40PM

Well, I tried, but there were just too many little bugs. The sound and eject buttons on the keyboard didn't work. Audio didn't work in many of my movie files on my computer. Oh, let's see. What else. It was just a bunch of little things... Oh, I use DAVE to manage networking between Windows and my mac, and although Panther is better, it is still missing some features, and I wasn't going to try to install DAVE onto 10.3... it would surely be incompatible. The new Finder is great, but a little buggy. I want to do some coding, but I can't get ahold of XCode, and of course the 10.2 dev tools don't work. There were a few other things, too, but I don't remember.

So, my answer is I tried, but now I'm back on 10.2.6. It's a shame, though, because I know how much faster Panther is, and I really would like it to work. I guess I'll just have to wait for GM.

inactionman · July 7, 2003 12:08AM

I'm using it as my main OS until something goes wrong with it. I realize I could really screw up my HD doing this but I'll live with the consequences. Obviously, everything of any importance is backed up. The only thing I didn't bother with was my iTunes library. If I lose that I'll just re-rip everything in a better quality than I had initially done. Only a few glitches so far, iMovie crashed while exporting a file, I had to stop using Meteorologist as it killed Exposé's graphical yumminess so that really isn't a big loss. Toast won't launch but Missing Media Burner works swimmingly so I can still burn multi-session CDs. On a side note, I installed it as an update, couldn't install it on a separate partition or external drive because neither was an option and I didn't have the patience to wait for the GM.

nagha · July 7, 2003 12:32AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Dog Almighty

Still on 10.1.5.

Dear God! Why in the world would you stick with 10.1 knowing how much better 10.2 is? I certainly hope you're planning to upgrade to 10.3!

na

chucker · July 7, 2003 1:09AM

Quote:

Originally posted by nagha

Dear God! Why in the world would you stick with 10.1 knowing how much better 10.2 is? I certainly hope you're planning to upgrade to 10.3!

na

Well, our school computers, apart from the server (which is on 10.1.1 server), all run 9.1 :P

1337_5l4xx0r · July 7, 2003 1:20AM

I have to admit, I'm using Panther full time on my 'book. No major hitches besides Mozilla 1.4 and Toast not working. Mozilla 1.2 works, though. Weird.

I much prefer the new finder, even if it is fugly brushed metal. So many fewer mouse clicks! It's great. Ghost recon and all my important apps work.

jim katta · July 7, 2003 1:48AM

Definitely want to share my Panther saga. I was just too excited 'not' to try Panther. But I knew it might kill my system, so I backed up 'everything'. I tried it Panther. I loved it, for a while. Expose 'does' rock, the overall feel of the system is zippier/faster, but other than that, I can't see why it's supposed to be something we're going to pay $129 for to update the already great Jaguar. Oh, and I don't care what anyone says, in practical use, those new finder windows (in brushed metal) are ugly, cumbersome, and a plain drag. Keep the OS light and fast, not heavy, dark,etc.

People are raving about Expose, and yes, it is REALLY good, but after you use it a while, you realize that you want it, but it isn't necessarily a deal maker or breaker. It's just a cool work flow widget that kicks butt. After about two days, I purged Panther from my system, did a complete erase of the system, and reinstalled everything and restored all my old system goodies, apps, etc. This is DEFINITELY NOT READY for daily use. WAY too many little bugs in places that you'd never expect and can cripple your entire flow. I will go on the record as saying it's not really worth the hassle of playing with it yet unless you're a developer. There's simply not enough different in the OS that warrants messing with your system. If you have an extra OS X computer that you don't really use, then sure, put it on and play with it. But you'd do better to just wait, right now, it's not all that.

I think, unless they add some more 'big' features into Panther at the end of the year, I will not shell out that money for the upgrade. I "will" shell out the $30 bucks for iChat AV (after the beta license runs out), but that's about it. To me, Panther is one of those releases that makes you hold onto to your current system as long as possible until you 'absolutely must' upgrade. Kind of like how people never wanted to give up on system 7x, and then system 9x. Panther has many interesting features, but they are just 'interesting' and most are not essential enough to warrant the upgrade price.

Having removed Panther from my PowerBook Titanium, I miss the speedier system, but feel much better being back on Jaguar. These bugs in Panther will get fixed, so that's not my issue. My issue is: not enough new stuff in Panther to warrant the price. Also, I think it's absolutely hilarious, and obscene that Apple is actually shipping PowerMac G5s without Panther. Even if it's not ready by the time the G5s ship, those who purchase a G5 should get a coupon (or something) that allows them a free copy of Panther when it's released. DAMN Steve, stop raping us in the bank account, we support your company and the expensive prices, so cut us a deal. (for the record, I DO think the pricing of the Dual 2Ghz at $2999 was pretty good bang for the buck pricing)

alcimedes · July 7, 2003 9:46AM

lol, panther fixed a lot of problems my 'book was having, and Toast and Camino were the only victims. i can live with that.

at this point it is my primary OS, and i'm loving it. i've had almost 0 problems. it has actually been better to work with than 10.2 was for me.

placebo · July 7, 2003 10:53AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Chucker

Well, our school computers, apart from the server (which is on 10.1.1 server), all run 9.1 :P

All 9 at my school, too. I hate 9 with a passion. Some of our computers (the G4's) have OS X as a boot volume, but my teachers got wicked pissed off when I booted one into X 10.1.

1337_5l4xx0r · July 9, 2003 1:05AM

Quote:

Originally posted by alcimedes

lol, panther fixed a lot of problems my 'book was having, and Toast and Camino were the only victims. i can live with that.

at this point it is my primary OS, and i'm loving it. i've had almost 0 problems. it has actually been better to work with than 10.2 was for me.

I agree. Although both 10.2.x and Phanter have been rock-solid for me. A few weensy bugs in Phanter. I've not really noticed a huge speed increase like every one else seems to have, except for the increase one would expect from a well-threaded finder.

cjboffoli · July 10, 2003 6:58AM

Panther is very impressive so far. The look and feel (subtle changes to fonts and graphics) is great. The speed is very impressive (honestly makes me feel as though I suddenly have a faster processor). Expose is fun, though I have to change the corner I have currently set for hot activation as it has hair-trigger activation when my cursor is up in that area of the screen. Mail is much improved. I haven't really used the e-mail threads feature but it works so much faster. I still would like to see a way to remove attachments whilst keeping the text of a message. I like the new secure trash deleting. I also like the improvements to the network system prefs panel which provides current status of your network connection in a really nice graphical way. The most useful and giddiness-inducing feature has to be the ability to toggle between users without quitting applications when you log off. I haven't really experienced the bugs that some others have mentioned (I have Panther installed on a 700MHz 14" iBook with an 80GB hard drive and 640 MB of RAM). iChat DV has been the buggiest with stuck smiley windows and frequent connection crashes. Opera 6, Camino, Roxio Toast Titanium 5.2.1 and Apple's own new version of Backup 1.2.3 do not seem to run. Otherwise, this seems to be a very stable pre-release and I will absolutely be upgrading to the final release based on what I have seen so far.

ghost_user_name · July 10, 2003 4:59PM

What is this... "Pan-ther"??

I am still running good old system 7.5.5

LOL... no, wait, I am still running 7.5.5... damn.

68K Macs ROCK!!!!!!!!

mrmister · July 10, 2003 6:25PM

I have a spare PowerBook that runs Panther full time, but on my production machine it's 10.2.6 all the way.

gargoyle · July 10, 2003 6:49PM

Panther rocks. Yes its beta and no I wouldn't recommend it for every day use. I don't use it everyday mainly because of the lack of bluetooth, so I cant put m phone on charge on the other side of the room and send all my SMS from address book.

However, all you peeps that are saying its not worth the upgrade are MAD!

The speed increase in preview (quartz in general) is phenomenal, then you have Exposé, which is just about the best UI feature I have ever seen on a computer running a window based interface. Then there is the new finder, which even if you do not like the metal apps (i personally love 'em) is a great improvement over the 10.2 finder.

So stop being stinge bags and save $2 / day till its released. You won't even notice the cash go missing. Hell, just pretend you live in the UK and that petrol (Gas) costs you $1.30 per litre.

paulp · July 14, 2003 10:07AM

On the whole, good.

alcimedes · July 14, 2003 7:19PM

what lack of bluetooth? i've been using bluetooth on a daily basis.

kenneth · July 17, 2003 1:30AM

Jaguar baby.... even tho I am an ADC member

How many people using Panther as Primary OS?

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