You COULD stick to Snow Leopard, but if Apple is true to form then new releases of popular software will start demanding Mountain Goat. Likewise ‘apps’. We’ve seen that happen several times with iOS – older devices won’t run the new O/S, whereas newer apps need it (a limitation often imposed by developers using the most recent SDK to compile stuff).

Essentially, Apple is saying “new hardware please” every two or three years. And as its results show, it’s a strategy which is working very well for the company!

The only part that bothers me is the last little bit about iMessage. As for not porting Mountain Lion to old machines… well, having worked with old machines in the Windows world, let’s just say that being able to load an OS on a machine because you “can” is not all it’s cracked up to be. Ha.

But the iMessage rumor, if true, is really pretty low. If it runs on Lion then it should continue to run on Lion. If they wanted it to run only on Mountain Lion then they should never have released a version for Lion that will stop once ML goes live.

Of course, to me, it doesn’t really matter too much. I can’t deal with Messages in more than one place and so I don’t use it on my ipad nor do I foresee using it on my desktop. My workflow for these things is different. It suits me and doesn’t include having iMessage all over creation, I know many other people work differently and that’s fine. But if it’s offered as beta now… it should continue to be available on Lion without upgrade. Just my .02 which is worth about that.

And if they didn’t release an OS you’d all be just as peed off. Honestly whats your actual complaint?

They bring out a new OS, Apple has expectations of how people will interact with it, maybe those interactions require some horsepower, or maybe Apple wants you to buy more of their hardware. But here’s the thing: YOU DONT HAVE TO!

If your 4 year old white macbook works fine, stick with it, it’s not like Steve Jobs is reaching out from the grave and forcing you to buy their products is it, ah but then you’d have nothing to podcast about would you…

it only takes a little look at the phenomenally vast world of Hackintosh types to see why Apple cutting off the Intel GMA generation of machines might be a wise move. Huge numbers of Atom based laptops use this gfx platform and the hackintoshers do love their Dell Mini 9/10/11’s…

It is annoying. The most useful feature of Mountain Lion for me would have been Airplay Mirroring. According to Wikipedia, this requires and 2011 (or newer) Mac. I can’t believe that they can’t make that work on my 2.5 year old Macbook Pro with an nVidia 256MB GPU.

I was going to buy an iMac this year… But having reflected about it (and having read this article), I probably won’t now.

Also thanks to the PC Pro article of moving from a PC to a Mac – the aggravation of moving my iPhone “Master” from one computer to another is going to be a nightmare, so I’m leaving it where it is. I run iTunes (with 2 Airport Expresses), an iPhone (and potentially an iPad) quite happily off my PC, so why should I switch over to a Mac? Windows 7 works well and I like it.

Also my PC is now 7 years old, was upgraded 4 years ago to a Phenom with 4Gb RAM & 2Tb HDD, it’s still significantly quicker than the PC I use at work.

The other thing about buying Apple is that (until now) you were supposed to get greater longevity out of your hardware (possibly because it’s so damned expensive). If they’re going to start crippling its lifespan with the OS, then I ain’t touching it with a bargepole. Unless they’re prepared to drop their prices.

If anything, it’ll push me towards buying a new PC, or even just new components, which *might* just happen to be Hackintosh compatible.

[I'm already running a version of Snow Leopard on a VM machine quite happily, but I've not quite got the right components to run it natively. The next lot I buy I'll make sure they are completely compatible.]

So PC Pro, when can we have a Hackintosh article? ;^)

People making the comparison between Apple and Microsoft have obviously forgotten the introduction of Vista where Intel forced Microsoft to set hardware requirements too low and there were lots of BAD Vista experiences.

Apple needs to keep moving forward. Yes, it leaves older machines behind. But that is the price of progress.

I have a 2001 Powerbook G4 1 Ghz with a 12-inch screen. It is slow as molasses despite maxing out its memory and upgrading its hard drive when running Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.

I seriously cannot expect that it can run Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, nor even Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, or even OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion.

The best OS for this machine was Mac OS 9.2 With this, the Powerbook is still snappy.

The older machines can keep running the older operating system. If they run Mac OS X Lion, or Snow Leopard, then there is LOTS of software that will run on them.

That is the price of progress. Apple cannot slow itself down. It cannot avoid making the best products it can. Supporting older hardware simply holds back progress.

@Peter – I have Windows 7 32-bit running happy as Larry on Dell D620s with integrated graphics. Users are perfectly happy. Chunters along on a Core Duo (yes, Core Duo, not Core 2 Duo) with Office 2010 and runs absolutely fine, albeit that I bumped the memory to 2GB. Seriously, your argument’’s a non-starter.

iMac 24″ from 2006 here, nVidia GeForce discrete graphics, so it isn’t just Intel graphics being given the hard shoulder.

That said, Lion runs like a complete dog on it anyway, if it wasn’t for a couple of “Lion only” apps, I’d go back to Leopard – the machine has just got slower and slower with Snow Leopard and Lion (SL was heralded as a speed improvement over Leopard, but it ran noticeably slower on my iMac).

At some point, the requirements for getting new features means that old hardware is no longer able to cope. Try running Windows 7 on the 2006 vintage machines at my old employer – 1Ghz Celeron with 256MB RAM!

I won’t be buying another Mac at this time. The much heralded longevity of Mac hardware hasn’t materialised, it is no better (or worse) than an equivalent Windows machine of the same vintage.

The ironic thing, with my iMac, is that Windows Vista runs better on it than OS X!

The news, Jeff, is that new application software releases will typically require the latest iteration of OS X to run. These new releases will not just contain new features, but a plethora of bug fixes too, which may be essential for some users, and they will then be ransomed to purchasing new hardware if they wish to benefit from these bug fixes.

MS are not this cynical with their software releases.

I think that people’s upset stems from a knowledge that this is not progress but Apple driven obsolescence, driven by pure greed.

If new software were all about new features only, and bug fixes were supplied for old versions alongside the new (as MS do) then fair enough, but if you want Apple code which does what it is supposed to do (run without data loss, for example) then you need to keep shelling out for new hardware.

Or move to a different platform.

I have been running a fairly powerful Logic rig for several years now, and believe me, the software is far from perfect. I shall not be giving Apple any more money now. My next update will be a Windows system running Pro Tools.

Apple is extremely good at tempting new customers into the fold, but insultingly bad at treating existing customers with an ounce of respect.

OK these forums need fixing… I’ve typed out sevearl ong answer and although it said it had posted it, it has yet to appear. This has happened several times in the past and is pretty frustrating! Come on guys…!

To recap:

I agree with Tony – Apple have a history of obsoleting older devices when they really don’t need to. For example:
- iPhone 3G & 3GS – run both beautifully with iOS 3. As soon as you put 4 on there it runs like a dog.
- iPhone 4 – can run with iOS 5, but happier with 4 as you get slow-downs otherwise.

I can appreciate Apple wanting to have everyone at the same OS level, but they should continue supporting older OS’s (like Microsoft do)… “We won’t support you if you’re not on the latest iOS release” – why not? If it works well on that device, then leave it!

To keep your iPhone 3GS at iOS 3.1.3 you have to fight with iTunes to stop it trying to upgrade it everytime it’s connected and then subsequently check EVERY single app update to verify that it’s still working OK with your version of OS. Far too much hassle to keep your device running smoothly.

Agreed with Tony and mrmmm.

I got bitten when buying a 1st gen iPod Touch. OS updates past iOS 3 were blocked. That’s just 3 years of current OSes allowed before you end up behind the curve.

The lack of long-term support for Apple products puts me off buying from them again.

Why is this even a story? People are really concerned about not being able to upgrade from Snow Leopard to Mountain Lion on a > 5 year old computer… doubt it. We still run many G5 Mac Pro’s with Leopard with no complaints.

Just read that support for Vista & Win7 is being extended – how marvellous! It means I can upgrade to Windows 8/9/whatever as and when I’m ready and not be pushed into it by some greedy company who already charges too much for their products.

Does this make Mountain Goat poo? (My apologies – I just couldn’t resist it! :^D)

@DavrosG5

Fair point but surely, if you’re prematurely reducing the life of your Mac, surely people will get annoyed and move to another platform with greater longevity, especially given how much it costs?

Until now, people who bought Macs would be more likely to buy another Mac, given the fact their trusty Mac had given them long, reliable service. If they’re now buying an expensive piece of hardware that is only good for 3 years, surely they will get annoyed and consider alternatives when their piece of expensive hardware is no longer able to run the latest software?

There is some real tosh being spouted on this forum. The basic cost of a business of having an employee sitting at a desk with a PC is >20k pa, so less than £500 for an upgraded system unit is hardly going to break the bank. I presume the average business iMac user will be 20%-40% more expensive as thy will be “creative” and they all get paid shed-loads more.
How many people posting here run a car? Mine costs £3k pa to run and if I “upgrade” it will set me back another £5k-£10k. To upgrade my home laptop costs £450ish which works out at £150 pa if I upgrade every 3 years. As for the person who wasted valuable company time getting win7 onto an old Dell, that might be virtuous if you’re a non-profit or a charity but hardly good business sense for a commercial concern.

In my arsenal of Macs, I have a Pismo running Tiger (10.4)that’s in daily use and pootles along nicely. So, I’m finding it hard to summon a sense of outrage

Hi, I tried to write a balanced article on the ups and down of Apple’s obsolescence of existing kits through the OS. But that is not the whole issue. Apple has an obsolescence policy for Apps to OS which holds no justification.

Logic 8 runs beautifully on Lion as long as you use a terminal hack so that Lion will see it. If you try to install Logic 8 then you are blocked by Lion.

I bought new equipment that wont let me run an old OS and yet Apple has deliberately blocked a piece of £700 software which runs just fine on the OS and the hardware and does everything I need for Audio…thats immoral.

Ewen

Ewen> That really is rank of them. Never trust a hippy!

My MacBook is just on the wrong side of the cut-off. It is a late 2008 x3100 model. I think that looking at posted successes that I’ll be able to hack it on soon enough – it works in a VM a charm. Anyhoo, I think 4 year for the bottom of the range is alright at the cutting edge. Being stuck on Lion would be fine, and I’m sure this machine will remain relevant for years. For all the extras: they’re what makes an eventual hardware upgrade all the better….