Submitted by “With the release of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion this summer, Apple will make the switch to a new kind of digital distribution for its operating system upgrades by releasing the software first through its new Mac App Store, AppleInsider has learned. The Mac App Store, available to all users running the most recent version of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, will become the de facto method for obtaining the Lion upgrade, people familiar with the matter have revealed. Users will be able to upgrade instantly without the need for physical media by purchasing Lion through the Mac App Store.” The old-fashioned regular disc version (and hopefully, on a USB drive for Air owners such as myself) will still be available.
I see this as a good move while still allowing people like me who need to have physical media on hand.
I really think this will be a winning move as more people will become aware sooner of a new Mac OS X version when they see an announcement in the App Store. Right now the average user has to bump into this info through reading on a website or hearing it from an tech friend.
Granted there are a few questions I have on how you install this on a system that has crashed.. have to install Snow Leopard first??
Actually no, Lion creates a small recovery partition on your drive that will allow you to reinstall the OS and your apps over the internet/App Store if you hold a key on boot. It’s quite clever, and should alleviate most install issues (asides a drive failure, of course).
Wonderful, just like buying a windows PC with a hidden partition in lieu of a DVD. Though,I’m mindful, when Win 9 comes on a hot-swap 4Tb HD it’ll finally begin to make sense for the user.
Oh, didn’t Snow Leopard come by way of a double-sided DVD, or was that a Blue-Ray, and are you expected to download that or was it full of really cool ads for really cool stuff for the really cool?
Edited 2011-05-05 01:34 UTC
The DVD image of Snow Leopard can be copied verbatim to a USB flash drive to get a bootable USB Snow Leopard installer. Who says the same won’t be true for this ‘recovery partition’?
This will finally allow them to kill DVD drives on MacBook Pro’s in the near future as well. Which is nice, because it allows Apple to make the laptop flatter (such as the MacBook Air) or fit larger batteries. Both are a win IMO.
Edited 2011-05-05 10:38 UTC
Not sure of that. In most parts of the world, a significant part of legal music and videos is still distributed via audio CDs and DVDs. Would they piss off their user for the sake of cool design or improved battery life ?
Edited 2011-05-05 12:00 UTC
It is Apple … so yes.
But seriously Optical Media is on the way out. I don’t have a CD Drive on my Dell Latitude and I haven’t missed it.
For most people I know, digital files are still either ripped from a CD/DVD they own or pirated. Before digital distribution fully replaces optical media, I think they’ll have to find a way to make it more attractive to children (which would then continue to use it as adults).
At the moment, most music distribution platforms still require a debit/credit card, which most children (rightfully) do not have, or a Paypal account, which is itself based on a transactional bank account, which children do not have either. Exceptions are based on prepaid card, which generally require one to travel a long way before buying, and as such are just as attractive as physical copies. Pricing is also more or less the same, and with optical disks you get a physical object that you own with your data on it as a bonus.
Still, does the need for an optical drive to rip media mean you want to drag said drive around wherever you go? You could have a USB unit or second/old computer at home for that, and have a more optimal laptop on the go.
Fair point, though personally one of the things I like about laptops is that they have everything integrated in a single package…
I specifically look for laptops without integrated CD drives … i.e. Ultraportables. Because I use my bike to travel pretty much everywhere … weight is a big issue. Worst comes to worst … I can share my CD drive over the network.
The new MacBook Air has been selling like hot cakes, and does not have a CD drive. Besides that, I know of very few people who still buy CDs, I am one of the exceptions myself
.
If you’d tell somebody two years ago that Apple would make a tablet without Flash support, they’d probably call you crazy. They are doing fine.
There are a lot of things to dislike about Apple, but their urge to move forward is not one of them
.
Snow leopard upgrade was offered for close to $25. It said it “Required leopard” to work, but never checked. The “full version” was also available for $130 or so. I think the only difference was the packaging. If the upgrades are only distributed via the app store in the future, the problem goes away.
I’m not sure how much they care about the piracy of the os upgrades, but that could cut down on the desire for new hardware.
Snow Leopard was never released in a “Full Version” retail disc for $130. Their retail discs only comes as an “Upgrade Version” and comes in two flavors, a single user license for $29, or a “family pack” (5 user licenses) for $49. The retail discs don’t check for Leopard pre-installed.
Apple also sold Snow Leopard for $9.95 through their Up-To-Date program for customer that bought their Macs between June to December of 2009. The discs purchased though the Up-To-Date program checks to make sure Leopard is pre-installed on the computer.
I don’t think Apple really cares about piracy of their OS. They are a hardware company and that is where they make most of their money.
Yeah, I had my facts a bit skewed. I was confusing the previous full version ( Mac Leopard) with the Mac Box set. The box set included more software and was aprox 130. It wasn’t an upgrade version. Legally that’s what you were supposed to buy if you had anything other than leopard. That’s what happens when you post on an empty stomach before lunch.
All the Snow Leopard discs, whether they were labeled Single-User or Family Pack, Full Version or Upgrade, were identical, they all had the full version and did not check to see if you had a previous version of MacOS installed or not, and they did not check in with Apple to see if they had been installed on one computer or 50.
Apple uses an honor system instead of the horrific anti-piracy hoops you have to jump through when using Windows, wherein if your $6 network card in your computer dies and you install a new one, Windows goes nuts and threatens to lock you out if you don’t talk to a Microsoft representative over the phone and plead your case that you should not have to pay for another full version of Windows because your hardware “changed”. I’m not making this up, it actually happened to me once with XP.
Yeah. I mean, the Mac crashes on me all the time, it is unstable and applications run dog-slow. Rebooting every 15 minutes solves some of the issues, but that’s not really solution.
I’m not making this up, this actually happened to me with Mac OS 9.
The horror of classic mac is lost on today’s youth. Our lab was split 50/50 between win NT 3.51 and Mac OS 8.5. Win Nt 3.51 was bad too, but you were much more likely to lose your report you were typing on the mac.
Well, I’ve witnessed the horrors of Mac OS Classic, and I’m 20
Classic had plenty of cool games though…
It was all downhill after System 7.6
I personally don’t buy that bull****. I’ve been working in IT for many years and I’ve changed a many of malfunctioning network adapters on Windows XP workstations during my time. Never once have I seen such an occurrence. On top of that, any time I’ve had to deal with the reactivation folks at Microsoft, the process has been as smooth as can be expected. There was not a bunch of questioning or pleading my case. This goes for the desktop and server lines of windows. I’m not saying I enjoy jumping through hoops, because that’s exactly what it is. I’m saying you’re spreading FUD.
I can just see it: you, on your knees, pleading, yelling and begging the stupid phone robot MS uses to re-activate your XP Home. But the heartless and money-mongering machine just repeats one single sentence in all its brutality:
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
Please enter the activation number displayed on your screen.
But what does it matter, it’s a toll-free call!
I call BS. I think this did NOT happen to you. I think you did NOT have to plead your case, and convince the rep that you were playing fair.. I think you are echoing fears people had initially with the activation of XP, when they thought minor hardware changes would invalidate their installation, fears which also turned out to be unfounded.
I myself have, on many occasions, moved an XP install from one motherboard to another, changing chipsets, and frequently, the processor (i.e. from AMD to Intel). I have never had to have copies of XP re-activated.
But, maybe it happened to you. Maybe you did have to contact them.
I have had to call their re-activation line, however, to activate Windows Server 2003. The call went like this:
MS: “How can I help you?”
Me: “I have to reactivate my copy of Windows Server 2003 Standard.”
MS: “What is the product key?”
Me: (product key)
MS: “This has been activated several times in the past?”
Me: “Yes. We’re using this copy at school.”
MS: “Oh, okay. What is the name of the school?”
Me: (school name)
MS: “Okay. How many computers are you installing it on?”
Me: “Umm… I’m not sure yet. Lets say, 10.”
MS: “Okay. Here are your activation codes.”
Me: “Thank you.”
MS: “You’re welcome. Have a nice evening.”
All in all, the only difficult aspect was actually making sure the codes were correctly understood over the phone. I understand that I was using it for school, but I could have easily been making it up.
So, again, I call BS on your ‘experience’, and I think there is little or no truth to what you said.
Nope, I installed it on a new drive
Glad to hear it doesn’t require you to install 10.5 before you can install 10.6 on a new disc. I have the 10.5 up-to-date disc for my MBP that I bought in 2007 and it will not install unless I have 10.4 pre-installed.
Actually, this is not completely true. I have two Snow Leopard upgrade DVDs, and one has an upgrade check, the other hasn’t. Although it is trivial to circumvent the check.
(The one that I preordered has no check, the one that I bought in the Mac store does have one.)
Edited 2011-05-05 10:41 UTC
Unless Apple FINALLY starts treating the non-US part of the world in the iTMS/App Store/Mac App Store as a full-class citizen, I doubt this is going to get used much. As long as the only payment method is a credit card (which many people here do not have), it’s quite useless here (aside from the total lack of content in the Dutch iTMS). We have a far more secure and advanced online payment method in The Netherlands, it would be great if Apple started acknowledging that.
Of course, that would mean Apple not getting its hands on our credit card information.
http://store.apple.com/nl/product/MA145N/C?mco=MTY3ODQ5OTY
Since those have to be delivered, you might as well cut out the middle man and order Lion right away, mmm?
Since those have to be delivered, you might as well cut out the middle man and order Lion right away, mmm?
[/q]
Actually you can buy them over the counter in any supermarket here – again, maybe you need a new country if that’s not available to you…
Since those have to be delivered, you might as well cut out the middle man and order Lion right away, mmm?
[/q]
“I was wrong” is too difficult for you to type?
True, in some places it may not be used that much, which is why Apple will most likely see it in DVD &| USB form.
I would thing that the AppStore version will be cheaper than other methods to attract people to using that method as well.
I have used the AppStore to get the Dev versions of Lion and must say it’s a pretty painless way of doing it. It basically just downloads the installer into your Application folder, so you can install Lion anytime you like after that I have also used that image on another machine, so it’s not “fixed” to any particular hardware, well, not at the moment anyway 🙂
BTW, and I could be wrong, but I don’t think Apple is deliberately “not” acknowledging the Dutch or any other small population (I live in Australia, which has a similar population). With all the “stuff” they are working on, I guess they set their priorities. I am sure other payment methods will be included over time.
You could live somewhere other than Holland if you don’t have access to VISA / MasterCard DEBIT cards, which also work on iTunes FYI.
And I’d love to see these “more secure” payment options. Even with my VISA debit cards – I don’t own credit cards – if I make an online purchase from ANY new source I get a phone call from my bank within five minutes confirming that it was actually me making the purchase, and similarly for any purchase over a threshold I can set. My debit cards generally have less than $100 in them at any time, I have regular transfers going in for regular bills / payments, and it takes me under a minute to transfer funds in via my phone (either via internet banking or phone banking) if I need to buy something, and the whole shooting match doesn’t cost me a cent in fees.
That’s good enough security for me.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDEAL
The security problem which all payment cards have is that when you give someone your card information, you give that someone the right to withdraw as much money from it as he/she desires from your bank account, anywhere, anytime. You trust third parties way, way too much. And it’s because of this that you need to have your bank spamming you with phone calls instead of simply making your purchases in full peace of mind.
As Thom points out, Dutch banks have decided to fix this broken system by introducing a new payment method which is more akin to the way cash works : you give some amount of money to the third party, in a one-time transaction.
Technically, the final step of a purchase is to go to your bank’s website to review the receipt and send your money, in a fashion similar to the way Paypal works.
The implementation has its issues, as an example there’s no chargeback right when you use it, but it’s already miles away from broadcasting your banking information everywhere on the net.
Edited 2011-05-05 06:52 UTC
This is covered legally. The law states you have the right to return any purchased good online within 7 days, money returned.
Oh, right then. I thought that if the wikipedia article about iDEAL took the time to mention this “no chargeback” thing, the 7-day return thing didn’t work either.
Just a nitpick: When you give somebody your card info, you don’t give them the RIGHT to withdraw as much as he/she desires, but you do give them the ABILITY. You then have to trust that they don’t abuse that ability.
Indeed, wrong wording. Thanks for pointing that out
I second that as well, nothing frosts my cookies more than companies who provide online services where the US service is first class and the international version is third rate. That isn’t half the problem though, the other half is the fact that many countries have metered internet or are now introducing it (the fact that ISP’s have finally caught on that traffic is outpacing the buy back period for investment – what a shock!) thus people are going to ask themselves whether they should use up 4GB of their ‘monthly download allowance’ when upgrading Mac OS X.
Don’t get me wrong though, if Apple were to provide a downloaded self contained application with two buttons, one that said “create USB installer” and another that says “create DVD installer” then I’d say all power to it but the whole idea of ‘hidden partitions’ creeps me out. I’ve had experience with these ‘hidden partitions’ (Toshiba, HP and Lenovo) and they have always left me with a bitter after taste.
it is good though that there are rumours regarding Apple providing physical installation media because I’d be tempted to get the physical version rather than the download one.
Edited 2011-05-05 02:06 UTC
You can use Click & Buy with iTunes NL, and they accept a bank account and iDeal.
Ah, awesome. I was unaware of that.