Snow Leopard VS. Lion

[Ctrl-Opt-Del]

Mint is one I haven't tried yet. I'm conflicted on whether to try it or Arch next.

Personally, I think Mint has numerous advantages over any other Linux distro:

• It's not Ubuntu, so it doesn't have the well-meaning, but immature "Unity" interface by default.
• It's the fourth most popular desktop OS (after Ubuntu).
• It's built on the Ubuntu kernel, meaning that it can access both its own software repository, and the Ubuntu software repository (both being huge, due to both distro's popularity).
• It has support for proprietary, third-party plug-ins and drivers built-in at the point of installation that - due to licencing issues - Ubuntu makes it hard or down-right impossible to install.
• As I stated above, it (and Ubuntu, with a little more effort) is not just re-skinable, but actually re-shellable, meaning you can make it look and work like any OS; including OS X.

 

[vansmith]

I do have to laugh about the "unscientific test." I'm not debating that a scroll bar can be faster, and I use only a trackpad on all of my Macs. I guess I'm just not in that much of a hurry.

There's a reason I said unscientific. Haha. And yes, I'm always in a hurry. That might be the caffeine talking though.

 

[MYmacROX]

I gave the whole "no scrollbar" thing a fair effort when I first upgraded to Lion just to see if it would grow on me. And I haven't turned back since. It's not that I prefer it or I think one way is better than the other. I just got used to it and don't miss the scrollbar. If I want to see where I am on a page, I use 2 fingers to scroll a tiny bit and the bar shows me how far along I am. I see no lacking or disadvantage. Maybe it's personal preference, but I suggest at least trying it out for a couple of weeks or so. As mentioned, it's a very simple thing to change in System Preferences.

 

[osxx]

So far I like Lion but Safari could use a tune up.

 

[chas_m]

MYmacROX, I was exactly the same way about "natural" scrolling. Tried it for a second, HATED IT, turned it off.

After a couple of weeks, I wasn't so busy, so I turned it back on and gave it an honest shot. 15 minutes later I was fine with it and now scrolling on the Mac and iOS devices is in harmony. I don't think I'll go back, though it doesn't take long for my brain to adjust.

 

[_Stormin]

I can't go back to "unnatural scrolling." I gave it a shot to see what a buddy was on about, and I couldn't stop screwing it up. I think that it comes from having an iPad first. I just expected it to work the way it does in Lion.

It could be something that they adopted because of the fact that iOS devices may bring people into the Apple fold.

 

[chas_m]

Despite some criticism (some of it quite fair), I think the iOS-like changes to most things in Lion that got that treatment were very intelligent choices that, with an OPEN MIND, will increase productivity.

That's not to say Lion is not without a few missteps (the "gray or grayer" soft-gray choices in window titles are too hard for many of us to distinguish, making us think that something is "grayed out" when in fact its clickable or active for example), but by and large the improvements to Lion are exactly that: improvements. Change doesn't come easy to some people, but that is what technology is all about.

If you want a good, VERY THOROUGH summary what is and is not better in Lion, I'd point you to the ridiculously long and detailed Ars Technica summary (a good chance to use the very cool "reader" and Reading List features of Safari). I agree with nearly everything they said there and they are widely seen as tough but fair.

(bearing in mind that it's now outdated with two updates that addressed some of what they point out.)

 

[Doug b]

Although I'm currently typing this on my purely Lion based Mac, I'm going to have to agree with the assessment that most of what has become of 10.7 vs SL is fluff, and that a lot of what I'm seeing is a step backwards.

I actually did a squeaky clean install of Lion today, with the intention of giving it my full attention. I had been, up until now, dual booting with SL, though Lion never saw the light of day on my machine. Installed Lion on my wifes MBP a couple of weeks ago, simply because she has an iPad, and thus the whole iCloud thing makes sense if she learns how to utilize it.

Anyway, I'm going to try and keep an open mind, but thus far, a few things right off the bad aggitate me. The biggest of them all, is memory allocation/management. I personally don't care for time machine, nor do I care for how Lion wants to take up where things left off. In SL, the process "kernel task" would hover around 80-100 MB, and would only increase minimally as time went by, and as I'd open multiple applications.

From the get go with Lion, it starts by eating up nearly half a gigabyte, without any apps open! Now let me start using Lightroom, Silver Efex, Photoshop etc.. and there goes the rest of the memory real quickly! Page IN/OUT city, without a doubt!

And then, there's the gimped exposé. I can deal with how spaces are now handled, but not in conjunction with what a mess exposé has become. You can point at grouped windows and two finger swipe at them till the cows come home, it's still a train wreck! Half the time you can't tell where one window begins and the other ends, let alone try to find the window you want!

For those of you who haven't seen the video I made of how Spaces/Exposé works in Snow Leopard, here it is. You'll need to disable Flash block. The password is "mac forums". Be sure to include the space (and no quotes obviously). Put it on HD, full screen and stretch.

Screenflow Tutorials -| SmugMug

Doug

 

[chas_m]

I have to point out that:

a. Time Machine was not a feature of Lion. It was a feature of Snow Leopard.
b. kernel_task is taking up 210.9MB of real mem and 12.8 of virtual mem on my machine, which has been on all day doing various tasks from complex to simple. So your experience is with is not repeatable, at least here.
c. "nor do I care for how Lion wants to take up where things left off" is a checkbox. It's very efficient for many, but if it's not for you just turn it off.

I'll cheerfully go along with your contention that expose isn't what it should be, though I haven't had multiple windows in an app open in years so frankly I have little idea what you're talking about. I'll take your word for it on that one.

 

[dtravis7]

I agree with Chas in everything except Time machine as it was first introduced in 10.5 Leopard. It's not a LION thing. I have been using it since the day 10.5 was released and love it in fact!

And yes, Time Machine can be disabled also.

 

[Discerptor]

b. kernel_task is taking up 210.9MB of real mem and 12.8 of virtual mem on my machine, which has been on all day doing various tasks from complex to simple. So your experience is with is not repeatable, at least here.

I'll cheerfully go along with your contention that expose isn't what it should be, though I haven't had multiple windows in an app open in years so frankly I have little idea what you're talking about. I'll take your word for it on that one.

At face value, these two statements would appear to contradict each other. No one is arguing that Lion isn't fine for light usage (unless you have less than 4GB of RAM and no SSD), but its performance is horrid for power users, particularly those with workflows that involve serious multitasking. The fact Mission Control is a train wreck compared to Exposé exacerbates the frustration for said users.

 

[Lord Elrond]

Ok no bs here. What I'm reading about lion is worrying me. It's still not too late for me to cancel my iMac order so I'm wondering if I should do that or not?

 

[vansmith]

What about Lion seems to be of greatest concern to you?

One thing to note - we can be a fairly critical group. Most people here are just fine with Lion (on the whole). You've just stumbled on a thread where some of our more vocal critical thinkers have decided to chime in.

 

[Doug b]

I have to point out that:

a. Time Machine was not a feature of Lion. It was a feature of Snow Leopard.
b. kernel_task is taking up 210.9MB of real mem and 12.8 of virtual mem on my machine, which has been on all day doing various tasks from complex to simple. So your experience is with is not repeatable, at least here.
c. "nor do I care for how Lion wants to take up where things left off" is a checkbox. It's very efficient for many, but if it's not for you just turn it off.

I'll cheerfully go along with your contention that expose isn't what it should be, though I haven't had multiple windows in an app open in years so frankly I have little idea what you're talking about. I'll take your word for it on that one.

I'm at work so only have a sec... I have no idea of how " time machine" was integral to my post. I didn't mean to type that, and need to figure out why I did. Maybe I meant something else...but it was late and I was overly tired! As for the rest, that will have to wait until later.

 

[Lord Elrond]

I'm one of those folks who read the comments section more than an article purporting to praise or decry something.

Some of those comments have suggested glitches causing slow downs, crashes etc. with lion. Clearly it seems most were thrilled with snow leopard.

It reminds me of when Millenium edition of windows came out and it sucked. Then they released XP which was extremely stable. Then Vista came out and sucked.

I'm thinking I might be ok because I've never had a Mac before so I'm getting used to an entirely new system but the main reason I'm switching is because of Mac's rep for stability and reliability.

It's a big investment and I don't want to regret it.

 

[pigoo3]

It's a big investment and I don't want to regret it.

At $29 bucks...at least Lion is not a big $$$ investment!

- Nick

 

[Lord Elrond]

At $29 bucks...at least Lion is not a big $$$ investment!

- Nick

I was actually referring to my brand new iMac which is supposed to ship January 24th.

 

[pigoo3]

I was actually referring to my brand new iMac which is supposed to ship January 24th.

Ahh. Since the thread title is "Snow Leopard vs. Lion"...I thought you were talking about Lion.

I didn't realize that any model Mac was in such short supply that your ship date was so far out.

- Nick

 

[alexsd123]

My biggest gripes with Lion are Expose, autosave and all this reopen nonsense.

Expose is more crammed than in Snow Leopard and it is slower. For example, there is a pause where you can not undo the Expose animation. Try pressing the expose button and compare it to the 4 finger swipe. You are able to quickly stop the expose.

The autosave feature seems like it would be very useful. However, I find it very annoying because it made saving documents a lot more complicated. There is no longer a "save as" function and you instead either have to export it as something or save a version which does not allow you to change the document's name - very frustrating.

The reopen feature is also annoying. Whenever you open up pages or an app it comes up with what you had open last time. It also opens up windows when you shut down your computer and always asks you if you want to reopen the windows when you restart. I can't really say anything bad for this feature except that it really irritates me.

I've also noticed a lot more problems while web browsing. I am not sure if this is related to Lion or if my computer is just getting older, but I am getting a lot more hiccups and freezing than with Snow Leopard.

All in all, it's just $29 but it's $29 that I shouldn't have spent because it's just caused more problems than solutions for me.

 

[Lord Elrond]

Ahh. Since the thread title is "Snow Leopard vs. Lion"...I thought you were talking about Lion.

I didn't realize that any model Mac was in such short supply that your ship date was so far out.

- Nick

Thanks for the link regarding beach balls, Nick.

I just ordered it about 3 days ago so yeah it will take a few weeks