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Apple Archive

The Early Adopter Curse: Buy Now or Wait?

, 2005.06.03

Be first or be bug-free?

This is the question facing those considering adopting Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger). It was also the question for those who adopted Microsoft's first version of Office for OS X - and the earlier versions of Safari as well as a slew of other applications from many different developers.

I had a friend ask me how come his Mac, with Tiger, kept running a root process called "update" and then freezing up shortly thereafter. I couldn't really tell him much, unfortunately. It sounded like one of those early-adopter bugs that many people face. These would include issues with screen brightness and early versions of 10.3, PowerBook battery life and early versions of OS X in general, and sleep mode with early versions of 10.1.

The bugs seem endless and many only show up in a few machines, making it very hard for the developers to diagnose them.

"They should spend more time testing the software before they release it" is the argument that comes up right about now. It's nice in theory, but the more time spent testing the software, the more time people have to go without an update. Time is money, and too long a period with no updates whatsoever would turn people off to any given company's software, no matter how good the final version is supposed to be.

If it doesn't actually exist on store shelves, it's in reality no good to anyone.

What would have happened if Apple had spent more time developing OS X so that the release that ended up being 10.1 was actually 10.0? There would have been fewer complaints by the reviewers, but also people's (and other company's) confidence in the OS would have gone down if it took too long for it to be developed. The fact that Apple released it as it was showed that they were making progress, and the 10.1 update that followed proved to the public and other software developers that Apple was indeed serious about making OS X a completely useable OS.

While these buggy versions end up getting a lot of public criticism, they sometimes exist as proof that a company is actively developing the product. Microsoft Office 4.2 (which included Word 6) got pretty lousy reviews (and Word 5 was actually faster, even in 68K emulation), but the Power Mac version showed that Microsoft was committed to developing for the PowerPC platform.

This isn't something that only happens with software. Apple's Power Mac 6100 was released even before it had an OS to run on it - Apple put together version 7.1.2, which ran on the machine, nut it ran almost completely in 68K emulation. While PowerPC was supposed to be the next generation, with the software at the time it seemed like the usability of the machine only existed in theory.

Power Mac G4 This also happened with the early G4s. The first low-end model that came out - both the original 400 MHz version and the latere 350 Mhz one - was actually based on a Yosemite (blue G3) motherboard. It was basically the same computer but with a G4 processor. This gave people a taste of what the G4 could do while keeping the price down (one of the few applications to fully utilise the G4 at the time was Photoshop). It wasn't until OS X was developed that the operating system and most software took full advantage of the G4 processor.

There will always be early adopters eager to purchase products before they get updated and the bugs get worked out. Tiger sold extremely well the first day it went on sale, and there are plenty of people using it right now. But then again, there are a huge number of people still using Panther, Jaguar, and even the classic Mac OS.

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Links for the Day

Mac of the Day: 17" MacBook Pro Core Duo, Apr. 2006 - The top-end MacBook Pro includes a 1680 x 1050, 2.16 GHz Core Duo CPU, and supports Apple 30" Cinema Display.
Group of the Day: G4 List is for those using Power Mac G4s or G4 upgrades.
November 24 in LEM history: 98: Microsoft's heavy hand - 00: Looking at the iMac - 04: The best Mac for the holidays - Picking the right replacement for a dead mouse - Better battery for 15" AlBook
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