I waited to write this article until I got enough RAM to run Jaguar
comfortably.
First Impressions
Jaguar (Mac OS X 10.2) is nice. Very nice. It came preloaded on
my iBook. Press
power, and the standard "Welcome" screen comes up, along with the Mac
OS setup. It took about 15 minutes to configure everything exactly the
way I wanted.
Jaguar represents my first real use of Mac OS X. I have tinkered
with everything from the Public Beta to 10.0 and 10.1. However, most of
these experiences were on other people's computers. Now I get to
actually use Jag on my very own.
The interface seems reasonably well developed and looks stunning. It
has some strange idiosyncrasies (notably, you can only drag items to
the Dock from icon view), and the new application-specific menu is
somewhat disorienting. Performance is excellent with the Radeon 7500,
which can take advantage of Quartz Extreme, although still not up to
OS 9 levels. In my use, I've noticed a 5-10% performance decrease
in Jaguar.
This performance decrease is easily offset by true multithreading.
Basically, multithreading lets the computer do many tasks (threads) at
once. Everything in OS X is multithreaded, which translates into
much better productivity. For instance, when I go online I usually have
my browser (Chimera in X and
IE in 9), my email client (Mail in X and Entourage in 9), and iChat or
AIM. In 9, I have to launch IE, wait for it to load, then launch
Entourage and wait for it to load, and lastly launch AIM. In Jaguar, I
can click the Dock icons for Navigator, Mail, and iChat and have all
three load simultaneously. Obviously it takes nearly the same amount of
time, but I can also be doing other things while the apps load in the
background.
Jaguar is also very stable. I've had the equivalent of a crash twice
(the screen dims and a message pops up saying "Your computer needs to
be restarted. Please press the Power button to restart"). The culprit
is iMovie. iMovie apparently dislikes running at the same time as
GraphicConverter and
Microsoft
Word, since both crashes occurred when all three were running.
As everyone throughout the Mac Web says, buy RAM if you plan to run
Jaguar. This is especially true if you plan to run Classic. Classic was
extremely slow with only 128 MB of RAM, but things got to an
almost-as-fast-as-the-real-thing state when I increased memory to 384
MB. RAM is definitely a good choice and the most inexpensive way to
increase speed on your Mac. I got a 256 MB low-profile PC 133 SODIMM
for $25 shipped, and it increased normal Finder performance by 10% and
Classic performance by about 50%.
Another planned upgrade is a hard drive. I'm looking at IBM's 5400
rpm drives, probably in a 40 GB size. However, I'm worried about heat
and power consumption. Coincidentally, if anyone has experience with a
fast, hot hard drive in an iBook, please email me. :-)
Increased disk access and transfer rates will also boost performance,
as Dan Knight found on his
TiBook.
My biggest problem is that not all of my software is OS X
compatible. My main productivity apps (MS Office, iChat/AIM, Toast,
Navigator, Mail) are OS X native, which is good. It means I can
get my schoolwork done in X.
However, most of my other apps are not OS X native. This
includes Freeway LE, Dreamweaver, Flash, Adobe Photoshop, ProTools LE,
BBEdit, and Final Cut Pro. I've had to replace these with other apps.
For work on websites I have to go back to OS 9. I have a
carbonized demo of Flash MX and Dreamweaver MX, but they expire in a
few days, and I can't afford to purchase them.
The same applies for Photoshop - I've been using GraphicConverter
for basic image work, but I really miss the functionality and high-end
features of Photoshop.
ProTools LE has been replaced (for now) by the very capable Sound
Studio for basic audio work. However, Sound Studio is a completely
different beast, and I'm really only using it for quick-and-dirty
recording.
Final Cut Pro has somewhat been replaced by iMovie, but when I want
to do more complex audio with movies, I go back to 9 with ProTools LE
and FCP.
It will be a while before I can afford software for Jaguar. I get
education pricing, which is a bonus, but it will still be a while.
All in all, Jaguar is an excellent OS that is (mostly) a pleasure to
use. Performance is more than acceptable on an 800 MHz G3 with a slow
hard drive. The only thing precluding my using it all the time is a
lack of Carbonized software. I'd recommend Jaguar to anyone with the
hardware to run it, meaning 500 MHz+ with a decent video card
(preferably one that supports Quartz Extreme) and 256 MB+ of
memory.
However, if you do finally take the plunge to Jaguar, keep in mind
that it will be a slow migration unless you have the cash to buy
Carbonized versions of all your apps at once.
Next time: More about the iBook.
Share your perspective on the Mac by emailing with "My Turn" as your subject.
