Apple Says New OS X ‘Mavericks’ Will Be Offered for Free

http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2013/10/22/apple-says-new-os-x-mavericks-will-be-offered-for-free/

by jdmitch • 13 years ago

414 351 13 years ago

blogs.barrons.com

mpg33• 13 years ago

s w e e t

ics• 13 years ago

If you're too busy to read the whole article or watch the keynote, also note that you can upgrade directly from Snow Leopard or later. They listed the hardware models which will take it as well– the 2007 Mac Minis and MacBook Pros are supposedly good to go.

arrrg3• 13 years ago

Apple is all about that planned obsolescence, right!

anologwintermut• 13 years ago

That argument usually applied to iOS an their practices about non easily user repairable hardware.

lukifer6• 13 years ago

It can still be planned obsolescence even if the plan is a good one. ;)

Apple has always attempted to strike a balance between longevity and progress, especially on Macs (5-7 year lifespan, usually). iOS is faster-moving, and gets the shaft more often (2-3 years, sometimes less). The latter will hopefully get better as the mobile hardware catches up to desktops; most of the forced upgrades have been due to low RAM or other hardware deficiencies.

brymaster6• 13 years ago

Since you're being credulous, I'll bite:

Just because it's "free" and you can update systems that are on Snow Leopard, doesn't mean it'll update all systems on Snow Leopard. For those paying attention, Apple killed off quite a bit of hardware with 10.8. Those certainly aren't upgradable to Mavericks.

badman_ting• 13 years ago

Also, their OS upgrades are more expensive than everyone else's because their customers are idiot sheep easily fooled by flashy marketing. That's why this is so expensive.

jared314• 13 years ago

While they may be good to go, I still like waiting a week to upgrade apple products. They do occasionally break things important to my workflow. The last one for me was VirtualBox support along with the Xcode commandline tools. While workarounds and patches appear fairly quickly, it is prudent not to put myself out of action, potentially for days or weeks, if I can avoid it.

btian• 13 years ago

It's always a good idea to create a smaller partition and install the new OS. Make sure that everything is working, then upgrade the main partition.

shadesandcolour• 13 years ago

If you're concerned about application compatibility, you can check out RoaringApps. They have a new table for Mavericks compatibility.

http://roaringapps.com/apps

iambateman2• 13 years ago

Didn't Lion not support 2008 models? I think it's cool, and unusual, that they can now upgrade to Mavericks.

glogla• 13 years ago

I'm running Lion on 2007 MacBook, so it should support 2008 models.

The problem was with Mountain Lion, because it required 64-bit EFI (or something) which older models don't have.

Dan_Nguyen• 13 years ago

My girlfriend uses a 2008 aluminum MB (non-Pro), and I never had any issues upgrading her to previous versions of OSX. Now it's running Mountain Lion and downloading Mavericks as I type.

Turing_Machine• 13 years ago

Depends on which model and when you bought it. If it's an iMac, you're good all the way back to mid-2007. Mac Pro needs to be early 2008 or later. Mac Mini needs to be early 2009 or later.

If it won't run Lion/Mountain Lion, it won't run Mavericks either, unfortunately.

Also note that some features (e.g., AirDrop) aren't available on older machines running Mountain Lion, even if the basic OS runs. I don't know if that's been changed for Mavericks.

bluedino• 13 years ago

I wonder what the technical reason is for not letting Leopard users upgrade. It seems like everyone I know with a 2008/2009 is still on 10.5.8

durin42• 13 years ago

No app store in Leopard? If the MAS is the only distribution vector, there's a bootstrapping problem from 10.5 IIRC.

wtallis6• 13 years ago

10.5 doesn't support the Mac App Store. And, why would they put effort into testing the upgrade process from an OS that is only still used by people who never upgrade the OS?

tehwalrus2• 13 years ago

snow leopard was the first 64-bit only OS X. You couldn't allow all Leopard users to upgrade, so that's not what's in the press release. People may still be able to upgrade though, if they can work out how to install the App Store.

xenonite• 13 years ago

The most technical reason for not offering an upgrade to all 10.5 users is: PowerPC-Architecture! 10.6 was the first Intel-Only OS X, and 10.5 the last one for PowerPCs.

joezydeco• 13 years ago

In mid-2012 Leopard users were offered a free DVD upgrade to Snow Leopard to get the App Store (and access to later upgrades).

molsongolden• 13 years ago

No luck for us 1st gen 2006 macbook users!

wiredfool• 13 years ago

There was no luck on Lion or Mountain Lion either.

georgebarnett• 13 years ago

Sadly the first Core Duo's were 32 bit.

With that in mind, I can understand Apples motivation to move the whole line to 64 as soon as is possible.

aydoubleyou• 13 years ago

Where can I find the list of models?

mfranzwa• 13 years ago

http://www.apple.com/osx/specs/

mwcremer• 13 years ago

http://www.apple.com/osx/specs/

twoodfin• 13 years ago

I'm hopeful I didn't misread the slide, and that the original Macbook Air will be supported. Not my primary laptop, but it'd be great to move up from Lion.

wtallis6• 13 years ago

Nope. The original MacBook Air used a shitty Intel GMA GPU. OS X 10.8 and later require a real GPU - NVidia, AMD, or Intel Sandy Bridge or newer.

shinratdr3• 13 years ago

10.8 didn't support that MBA, so I'm not sure why you would hope that 10.9 would suddenly reintroduce compatibility.

easytiger• 13 years ago

That's confusing, didn't they charge to upgrade to ML. Doesn't that then infer they should refund anyone who paid for an ML upgrade?

jasonlotito• 13 years ago

Why? I got what they paid for. I don't feel slighted.

I don't really understand how you can be confused.

panacea• 13 years ago

A boot to the face of Microsoft.

Pxtl• 13 years ago

Yup. They had trouble getting people to buy Windows 8 when it was $40.

CrazedGeek2• 13 years ago

Do you have a citation for that? I can't seem to find any sales information on the $40 promo.

MrZongle2• 13 years ago

No kidding.

Not only will Apple get some good press for this (barring any major technical snafu) but they'll glean some additional community goodwill and drastically reduce the number of legacy OS X versions in the wild.

camus2• 13 years ago

OsX is not free, you still need to buy a Mac. As for MSFT , they are a software company,not sure what they can do about Windows price ,which will never be free. Want free stuff? use Linux.

guywithabike• 13 years ago

Linux is not free, you still need to buy a computer.

dham3• 13 years ago

Since when have you had to have a Mac to run OSX?

joekrill• 13 years ago

Windows 8.1 upgrade is free. How is this any different?

byuu• 13 years ago

Well, a much smaller percentage of Windows users are on 8.0 than OS X users are on Snow Leopard or later. If Blue allowed upgrades from Windows 7 for free, that'd be a more equal comparison.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

Mavericks is free from Snow Leopard onwards (because Leopard didn't have the appstore).

In terms of period that's equivalent to giving 8.1 free to all W7 users (both SL and W7 were released mid-2009)

josteink4• 13 years ago

Microsoft's business model is selling a licensed OS, something which honestly is getting harder every passing day. Apple's business model is selling compelling hardware at a premium price with their own software preloaded.

Apple could (and now indeed does) give away their software for free and still make a decent living. Their software wont run on any hardware they haven't already made a profit on, so there's no significant "piracy" risk either way.

That said, Windows 8.1 was a free upgrade for everyone already on the Windows 8 bandwagon (and thus in need for some overhauls).

ericd• 13 years ago

Haven't the service packs always been free? I don't remember paying for any, at least...

revelation3• 13 years ago

Microsoft sells software, Apple sells hardware with matching software. But make no mistake, they are a hardware company - OSX won't even run without a chip confirming its an authentic Mac.

The idea that they would charge for these smaller OSX updates is bizarre, and the price point has been in the "we need this for accounting" range in the past.

foogered• 13 years ago

I feel the need to point out that you can run Mac OS X on pretty much any recent Intel processor and a wide range of motherboards. It is not locked to Apple hardware.

evilduck• 13 years ago

OSX won't even run without a chip confirming its an authentic Mac.

You mean EFI? Because Macs don't have any special hardware inside, and especially not any "authentic Mac" chips.

27182818284• 13 years ago

Microsoft sells software, Apple sells hardware with matching software.

Something Microsoft would love, love, love to change about themselves. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface

free6522• 13 years ago

What chip? I have a hakintosh with 10.8.4..

chollida1• 13 years ago

I'm not sure I understand this.

Windows 8.1 is about as equivalent to OS X 10.9 as you can get and it was also free.

What exactly is the "boot to the face" here?

NoPiece• 13 years ago

Except Mavericks is free for everyone (who can run it). I have Windows 7 and MS is not offering 8 or 8.1 to me for free.

lukifer6• 13 years ago

Apple's attempting to set a new expectation with consumers: OS updates should be free. Users are already accustomed to it on their phones, now they'll start to expect it of their computers.

I'm willing to wager that Apple never charges for an OS update again. I'm surprised they've taken this long to make the leap. (Of course, Microsoft makes more from OEM licensing than upgrades, but it's still a blow to their value in the consumer headspace.)

jfb2• 13 years ago

Apple and Microsoft are in almost entirely disjoint businesses, anyway. I doubt that there's much useful analogizing to be done about their current respective situations.

FULL DISCLOSURE: Apple employee.

smaili• 13 years ago

This is very significant because it has signaled a shift from a time where Operating Systems was once a major revenue stream.

Very interested to see if Microsoft will follow suit.

kvb• 13 years ago

Was OS revenue ever a big source of income for Apple?

uptown2• 13 years ago

"Very interested to see if Microsoft will follow suit."

And what? Make it up in volume? Unless Microsoft's Surface sales take-off, they can't afford to give Windows away for free apart from what are essentially service-packs like the 8.1 update they just released.

scarmig• 13 years ago

I thought Office, Exchange, etc. products actually formed the bulk of their revenue.

vdaniuk• 13 years ago

Make it up in Windows Store sales commissions? However, you are right, Windows is a cash cow that generates immense revenue to Microsoft.

corresation2• 13 years ago

And what? Make it up in volume?

Just chiming in conversationally (not refuting anything), but Windows original ascension was entirely based on piracy -- Microsoft did nothing to stop home users from thieving Windows as it lubricated its use for business (and business could much more easily be convinced to spend, if not at the outset, once the infrastructure was in place and they suddenly worried about a disgruntled employee turn them in).

And of course, Microsoft knows (and controls) the ecosystem more than anyone. Microsoft should be able to monetize users beyond just the operating system, but they are proving totally incompetent at doing that with home users.

TillE• 13 years ago

I expect they could offer free upgrades for the consumer edition of the OS without any significant hit. The bulk of their revenues are surely from OEMs and businesses, not home users buying a boxed copy.

jameshart• 13 years ago

Microsoft has a history of giving away free updates to the operating system when you buy their hardware: I never had to pay for any OS updates on my Xbox 360.

josteink4• 13 years ago

Right. Apple event today.

What on earth compelled Nokia to launch their new Windows-tablet on the same day?

pinaceae• 13 years ago

they knew it's crap and wanted to bury it?

meepmorp4• 13 years ago

Dunno. I looked at an overview of the thing, and it seemed not too bad. Design looked nice, the battery in the keyboard cover thing seemed cool.

I can't imagine buying over an iPad, but I could see where it might appeal to more MS oriented folks.

jbigelow76• 13 years ago

Nokia announced their event first. Two ways to read Apple then targeting the same day -

For the Apple Fanboy: Apple wasn't even aware Nokia was releasing anything, because honestly, it's windows mobile so who cares, and this is pure coincidence.

For the Msft Fanboy: Apple releases a sad, incremental improvement in hardware that isn't their primary focus anymore in an attempt to keep the attention off of a rival.

potatolicious• 13 years ago

Or Apple knew, but it didn't affect their timing at all. Apple only announces on Tuesdays, and there are only 5 Tuesdays in October - and we've known this announcement was coming this month for a very, very long time.

I sincerely doubt Apple gives one tiny hoot about Windows tablets when it comes to timing their announcements. A flagship Android tablet maybe.

tedunangst• 13 years ago

Considering today's October 22 iPad announcement came 364 days after last year's October 23 iPad announcement, I'm going to guess Nokia's announcement wasn't a contributing factor for Apple's scheduling.

chm3• 13 years ago

I own a 2008 15" MBP. I didn't want to upgrade from Snow Leopard - there seemed to be a synergy between SL and my hardware.

Even for free, I'm weary of upgrading my OS. Too scared to take a performance hit.

dilap• 13 years ago

Recent releases of OS X, and probably this latest one too, have focused a lot on actually improving the efficiency of the OS. Can't know for sure w/o trying it, but I'd expect to get a performance improvement from the upgrade.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

Initial reports from the GM tell of many improvements, especially the memory subsystem which aside from the possibly gimmicky memory compression finally stopped sucking and swapping for no reason because it couldn't handle its own caches correctly. Users on even high-RAM configurations (16~32GB) which would still end up swapping in previous versions due to memleaks and memory mismanagement report 0 swapping.

wonderyak• 13 years ago

I love SL and I was really hesitant to upgrade to Lion. When I did, it was weird but I got over it. Lion and ML feel so much faster.

chm3• 13 years ago

I'm just worried that I'll be upgrading for eye-candy rather than increased power usability.

kailuowang• 13 years ago

Does anyone know if this upgrade is worthwhile for software development?

cmiles74• 13 years ago

I would think it'd only make a big difference if you're developing targeting this newest release of OSX. There isn't a new XCode release at this time.[0] It is likely that the next XCode release will require Mavericks to run.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xcode#Version_history

perishabledave• 13 years ago

Battery life is said to increase an hour and the multiple screen monitor functionality has been improved. Nothing that would really change your development drastically. That being said it is a solid release and quite stable, I wouldn't see much reason not to upgrade.

lukifer6• 13 years ago

For n=1: The 10.9 GM has been smooth as butter, didn't break any of my mac apps or *nix tools. Obviously double-check on any tools which are mission-critical, but I recommend it in general, a noticeably pleasant upgrade to usability, battery and performance.

qwerty_asdf3• 13 years ago

So where can I go to download an ISO?

I'd like to burn a bootable DVD, and load it up as a non-networked offline install. Is such a thing even possible?

pat2man• 13 years ago

There are a few tools that will do this for you, basically copying the hidden restore partition onto a USB stick. Bootable DVD though? Really?

barake• 13 years ago

As of Mountain Lion, the recovery partition doesn't contain the full OS. Just enough to bootstrap and download the whole thing from Apple. They also do not sell the update on physical media (thumb drives, DVDs, etc.) in store.

qwerty_asdf3• 13 years ago

  > Bootable DVD though? Really?

In light of recent events involving the NSA and leaked documents, yes. A bootable DVD. Really.

For some heavy-duty discussion on the withertos and wherefores, take a quick gander at a recent thread, over here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6532642

Remember that part where GCHQ stormed the offices of The Guardian, and took an angle grinder to one of their laptops?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/20/nsa-snowden-fil...

LX-350• 13 years ago

Lion DiskMaker has a beta for creating a Mavericks GM disk. It should be updated soon to support the release. You just download the installer from the App Store and run Lion DiskMaker.

http://liondiskmaker.com/

nearengine3• 13 years ago

The installer itself can do this:

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/WHATEVER_DISK –applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app –nointeraction

Groxx• 13 years ago

Probably the same way as I've done with Mountain Lion, but with a dual-layer DVD instead: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/apple-in-the-enterprise/how... (not that exact link, but the same basic thing is all over the internet) If you want to do this for an older OS version you've purchased, you can option-click on the Purchases tab-button-thing in the App Store, and it'll show everything. (totally undiscoverable, but at least it exists)

Works great, much faster installs than a disk.

tvon• 13 years ago

You can't download an ISO, you'll need a working OSX install to download it from the App Store. From there I believe you can burn an install DVD and AFAIK you've always been able to do a non-networked install.

edit: Un-tested by me, but I've heard this is how you do it:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=18081307&postcoun...

nearengine3• 13 years ago

That is the method I used on an 8GB flash drive, worked great.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

Download the installer from MAS, it's a .app within which you'll find a `createinstallmedia` binary. As its name indicates, that binary can be used to create a bootable install media. Not sure it can create a DVD, but it can create a bootable USB key.

ville• 13 years ago

Free as in free beer, not as in free speech.

lukifer6• 13 years ago

Just give it up, and call it "liberated software" or something. Language is defined by usage, and no one outside the FOSS community thinks that's what "free" means. (And while we're at it, the media is never, ever going to adopt the word "cracker" either.)

lucasnemeth3• 13 years ago

free fre·er, fre·est, adverb, verb, freed, free·ing. adjective 1. enjoying personal rights or liberty, as a person who is not in slavery: a land of free people. 2. pertaining to or reserved for those who enjoy personal liberty: They were thankful to be living on free soil. 3. existing under, characterized by, or possessing civil and political liberties that are, as a rule, constitutionally guaranteed by representative government: the free nations of the world. 4. enjoying political autonomy, as a people or country not under foreign rule; independent. 5. exempt from external authority, interference, restriction, etc., as a person or one's will, thought, choice, action, etc.; independent; unrestricted.

lucasnemeth3• 13 years ago

It's not even free as in free beer, it's free as in a "all you can drink buffet", it's only free for those who already paid the entry ticket.

SeanLuke• 13 years ago

Wasn't there a McCain-Feingold rule which made free upgrades illegal that entangled Apple in the past?

Edit: Sarbanes-Oxley, not McCain-Feingold. I had forgotten.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6593993

No. FASB changes revenue recognition principles in 2010 to allow this type of update.

publicfig• 13 years ago

I think you may be thinking of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act, which is what Apple cited for charging for some upgrades in the past (that and GAAP)[1]. If I remember correctly, things have changed on that level now, though I don't know if it's through legislation or through a reform of accounting practices

[1]http://appleinsider.com/article/?id=2419

crbnw00ts• 13 years ago

Not any more. The rules were changed / clarified a few years ago:

http://www.inc.com/guides/2010/11/how-to-comply-with-new-rev...

Apple mentions their adoption of the rules in this press release (scroll down to "Retrospective Adoption of Amended Accounting Standards"):

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/01/25Apple-Reports-Firs...

That is how they've been able to give customers free iOS upgrades all this time without having to defer any revenue from the original sale of the hardware. They are apparently now applying the same practices to OS X software.

AsymetricCom• 13 years ago

I guess this one is on the NSA. Thanks guys!

Alex3917• 13 years ago

So can we now file a class action suit for all those times they told us it would be illegal to not charge a fee for upgrading?

k2enemy• 13 years ago

No. FASB changed revenue recognition principles in 2010 to allow this type of update.

millerm2• 13 years ago

Wow, great response! I was wondering when someone was going to bring that up.

D9u4• 13 years ago

Real breakthrough would be for OS X to run on Windoze devices... If you're a distro hopping nixer there's nothing to see here... Move along.

tomschlick• 13 years ago

Yeah if by breakthrough you mean shits the bed. The reason OSX works so well is because Apple has a limited set of hardware they have to support vs the wild west of hardware that windows has to support.

D9u4• 13 years ago

No, by "breakthrough" I mean support common x86 devices, which OS X does support to a limited degree.

r00fus• 13 years ago

Yes, Apple is a hardware manufacturer that happens to make it's own OS (something that Dell or Lenovo could do any day if they could get off the MSFT/INTC gravy train - by creating their own Linux distro).

Switching models to compete with the Windows model is a mistake they were lucky to make once and live to tell about. They will not make that mistake again.

If you're looking for competition against Microsoft, look to Google. Both of these companies aren't hardware companies at their heart, and both want manufacturers to bundle their OS.

I'd say that if Microsoft had an ally, it would be Apple today (only in the sense that Apple doesn't care for Microsoft's business).

yeukhon• 13 years ago

Finally. There is almost no point if you are selling your OS for just $30, $40 dollars. I am going to wait a few months until I upgrade. Most of the software I use probably be better off with the current version.

ChikkaChiChi• 13 years ago

Some would say that Mavericks was launched for free because Windows 8.1 did the same. Those same people might also say that Apple did one better by offering the update for computers running older than the most recent version of their software.

ctdonath3• 13 years ago

Offering it for older computers & versions indicates this was in the works long before MS released 8.1 out of urgency.

microtonal• 13 years ago

This has been coming a long time. The updates were already very cheap (20something Euros) compared to the old days (> 100 Euro if I remember correctly) and it fits in with the iOS strategy of having the latest version on every device.

OS X upgrade revenue is now such a minuscule piece of the pie that it probably doesn't matter anymore.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

the old days (> 100 Euro if I remember correctly)

Yes, 129 for single-user and 169 for family (5-user).

And these are not so old days, Leopard was 129 and that was in 2007. Snow Leopard and Lion were 30, and ML was 20 (in USD, IIRC $129 translated to 129€ but ML is "only" 18€)

eungyu• 13 years ago

OS X Prices by Version - http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/osx-pr...

bsimpson• 13 years ago

Apple's policy until System 7 was that you paid for the hardware and you should be able to expect software updates free for the life of the product. Nice to see them coming home, on this point anyway.

heartbreak3• 13 years ago

Apple still makes money selling the computers that are running free OS X Mavericks. Microsoft makes no money by giving away Windows 8.1 for free to consumers.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

Apple still makes money selling the computers that are running free OS X Mavericks.

Well you can install Mavericks on machines from 2007, that's money from quite a long time ago.

epsylon• 13 years ago

Microsoft makes no money by giving away Windows 8.1 for free to consumers.

Of course they make money from it. That's very naive of you to think that they don't.

devx• 13 years ago

I think the bigger hit to Microsoft, or just as big, is the free and much improved iWorks. Now there are 2 office suites from 2 big companies being offered for free (Docs and iWorks), which are becoming increasingly more popular not just with consumers, but a lot of enterprise customers, too.

Microsoft should be terrified. Both of their cash cows are getting rapidly commoditized.

untog2• 13 years ago

Wait and see if iWorks makes it into corporate environments. I'm not sure it will. Google Docs has a better chance.

footpath• 13 years ago

Is this really the case? According to a survey by Forrester[0], corporations are still largely dominated by Microsoft products.

[0]http://blogs.forrester.com/philipp_karcher/13-10-17-office_p...

Geee• 13 years ago

I think it just pays Apple more in customer satisfaction to have everyone on the same boat. Simple economics. They make the money on the hardware after all. Same thing for free iLife and iWork, customers pay for the complete experience in the price of the device.

rogerbinns• 13 years ago

It also helps developers. It would be a reasonable position to take to only support the latest MacOS release and features. (People who don't want to upgrade their MacOS version for free are also less likely to want to try your software or upgrade to new versions of it.)

glhaynes• 13 years ago

They went out of their way to point out that this is a "going forward" thing, too — system software on Apple devices is free. I assume Windows 9 isn't gonna be.

gohrt2• 13 years ago

I wonder how this jibes with Apple's much-derided claims that stuff like XCode had to be $5 due to accounting regulations around free upgrades.

Windows 9 might be free for the same reason -- the new features are in apps and services, and the OS is a compatibility layer than needs to keep up.

For example, hypothetically: Office 2014 is expensive, Win 9 is free to provide access to Office 2014 Viewer or whatever.

McPants• 13 years ago

The reason they offer it for free is pretty simple to me. They have an app store which is making them more money than the Operating System itself. The more people who have access to the app store the more money they make, so why put a price barrier between the user and the store?

This is why Windows 8.1 is free and I will assume the next iterations of Windows will be. Windows now has an app store and they are banking on getting as many people into that ecosystem as possible. While they may lose money in the OS purchase, that isn't where the bulk of the money is made anymore.

It's all about money.

MiguelHudnandez• 13 years ago

Microsoft has never charged for service packs. They are being a little more generous with 8.1, but I still lump it in with service packs.

locusm• 13 years ago

The upgrade path for Windows 8.1 is pretty confusing - it differs depending on what edition you have.

Zenst• 13 years ago

The whole free OS which can only run upon hardware they have already sold you is reminding me of how IBM used to sell AIX and moved into giving it away free as it would only run upon hardware only they made and sold you.

Question is though, what about support. You have a 3 year old Mac of some flavour and upgrade to this OS, what about issues you may have.

ANother aspect would be that by in effect making this level of OS available to all supported models out there warranty wise, they make life in supporting systems a little bit easier and very likely will drop support for the other older OS's on these models quicker. Again making life in support easier in many ways as well as making developers lives a lot easier. Especialy if they can target toward the a single denominator OS wise and take advantage of all the features without working towards only features common to the previous flavours.

Either way a good move. Though can bet there will be somebody on the older flavour of OS who will have some essentual application that they must have which has issues. But time will tell.

Good move on many levels I'd say by Apple.

midgetjones• 13 years ago

I think that it's most likely they want everyone on the latest OSX for the same reasons that it's good to have everyone on the latest iOS.

Whatever they're planning, getting everyone on board is obviously an important part of that.

I think the biggest thing over the last two keynotes is the iWork update - MS have been ridicuslously slow in the one area they could have won, which was bringing Office to iOS. I'm pretty sure this is the nail in the coffin.

sarreph2• 13 years ago

Whatever they're planning

You just wait...

mturmon2• 13 years ago

"...the iWork update..."

This seems to be really powerful. I've been surprised, during the last two demos of iWork, at the lack of oohs and aahs in the audience when things like (last time) the web-based editing, and (this time) the collaboration on live documents were demo'ed.

myko• 13 years ago

Do you think MS is planning on bringing Office to iOS? I figure if they haven't by now, they wont at all.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

The whole free OS which can only run upon hardware they have already sold you is reminding me of how IBM used to sell AIX and moved into giving it away free as it would only run upon hardware only they made and sold you.

On the other hand, once upon a time Apple made you pay for software which also run upon hardware only they made and sold you. Back before Snow Leopard, that was $129 per user (though installable on an unlimited number of machines)

savoytruffle• 13 years ago

Snow Leopard was the first cheap version because it had "No New Features". It was $29 for a DVD. Leopard was the last one to cost $129 in 2007.

willimholte• 13 years ago

IIRC it was not legal to install on multiple machines (perhaps it was legal for multiple personal machines?).

yuhong2• 13 years ago

Not before System 7.1 released in 1992 though.

X-Istence• 13 years ago

Even if your Mac is no longer supported or on Apple care you can always book an appointment with the genius bar to get questions answered regarding setting up email accounts or if something is malfunctioning.

Apple also sells one-on-one sessions if you are so inclined or need longer sessions than what the genius bar can help you with.

te_chris• 13 years ago

* if you live in a country where apple has such things (not New Zealand).

ZachWick• 13 years ago

I wonder how "out of date" your Apple product can be and they will still help you with it? I think a trip to my local Apple Store with my trusty Apple ][+ is in order.

tehwebguy• 13 years ago

Question is though, what about support. You have a 3 year old Mac of some flavour and upgrade to this OS, what about issues you may have.

If you have an Apple store nearby you can walk in and get help. There is a limit to what they will do, my anecdotal experience is that most people with software issues get them fixed in a few minutes without going to repair.

But if you don't you are SOL with a >3 year old product.

Here are the timelines for AppleCare: http://www.apple.com/support/products/mac.html

MattBearman• 13 years ago

It's worth noting that if you're in the EU you get 2 years warrantee for free - http://www.apple.com/uk/legal/statutory-warranty/

zcam• 13 years ago

It's only "free" for Snow Leopard owners, which means not free at all, on the other hand this answers the support question.

jfb2• 13 years ago

It's free for anyone with supported hardware, by the commonly accepted definition of "free".

Tehnix• 13 years ago

Stab in the dark, but, I guess it's because it requires the App Store to get it, which, AFAIK, first became available in 10.6.6, meaning, Snow Leopard is the farthest back you go.

If you get someone to DL it for you and burn it to disk/USB drive, you can probably also install it on Macs with older versions, since you'll just boot up in it..

So, it is free for everyone, but, only distributed easily to Snow Leopard and thereafter users.

thrillgore• 13 years ago

Question is though, what about support. You have a 3 year old Mac of some flavour and upgrade to this OS, what about issues you may have.

I have a Macbook Pro 5,1 and only about three weeks ago did I upgrade to Mountain Lion from Lion. I typically wait a couple of point releases to make sure all the beachballs are resolved.

I do need real multi-monitor support though...

epmatsw3• 13 years ago

That's been the case for the last few releases. When Lion came out, a lot of major apps dropped support for Snow Leopard within a year. I stuck around on SL for a while because I preferred (and still prefer) the way that it handled Spaces, but I eventually didn't feel like I could keep missing out on updates just for that.

avn2109• 13 years ago

Seriously. Mission control was a major productivity drop down from spaces.

DustinCalim• 13 years ago

Question is though, what about support.

They sell you that too.

mweibel• 13 years ago

I have a late 2008 macbook pro (which happens to be the oldest supported version) and Mountain Lion worked flawlessly. I'll upgrade to Mavericks today and see what happens. I think it'll work without problems :)

samstave• 13 years ago

Can anyone try running this in a virtualbox?

Can anyone point me to an ISO of this?

frank_boyd• 13 years ago

Of course.

The competition is already free and Apple has still a high security prison as far as the lock-in effect of its technology is concerned, so they're still safe.

jasoncartwright• 13 years ago

Here is the App Store link to upgrade now...

https://itunes.apple.com/app/os-x-mavericks/id675248567?mt=1...

corresation2• 13 years ago

Installed it on a Mac Mini (3rd gen i7) and after the install it sat on a blank screen (with mouse cursor), but a forced restart and all was perfect and everything is operating brilliantly. Fantastic treat that it is free.

aroch2• 13 years ago

Kernel Caches that aren't cleared properly will do this, the display drivers changes significantly and they're stored in PRAM

neya• 13 years ago

It should be worth noting that if you run Adobe's Creative Suite (version 6 and below), it has some compatibility problems for a number of users, including me[1] while running it on Mavericks. If your business depends on this software, I would advise you to wait for a few more months until these bugs are fixed. Overall, very excited!

[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6538803

aleem• 13 years ago

It seems the key initiative here is to improve adoption rates which is a sound strategy. As a developer, it's always a pleasure to write apps that only have to support the latest and greatest.

It would be a pretty big feat if the adoption rates for Mavericks came anywhere close to the adoption rates for iOS7.

saejox• 13 years ago

First i heard this i immidiately gone to apple.com/osx looked for iso download.

Yes i am naive like that.

D9u4• 13 years ago

We can download hundreds of fully functional iso for a myriad of unix-like systems... Why is it naive to expect Apple to follow suit?

Is it their software which is so costly, or is it the hardware upon which that software runs?

trimbo2• 13 years ago

I love how it's free for the "first time ever"...

... except before... I think it was... System 7.5? All new OSes used to be free for Mac and Apple II.

masklinn9• 13 years ago

10.1 was also free for 10.0 users, though mostly because 10.0 wasn't really finished (some would argue 10.1 was not either)

shinratdr3• 13 years ago

OS X is a seperate OS. Apple didn't say that this is the first time they had given away an OS. They said this is the first free OS X release. Which it is.

trimbo2• 13 years ago

"Today we're going to revolutionize pricing. Today we announce a new era for the Mac. Today we announce that Mavericks is free."

This is a quote from the Verge's liveblog of an Apple guy. Note he said "Mac", which made me think of it.

nandhp• 13 years ago

What about virtualization? Previously, one would only be allowed virtualize OS X if they purchased a copy (you can't virtualize the copy that came with the computer). Since it sounds like that's no longer an option, do I get virtualization for free now?

ucha• 13 years ago

It's definitely a great incentive for users to update their hardware. If you could still use iOS3 on your iPhone 3GS, it would be reasonably fast and responsive but because the upgrade to iOS6 is free, you go for it only to discover that it is now unusable. Same logic goes now for Macs.

shinratdr3• 13 years ago

I think lack of app compatibility and broken websites would be a bigger incentive.

krrrh• 13 years ago

Check out whited00r if you Have an old 3GS that you want to make snappy.

As for OSX, this update (like many in the past) has several features which rejuvenate older hardware. It does the opposite of what you claim.

beagle33• 13 years ago

As a recent Mac convert, who plans to do Mac software development but hasn't started yet - is there a way to copy the existing mountain lion install on my Mac to a VM image so I can test on ML after I upgrade to Mavericks?

alexgaribay• 13 years ago

With the latest version of VMWare fusion, you could probably do that.

k-mcgrady• 13 years ago

I haven't used it but I believe an app like SuperDuper can clone your drive and let you do that.

itafroma2• 13 years ago

You can: I upgraded my Mountain Lion test machine to Mavericks when DP1 landed and created a Parallels virtual machine for Mountain Lion.

However, I found—at least with Parallels—you can't just take an existing hard drive image and use that: you have to create a new virtual machine, install Mountain Lion from scratch on it, then use OS X's Migration Assistant to move everything over.

beagle33• 13 years ago

Thanks. My Mac came with Mountain lion pre-installed; where can I find install media to install ML into parallels?

stcredzero4• 13 years ago

I successfully installed Mac OS X in VirtualBox using iAtkos ML2, then upgraded it to the latest Mountain Lion through the App Store. You could probably do this, then arrange to mount your current drive and use Migration Assistant.

I might be doing this myself. Google "iAtkos ML2 VirtualBox" to find the settings for VirtualBox that will work.

wmeredith2• 13 years ago

Jesus, between this and Android, Microsoft's cash cow has now been fully commoditized. Ouch.

hkdobrev• 13 years ago

Actually because of patents royalties Microsoft gets more money from Android than Windows Phone.

Every sold Android phone is putting few bucks in MS pocket.

csense5• 13 years ago

Can you cite any sources for this?

josephlord• 13 years ago

I think that the total Android revenue was greater than the total Windows Phone revenue quite a while ago. I don't know if it still holds true now that WinPho sales are more than a whisker over none.

gaius2• 13 years ago

Because Pages and Numbers are free? Oh no, no no. You misunderstand how this works...

wmeredith2• 13 years ago

Jeez, it would sure be helpful if you would explain it to me, then. How worthless is this comment?

ndrake2• 13 years ago

Anyone know what the JVM situation is on Mavericks? Does Apple still provide a version of 1.6 or would I be required to upgrade to Oracle's 1.7 install?

ptomato• 13 years ago

Attempting to use java directs you to here: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/inde...

ndrake2• 13 years ago

Finally got a chance to test this on a spare machine at work. Apple directs you to download Oracle's Java 7 installer, but I was able to download the recent 2013-005 update and install it on Mavericks. Seems to run fine.

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1572

malandrew• 13 years ago

Hypothesis: Apple OS X is now knocking hard at the doors of the enterprise, and it's removing every barrier to entry except their main source of revenue, hardware costs.

iWork is more than good enough for many MS Office use cases. If you work on documents that you often don't need to exchange with co-workers, then you don't really have any barriers to switching. Obviously, financial analysts with their massive models in excel aren't going anywhere anytime soon, but real estate agents like my mother and others like her have few reasons not to switch.

Next time someone goes to upgrade office, they are going to have to compare an expensive software license with putting that money into a brand new computer instead and who doesn't love having a fresh new computer.

nraynaud3• 13 years ago

I guess somehow they are already completely inside with the iDevices?

I guess it's more seen as a push to avoid maintaining old software at high costs, and limiting fragmentation, by migrating as much people as possible. I guess the longevity of Windows XP must be seen as a scary thing. Also on a psychological level, the users get used to upgrade without too much fear. The company can retire the products sooner, flip the technology faster.

Touche2• 13 years ago

iWork has potential because of iPads being moved into the enterprise, the OSX release is largely irrelevant (OSX is never going to be popular in the enterprise). Since they are doing iWorks web apps now, this gives people the ability to use iPads while they're on the road and then log into the same document from their Windows Office machine.

gdonelli• 13 years ago

...and the Developer Tools have always been free! I would say OS X is the best dev environment ever!

viseztrance2• 13 years ago

It sounds great, but an OS upgrade shouldn't had been paid in the first place. For instance I would be pretty pissed off to pay to upgrade my phone's software. This is just a reminder that computers have become general consumer items.

meepmorp4• 13 years ago

Would you apply that same logic to Windows? Say between 7 and 8?

viseztrance2• 13 years ago

If they can cope with the UI, absolutely. Computers are a commodity. Personally I know very few people that even upgrade windows. They just buy a new machine (which like their current machine, already comes with windows preinstalled).

netcan• 13 years ago

Seems like a sensible move and going with the flow. OS upgrades seem like a strange thing to pay for these days. It adds to the proposition first time macs converts.

One downside is that paid software upgrades provide a useful feedback mechanism. It must get over the 'is this worth $100' bar to sell. I think this is probably important for iwork also. Between creating revenue vs enhancing the mac's value & pulling users deeper into Apple-land, I think the right decision could be to go free. OTOH, that would absolve iwork from having to be good enough that users choose to pay money for it.

Still, free OS upgrades seem like the right choice.

mindo• 13 years ago

I would be just happy if it would be possible to upgrade, but I've tried 3 times the downloading keep crashing. I don't understand why they just don't make it so the updates would roll out on bittorrent like network. Its 5.29GB after all and every time it stops I would have like 1.6 - 3GB downloaded. And that is not to mention the download speeds that are just awful right now...

csense5• 13 years ago

I haven't used any Apple machine since 2004. Some HN'ers like Apple, so I've been kind of interested to see what Apple machines do that PC's don't. But I don't want to pay premium prices for iGoods.

Does this mean I can run the new OS in a VM to check out the Apple ecosystem? Or is this only free (as in beer) to people who have an existing paid license for a previous Apple operating system?

Touche2• 13 years ago

You can't legally run an OSX VM on a non-Apple computer.

sarreph2• 13 years ago

FYI:

http://www.lockergnome.com/osx/2012/02/24/are-hackintosh-com...

georgemcbay• 13 years ago

You don't need to have an existing paid license(1), but you do need to run it on Apple Mac hardware. Non-Apple hardware and VMs are not supported, don't work without some significant hacking and are forbidden by EULA.

(1) Practically speaking if you have a machine capable of running this legally, you also have an existing paid license for MacOS, so this is mostly a theoretical difference.

sjmulder• 13 years ago

Actually, you are allowed (and certainly able to) run OS X in up to two VMs. I installed 10.8 in VMware Fusion 5 and it was a breeze.

cmyr• 13 years ago

For what it's worth, the 'premium prices' argument is starting to sound a little dated.

AwayMachine• 13 years ago

Macbook Air starts at $999.

All I want to do is browse the Internet.

I could buy 3 Chromebooks for the price of that Macbook Air. Or 1 Chromebook and save money.

gnur2• 13 years ago

Apple devices aren't really that overpriced. Try to get a comparable device (power, weight, battery life, slimness) for the same price and it's harder then you think. If you can find me a good alternative for a 11" macbook air for less then an macbook air I'd be delighted to hear what it is because I've been dying for a good ultralight laptop that can run ubuntu without dealing with efi/uefi/bootcamp stuff.

lmm• 13 years ago

I've been very happy with my Samsung NP900X1B, which was much better value than an air for me at the time I bought it. (There's probably a newer equivalent model nowadays)

ansgri• 13 years ago

efi/uefi seems to be a solved problem for ubuntu. I'm running Linux Mint on Asus UX31A (which would be best laptop ever if it was more reliable) installed all-by-default without _any_ problems, even with hotkeys and touchpad. Also a colleague of mine happily runs Fedora on UX32A.

EricDeb• 13 years ago

I'll agree with you with respect to laptops. Desktops are a different story. Non-Mac desktops are much cheaper, especially if you choose to build it yourself.

jebblue• 13 years ago

> so I've been kind of interested to see what Apple machines do that PC's don't.

My PC runs Ubuntu Linux and I can't think of anything I would need a Mac can do for me that my PC can't.

njr123• 13 years ago

If you only care about CPU speed and memory, then apple is going to seem pretty overpriced. But if you also care about weight, battery life and build quality, then apple is almost then only option. Not only is there no cheaper option from the PC companies, theres not really anything comparable for any price.

Udo• 13 years ago

I've switched to OS X exclusively about ten years ago. The reasons for choosing tech platforms are always personal, based on a combination of perception and actual benefits, and how those benefits are subjectively weighed against the drawbacks. So I can only answer that from a personal point of view.

so I've been kind of interested to see what Apple machines do that PC's don't.

They run OS X. The hardware is nice, too, but if that was the only selling point I would probably buy cheaper and more powerful PCs.

But I don't want to pay premium prices for iGoods.

Then don't. We don't all have the same preferences and usage patterns. If using Apple stuff doesn't hold any benefits for you, that's totally fine and reasonable. Contrary to many Apple users, I do believe their hardware is quite expensive. The question is if it's worth it. For me, that answer is "yes" at the moment, though that may change.

Does this mean I can run the new OS in a VM to check out the Apple ecosystem?

I'm not sure if you can legally check out OS X in a VM, but technically that option has been available for some time. However, I don't see why anyone would. Doing actual work inside a VM is bound to be painful.

octavn2• 13 years ago

This is part of a bigger company wide strategy to offer software updates for free for their products, a strategy they pioneered with iOs.

There's also a huge difference in what each update adds when compared to 8.1 . Where 8.1 tries to fix all the initial issues with W8 (missing start button anyone?), Maverick adds serious new features (1+ hour of battery, compressed RAM).

The free iWork suite is a direct attack to MSFT Office. Giving it away for free will pay long term in decreasing market share for Office. Office H&O is $220. Buy a Mac/iPhone/iPad and you get that for free.

laureny• 13 years ago

This is part of a bigger company wide strategy to offer software updates for free for their products, a strategy they pioneered with iOs.

Pioneered?

Android updates have been free since day one.

octavn2• 13 years ago

June 2007: iPhone is released July 2008: iPhone OS 2.0 is released September 2008: Android 1.0 is released

malbs• 13 years ago

Damn disappointing to see I can't upgrade the Mac mini I have from ~2008. It's a Macmini2,1, but I have upgraded the ram from 500mb to 4gb (3gb addressable), the cpu to the fastest possible (2.3ghz core2), and a samsung 840 128gb ssd. The machine is a beast now, except for the fact the sound occasionally stops working (sudo killall coreaudiod!)

I understand the why - the chipset/cpu is 32bit, and Mavericks is 64-bit only. Bit of a bugger. The user won't notice though (My wife)

I'm sure the upgrade experience would be better than my Windows 8 -> Windows 8.1 experience of last week. The best way to describe that would be train wreck.

jffry• 13 years ago

When I went into MSFT's Store app on my Win8 VM and installed the 8.1 upgrade, it rebooted and then went through the entire first-time setup routine. Everything it wanted, was already configured, so asking me again is just a sloppy experience!

newman314• 13 years ago

This.

From what I have been able to find, the CPU is perfectly 64bit capable but Apple has simply chosen not to release a compatible UEFI for it.

Some enterprising folks have gotten things to work but it's veering into hackintosh territory.

hcarvalhoalves• 13 years ago

I believe they are offering this update for free since it's more about performance tweaks and library frameworks for app developers, not so much in terms of features or bundled apps, so it makes sense to have as much people as possible running it. Given OS X updates are a pretty streamlined process (and Time Machine helps in the case it borks something), I hope they keep this trend.

DSingularity• 13 years ago

Thats certainly a reason to offer it for a cheaper price. I think once you offer something free -- its hard to go back. I imagine it will tick off customers. So I dont think the incremental nature of OSX is the reason its free.

mustapha• 13 years ago

After perfecting the NSA OS with cloud based keychaining for easy access you can now be backdoored, free.

dlau1• 13 years ago

13 hours battery life now on my 11" 2013 macbook air, wow

shill• 13 years ago

I lost all notes in the Notes app after upgrading. The data file is still there but I'm not sure how to reattach it yet.

shurcooL• 13 years ago

This is the biggest reason this is awesome:

  Base SDK = 10.9
  Minimum Deployment Target = 10.9

Tyrannosaurs2• 13 years ago

Curious to know whether the fact that OS X is no longer a revenue stream might mean that Apple are more inclined to open it (or at least parts of it) up.

As with a mobile OS, the services layer on top of the OS seems as important as the operating system itself. With so much of the value in owning a Mac being iLife, iWork, iCloud, maps, iTunes, the Appstore and so on, could Apple open up OS X in the way Android is open (by which I mean for inspection more than contribution and just the core, not the services)?

Seems against their culture but this takes away one of the big reasons why they wouldn't.

ranebo• 13 years ago

No chance this will happen. All their software and services only have one purpose, to help sell more hardware. Thats where their money comes from.

free6522• 13 years ago

May be a silly question. But did they put some any "lawyer" language to prevent hackintoshes from running maverick?

Apple Says New OS X ‘Mavericks’ Will Be Offered for Free

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