Is OSX Mountain Lion worth getting?

Tested did a great video on it. It certainly seems like it’s worth the minimal price tag.

I will get it but I don’t like to be in the first wave. Let the others find the bugs and fix them, then I will proceed.

It is supposed to have all sorts of new and wonderful things.

I’ve been running it for a while now and really appreciate some of the new features. The dictation feature is kind of cool, but has the drawback that it requires an internet connection and sends your dictation off in one big chunk. It’s reasonably accurate from my very basic tests. Notifications with VIP’s in mail is a nice feature. With regards to tabs in the cloud, I’m pretty sure these only work with other OS X 10.8 Macs using your iCloud account at the moment, and we will have to wait for iOS 6 for that functionality to cross over to iPhones, iPads etc.

The biggest selling point I can see for the average Mac user is the added security. Using the default security setting of “Mac App Store and identified developers” makes the platform VERY secure, to the point that I would suggest OS X 10.8 users not use anti-virus software (because these programs can potentially open up significant security holes, and they act like a parasite, sucking up resources and slowing everything down).

Also, it’s only $20, so that makes it a no brainer. For the average Mac user, I think @rooeytoo‘s approach is smart, usually the first few updates after commercial release iron out the majority of glitches that may still be out there. I haven’t experienced any major issues since installing the release build.

As an ancillary question, do I need to pay twice when I upgrade to Lion on both a desk top and a lap top?

By updates. do you mean 10.8. <numbr>?

@gailcalled No, you can find it in the installed tab of the Mac App Store.
Yes, yes he does. 10.8.1 for example will probably contain a few bug fixes. I doubt they’ll be any major bugs though, why wait?

@Paul: Because I have a few days of peace and quiet and want to enjoy them before screwing around with downloading, installing and getting a migraine.

Thanks for the advice.

@gailcalled It wasn’t meant aggressively :P Mountain Lion is a breeze to install. It’s as simple as clicking a button :)

Sez you! How far are you from the NY/ MA border in the Berkshires?

3336.763 miles and change

What I have to call GU (geographically undesirable), unfortunately.

The extended iCloud features will most likely not be compatible with iOS5, it’d be a waste of energy to get an incremental update on 5 when all focus is being put on iOS6 and the inevitable new iPhone launch.

iOS6/OSX 10.8 will be the versions in which Apple is really going to push the iCloud integration with support going as far back as iPhone 3GS and late 2007 macs

@sinscriven While I agree for the most part, the fact that the first gen iPad isn’t supported in iOS 6, is kind of a bummer for iCloud tabs. IMO, iPads should have a longer life-cycle than iPhones (since they have the carrier upgrades every 2 years).

@gorillapaws Agreed. Seems more like a money decision than a technical one too, which is irritating. They seem to be getting more and more comfortable with treating their devices as if they had shelf-lives than supporting them for several years like they used to with the desktops.