Becoming Wary of Apple Updates
I don’t know about you, my fellow Mac users, but I am becoming increasingly wary of installing certain Apple updates. Primarily because of two updates. The first problem lies in the fairly major update of 10.4.9 to 10.4.10. This has caused any number of external audio devices to stop working, in particular my Behringer FCA202 unit will not be recognized by Core Audio and is unusable on my Intel Macbook Pro. There are possible fixes, the most annoying and guaranteed to work being a roll back of my system to 10.4.9. I have already attempted, as some have discussed, using Pacifist to reinstall the audio package portion of 10.4.9 and that didn’t work. So, for now, I’m using a cheaper device between my mixer and my computer and am resigned to waiting–and hoping–that Leopard will fix this particular driver situation.
My second issue is that, ever since Apple released a battery update (1.3), my battery life has dropped significantly. Where I was getting over three hours, now I’m getting barely two. While I will attempt to “calibrate” my battery according to Apple’s instructions tonight, and while that may or may not help, I’m rather disturbed by how an update that claims to improve battery life has cut mine by a full third.
Because of the trouble I’ve had with these updates, I am going to be a whole lot more conservative about updating anything on my Mac. Not that I won’t, but I think I’m going to get in the habit of waiting at least four or five dates after update releases and to some research on their effects before running them myself.
Which also brings me to Leopard . . .
If you had asked me two weeks ago if I would rush out and buy Leopard the day it was released, I would have said “absolutely.” Now . . . not so much. I will probably wait until at least Christmas time, if not into January to see how things shake out with others before updating myself. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret switching to the Mac for a second and I am generally very pleased with my computer and my operating system and my software. However, I am discovering that it is easy to forget that Apple is not, despite the Job’s distortion field, perfect. Also, no matter the operating system, computers are complex and easy to disturb. Macs are no exception.
As a relatively new user (only about a year old as a Mac user – ok, ok, fanboy), these two updates represent my first real sense of caution when it comes to accepting Apple’s instructions and I’m wondering, for those of you who have been Mac users for a longer period of time, have you come across similar instances? Has Apple broken software or hardware that you depended on and how did you deal with it? Do you plan on upgrading to Leopard, and, if so, will you wait and see or open the cage right away and let it, roaring, onto your system?
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