Snow Leopard seems awesome so far (except that not all of the software I use has been updated for it yet).

The issue I faced today was the installation times.  When I installed Tiger, it only took 1 hour.  Leopard installed in 45 minutes.  Snow Leopard took 32 minutes on my iMac (pretty quick I guess).  On my macBook, it took 1 hour and 37 minutes.  The times for Tiger and Leopard are for my macBook.  My iMac is new and Snow Leopard is the first major upgrade on it.  I was really shocked about the whole 1 hour and 37 minute thing.  People were posting that upgrades were as fast as 13 minutes and the longest I heard was about 50 minutes.  So I allocated a good hour to do this on my macBook.  Just shocked.

I’ll admit, the Finder and Preview run a lot faster on my macBook now.  There are some other applications that also run a bit snappier.  The boot time, shut down time, and connecting to a wireless network are also faster.  So it’s definitely worth the upgrade.  Disk eject is now a lot more intuitive.  The preview in Finder is a great improvement (Expecially when uploading videos and stuff).

My only complain is that the installer didn’t run as fast as it claimed it would.  I’ll admit, I’m probably an anomaly because I do have some custom compiled things and modifications…  But that’s on my iMac, not on the macBook.  So yeah…

Love using Snow Leopard, but let’s hope that if I ever need to reinstall, it’s a lot faster.  The installation itself was easy and simple, but the wait was killing me (out of eagerness to test).

Oh, and one quick questions.  Is anyone else (on a 13″ macBook) experiencing issues with the Grid view of a Stack going out of screen?

I’m pretty sure MS will be gaining a lot of sales.  If you have that large of a market, and you announce a new product, then there is bound to be a large number of sales.  Heck, Apple could release a new iPod, and MS a new Zune, and many will predict that Apple’s sales will be bigger than MS’s because Apple currently has that market.  But if you release a failure like Vista and claim Windows 7 will make up for it, of course you’re going to see an increase in sales.  All of the people who bought Vista will want to upgrade, and all of the people still on XP might want to upgrade (if Windows 7 runs as well as people hope).

Apple gain a lot of people because Vista was a let-down.  Many are predicting that Snow Leopard will be a let down because it aims to improve upon Leopard, and not add hundreds of new features.  Leopard already added a bunch of new features, and I think every once in a while, it’s better to release something faster then something newer.

I’ve also heard that a lot of people think that the Windows 7 task bar is better than Mac’s dock.  I really like Mac’s dock.  Played with the Windows 7 taskbar, and sure it’s “good,” but it doesn’t work the way I work.  Windows 7 also added a lot more productivity features, but Mac’s Exposè is a lot nicer for me.

I also like the whole idea of the hard ware and the software coming from one place.  I don’t need to worry about compatability issues and stuff like that.  I also know most of my other hardware already works with Macs.  I don’t plan on upgrading my laptop to Snow Leopard until I can guarantee everything runs fine on my iMac (which hopefully, Snow Leopard comes out before I order).

One of the main reason’s I’m not switching to Windows 7 is the software available (odd, right?).  Things like Storyist, Scrivener, Nisus Writer, Pixelmator, and etc are only available on Macs.  Also, the number of things to use when developing applications for the Mac are much better (in my opinion) than Windows.

Another issue for me is the “editions” part to Windows.  I don’t really like seeing this in software.  I know the whole “pay for what you’ll use” approach to it, but the price difference between all of the different versions, “eek!”  I can’t afford “Ultimate,” but I can easily afford a Mac OS X upgrade.  I know that Mac OS upgrades are pretty much released yearly, but they do seem a bit more affordable in the long run (if you’re buying one of the upper end versions of Windows when it’s released).  It’s $129, no matter what you’re running previously.  I always do a clean install, so there’s not bloat from previous versions as well.

What were some of the other questions I’ve been asked… (I keep saying I’m buying a new iMac soon, and people want to know why ‘m not thinking about Windows 7)…

I have tried the Windows 7 Beta.  I am a Mac fanboy.  I don’t play computer games on my mac (that why I bought a PS2 and a Wii).  I like the Mac interface much more than Windows.  A lot of the applications’ interfaces seem more intuitive taking advantage of Mac’s features.  Windows 7 does offer some cool new features, but I like Mac’s better.

Mac only requires 512 MB of ram (at the moment), while Vista (non-Home Basic, Home Basic doesn’t compete with any OS in my opinion) needs at least 1 GB ram.

Aero isn’t too appealing to me.  At first I thought it was cool, but there doesn’t seem to be consistance between the window border and the content.  There’s no flow.  So some Mac applications lack a flow in the border and content of the application, but that’s being improved.

More onto editions…  The Windows XP “mode” everyone keeps telling me about is only available on the “Professional” version.  I’m guessing the price difference will reflect the inclusion of the Windows XP SP3 liscense.  I can run Windows XP on my Mac as well.  I guess you can install it under VirtualBox or something on one of the lower-end versions of Windows 7 as well.  To run it on my Mac, I do have to jump through the same hoops as the lower end versions of Windows 7, but I’m guessing, Mac OS X Snow Leopard will be cheaper than Windows 7 Home Premium.

Yeah…  There’s my rant.  I’ll stick with my Mac.  Don’t see me switching back any time soon.  If you’re wondering why I switched to mac in the first place, I’ve always wanted one, but was never allowed to get one until I graduated from High School.  The only reason I can see me switching back to Windows is when I need to use Turbo Tax, but then again, I think that run perfectly fine in a virtual machine.  Or if Mac’s become way out of budget and all of the software on my current Mac becomes way outdated and I’m forced to switch.  Or if I decide I really want to play fallout 3 and don’t want to buy an xBox 360.