Mac OS X Snow Leopard
Mac OS X Snow Leopard, officially known as OS X 10.6, was released by Apple Inc. on August 28, 2009. This version of the operating system followed Mac OS X Leopard and was a significant update in terms of performance, efficiency, and refinement rather than new features. Here are key details about Snow Leopard:
Release and Development
- Snow Leopard was announced by Steve Jobs at the WWDC 2008 as the next major release after Leopard, with a focus on improving the underlying system rather than adding new user-facing features.
- The primary goals for Snow Leopard were to make the system more reliable, faster, and to reduce memory usage.
Features and Enhancements
- Performance: Snow Leopard introduced a new version of the XNU kernel, which improved performance and reduced memory footprint. Apple claimed it to be 30% faster than Leopard.
- 64-bit Support: Full 64-bit support for applications, which allowed for larger memory addressing.
- Grand Central Dispatch (GCD): A technology to improve multi-threading and parallelization for better use of multi-core processors.
- OpenCL: A framework for developers to leverage the power of graphics processing units (GPUs) for general computing tasks.
- Microsoft Exchange Support: Native support for Microsoft Exchange was added through a new Mail, Address Book, and iCal integration.
- Safari 4: The browser was updated with performance enhancements and new features like Top Sites, Cover Flow, and VoiceOver improvements.
- QuickTime X: A new version of QuickTime with a streamlined interface and better performance.
- Time Machine: Enhancements to the backup utility including better support for backing up external drives.
System Requirements
- Minimum of an Intel Core 2 Duo, i5, or i7 processor.
- At least 1 GB of RAM, with 2 GB recommended.
- 5 GB of available disk space.
- Mac OS X Leopard or Tiger (version 10.4.11 or later) for upgrade.
Security Enhancements
- Introduction of ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization) to combat buffer overflow attacks.
- Improved sandboxing for applications to limit their access to system resources.
- New authentication mechanisms and stronger password policies.
Legacy and Impact
- Snow Leopard was praised for its focus on refinement and stability, which was a departure from previous versions that added numerous new features.
- It was the last version of Mac OS X to support the PowerPC architecture, marking a complete transition to Intel processors.
- Support for Snow Leopard ended in September 2013, with the release of OS X Mavericks.
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