Just in case you ever need to know: not a good idea to downgrade from Mac OS 10.5 to 10.3.1

As I was cleaning up the wreckage of our layout department, the Apple people told my boss, "I wouldn't recommend downgrading the OS." Oh, shut up, 'genius.' It was worth a try.

I'll be working most of the weekend to clean up the fallout (because it involved multiple machines). So: don't try this at home, kids. And btw: Leopard sucks. Not in the same way that, say, Windows sucks, but it seems like it's moving in that direction.

holy cow, what a HUGH MORAN!!!!!!11

SERIES!!!!!!!

Why did this person attempt such a "bold" move?

the first problem I can think of is, OSX 10.3 was never designed to run on an intel machine. is the mac an intel mac? I am not sure what would happen, if anything, to the HDD if you tried that, the formatting should be teh same, or easily fixed by disk utility.

We don't have an IT guy, so I get to moonlight in that department. It's kind of like having the guy who cuts your grass perform brain surgery.

These machines came with 10.3.1. The Leopard upgrade caused us major headaches. And the "improved" search features made it more time consuming to search (bring up the box and reset the parameters because they won't stay set properly, even when they're saved), adding to my production time under tight deadlines. And InDesign was crashing repeatedly, making it difficult to put out the paper. I also hate the new networking and file interfaces, especially the 'network' and 'devices' tabs in every file window, which want to refresh themselves laboriously every time you go to open a file. Ugh. Bill fucking Gates couldn't have done it better.

Someone once said that a Mac does things quietly in the background while PCs keep popping up windows and alerts to tell you how smart they are. I see OS X moving in a PC direction, adding useless bells and whistles to distract you with their inherent coolness and shiny interface designs, and I don't like it. They're messing up a good thing.

I did not mean to offend you.

Sorry.

I am sorry you did this. I do this stuff specifically on macs for real at the moment, until school starts in the fall, if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

I cant help you with what you have already done, but I can help it go smoother from here on out.

I knew I should have archived everything and done a clean wipe to take them back to the older system, but I didn't want to spend all the time that would entail. I was hoping for the quick fix. (This all came about when our backup drive died and the new one wasn't compatible with Panther, so my backup situation is rather precarious at the moment.)

We're re-installing Leopard (I was at work till 7pm tonight and I'm going back tomorrow). We have to upgrade Creative Suite and Quickbooks and throw in some extra ram and things will be tolerable. It's nothing real complex, just very time consuming. I sat all day watching paint dry and didn't even have a good book to read.

what specs are these computers running? Are they able to run Leopard?

FYI, do NOT upgrade Leopard to 10.5.2, stay at 10.5.1 .2 has too many bugs.

We hate to upgrade anything in the layout department, because if anything goes wrong, we only have a couple of days to fix it before the next week's work cycle begins.

As for specs, a couple of G5's, one an iMac, the other a tower, around 1.8 GHz each, iirc. They only have 256 ram, so there's lots of room for improvement. And they'll need it, because Leopard runs rather slowly on them.

The biggest damage done is that the boss now thinks I'm an idjit. But hey, you gotta try these things sometimes. Success is built on failure and all that. Better to ask forgiveness than to seek permission.

The downgrade resulted in a hybrid OS where Printing and System Preferences and Font Book all refused to work, and there was no longer any System Profiler! Wheeee! Fun.

I think the only thing you will need is ram to get Leopard running as well as possible on those computers.

Good Luck!

I think it will all be okay in the end. It was what we call "a learning experience." What I learned is that the designer doesn't have the time or the inclination to be the IT guy. But then, I've known that for years. :) If only they'd listen to me.

God, I wonder if we didn't end up with 10.5.2 - we just bought it last week. I didn't even think to check the exact version number during the seven days it was on the machines: proof positive that I am unqualified to be an IT guy. I've known several of them - they read the release notes like some people read the bible. They're on top of all the latest news and scuttlebutt. I just want to put out the paper and leave the office, go play some disc golf and not be bothered.

not 10.5.1 or 10.5.2

You will get .2 through software update.

I would go manually and find the 10.5.1 update and download and apply it manually. Burn it to a Cd if you want, and just take the cd from computer to computer and do it that way.

edit: here is the link: http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/apple/macosx_updates/macosx1051update.html

Little did I know my peril! I was tired and wanted some dinner, so I cancelled it. WHEW! Thank you! You have definitely saved my ass.

I wonder if I can bill my boss for the time spent on this thread...

I work for beer, and not that cheap shit either.

:P

that will work!

Photoshop. I had PS 7. Killed it dead. The only problem I've had, and it was heart breaking. Still, GIMP is not bad at all. It's not PS, but it is free.

You have ruined my day

But your file transfer will surely be complete in a few years.

standby power use, no overpriced software ...

I have it, and honestly haven't noticed anything different from the previous OS, except for the obvious updates.

10.5.2?

If you haven't, I suggest you don't.

it is a bag of bugs.

Leopard also needs more ram, it is one reason Apple has increased the standard amount of ram on all their machines.

haven't noticed any problems though. :shrug:

I knew about the ram, though it runs perfectly fine on my nearly 4-year-old iBook G4.

Most of the problems I have seen have been on intel machines. For whatever reason.

Most of the problems I have seen have been on intel machines. For whatever reason.

I find it disrupts my work flow in a dozen small ways. And my work flow is all about speed. I have to crank out an impossible amount of work very quickly, so speed is critical. Leopard slows me down. Panther ran faster (pardon the pun), and didn't have all the clunky bells and whistles; Leopard bogs me down and makes work harder and more time-consuming. I went into it in more detail in one of the upthread posts.

And this has been my big gripe with Windows, too: there is nothing more infuriating than a computer that thinks it knows what you want to do next, except possibly a computer that thinks it knows how best to organize your files.

Any of you who have ever worked with 3D Studio Max know that any program can be fitted with fully customizable menus and features. Choose which commands you want on your bar(s), choose where your bar is located, Command-1 for bar #2, etcetera. That is the operating system I want, and so far, I'm not aware that anyone has invented it. I want a desktop with a lean plugin architecture and a minimal memory footprint, totally customizable for different uses, with no trace or imprint from the programmers who developed it, beyond a simple default interface.

10.4 tiger might be just what you need. I would not go back to panther, it is supported less and less by the day. Tiger is by far the most stable and fast OS at the moment.

I know my boss won't shell out another dollar. It sounds like a good idea. In fact, if it can be done without too much hassle, I should probably go for it. I need speed and stability.

But you cant buy it from apple anymore.

You have to go elsewhere.

And leopard is by far my favorite. Although, I did upgrade to a MBP when I switched to leopard, so that probably makes a difference. The only qualm I have had are the minor bugs that come with any new OS, and Firefox sometimes doesn't play nice. I'd suspect that the computers you installed leopard on probably aren't powerful enough. Yeah, there are more bells and whistles, but that's just because processor power has increased. I think it is a terrible comparison to compare leopard to Vista... at least Leopard's updates don't crash and ruin the entire system...

I just don't like the way it begins to remind me of Windows.

My next machine may yet be a Mac. I haven't made up my mind yet, but I've come to hate Windows with a purple passion.

I'd say it may beat Leopard, with sheer customization, ease of use, and platform stability. I've got it running dual boot on my lappy.

I'm scared of the dark. :scared:

It is not the linux of old-- hard to remember command prompts and buggy hardware drivers. Ubuntu probably is the best OS out there right now. Plus there are tons of opensource programs that run great on Ubuntu, and it updates 4 or 5 times a year, constantly tweaking and improving.

I used it to go back to QT 6.