Wednesday Last Week(July 25), Apple Released Mountain Lion, the latest update to the OS X operating system into the Mac App StoreThe update is available exclusively on the Mac App Store for just $19.99..
Apple’s Video of Mountain LionOS X Mountain Lion brings more than 200 new features and enhancements to the Mac, including improved iCloud integration with support for Notes and Reminders, iMessage support via the new Messages application, Notification Center, Power Nap (updating during sleep), Dictation, enhanced sharing tools(Twitter Sharing available now, Facebook Sharing coming this fall with iOS 6), Game Center, Gatekeeper (improved security), AirPlay Mirroring and much more.
For those seeking server support, Mountain Lion Server is also available on the Mac App Store fror the same price as the regular Mountain Lion, $19.99.
Apple has announced that OS X Mountain Lion (10.8) downloads have exceeded three million in four days, “making it the most successful OS X release in Apple’s history”.
“Just a year after the incredibly successful introduction of Lion, customers have downloaded Mountain Lion over three million times in just four days, making it our most successful release ever,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.
Phil Schiller also said about Mountain Lion that “People are going to love the new features in Mountain Lion and how easy it is to download and install from the Mac App Store. With iCloud integration, Mountain Lion is even easier to set up, and your important information stays up to date across all your devices so you can keep editing documents, taking notes, creating reminders, and continue conversations whether you started on a Mac, iPhone or iPad.”
Here are what various sources on the web had to say about Mountain Lion:
- John Siracusa, Ars Technica
The Mac is a platform in transition. In Lion, OS X began shedding the well-worn trappings of traditional desktop computing at an accelerated rate. This trend continues in Mountain Lion. Where Lion stumbled, Mountain Lion regroups and tries again–while still forging bravely ahead in other areas.
As the second major refinement-focused release, it’s easy to view OS X 10.8 as “what 10.7 should have been.” The flip side of this argument is that the real-world mileage we’ve all put on Lion has helped Apple make the right kinds of adjustments in Mountain Lion. If we’d had to wait for two years after 10.6 for the next major release of OS X, chances are good that the worst of the missteps in Lion would just be landing on our doorsteps today. I’ll take 10.8, thanks.
- Jason Snell, Macworld
All told, I found Mountain Lion to be a stable, solid release. Even prerelease builds were far more stable than I’ve come to expect from OS X betas, leading me to wonder if Apple’s new annual schedule is leading to more careful incremental updates (with fewer bugs) rather than great leaps (with more, nastier bugs).
- Nilay Patel, The Verge
Ultimately, this is pretty easy: you should spend the $20 and upgrade to Mountain Lion, especially if you have a newer Mac. You’ll gain a handful of must-have features, and everything will get faster and smoother. I haven’t really missed Snow Leopard at all since upgrading, which is remarkable considering how much I disliked Lion.
- Brian Heater, Engadget
Taken as a whole, the features mark a fairly aggressive bid to fold the best of OS X and iOS into one product – a strategy we first saw with the introduction of the Mac App Store on Snow Leopard, and with the arrival of Launchpad last year in Lion.
That said, it seems time for Apple to make a bold new pronouncement on the desktop front. The company appears to have most of its resources invested in the mobile side – and there’s no question as to why: the iPhone and iPad have reinvigorated the company, making it a computing player on a scale that no one (save, perhaps, for Jobs himself) could have predicted a decade ago. Still, it might be hard for OS X users not to feel neglected – many of the latest new features feel a bit like iOS hand-me-downs. When and if Apple rolls out a new operating system this time next year, hopefully we’ll be seeing a very different side of Mac OS.
- Jim Dalrymple, The Loop
There will be tens of thousands of words published on Wednesday when Mountain Lion hits the Mac App Store, but let’s face it, what you really want to know is whether Mountain Lion is worth the upgrade. Let’s get that out of the way now – yes, it is definitely worth it.
Did you download Mountain Lion Already? Tell us in the Comments Below!