[pliny]

I think the first post is genuine, etc. But I don't miss OS 9 anymore. I certainly "trust" X more than 9 to work, that's why I use X full time for everything.

[freeandunmuzzled]

OMFG! Its the Thread That Time Forgot!!!!

[Hash]

Gul Banana, i tried your kpdecode app in terminal; not sure about currect usage since there werent any instructions.

The app says

rying /Library/Logs/panic.log
Creating stack map... loading modules and nametables... sh: nm: command not found
sh: c++filt: command not found
done.
Sun Jan 12 14:01:24 2003:
Backtrace 1:
0x000b2e7c: Symbol not found!
0x000affc4: Symbol not found!
0x000af704: Symbol not found!
0x000bc868: Symbol not found!
0x000b647c: Symbol not found!
0x00203a1c: Symbol not found!
0x00092830: Symbol not found!
0x00090009: Symbol not found!
Backtrace 2:
0x0008593c: Symbol not found!
0x00085d6c: Symbol not found!
0x00028b8c: Symbol not found!
0x0008f648: Symbol not found!
0x000926b8: Symbol not found!
Backtrace 3:
0x000b2e7c: Symbol not found!
0x000affc4: Symbol not found!
0x000af704: Symbol not found!
0x000bc868: Symbol not found!
0x000b647c: Symbol not found!
0x00203a1c: Symbol not found!
0x00092830: Symbol not found!
0x00090009: Symbol not found!


Well, it still under development, but it looks promising! Cant wait for final release!

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

Originally posted by Eug:
When I was shown 10.0 I was impressed with the GUI, but definitely not impressed with the stability. You're right though. Only played with it for maybe 20 minutes at a time. But even within that short period of time I would see it crash a couple of times.

Actually, I was rather stable, if you saw it crash twice in 20 minutes that is really strange.

It had a couple Kernal Panic issues when plugging in Firewire devices but that was also rare. The main problem with 10.0 is that is was DOG SLOW.

By 10.0.3 most of the crashes were gone.

10.1 was a dream in compairison.

[Hash]

Yup. I agree. 10.1.5 was as fast as Jaguar, very stable and joy to use. I REGRET upgrading to Jaguar. If my problems persist, i will probably downgrade to 10.1.5 (unfortunately, no safari)

[ApeInTheShell]

once again i am too lazy to read the debate.

However, i wonder if Windows XP was ready for primetime?
Yes it is part of the Microsoft Windows stable.
But correct me if i'm wrong, wasn't the whole point of the switch campaign to show Mac OS X was more reliable than a pc running Windows?
Blue screen of death, fatal exception error, reinstall the entire os..etc.

Mac people have problems because of hacks, unsupported hardware, beta and alpha apps,
badly written software or they didn't bother to back up.

I work in Flash MX, Dreamweaver MX, Photoshop 7 and listen to some music on itunes. I left those applications running yesterday from 1 pm till 2 am right now and
my computer is good to go.

Mac OS X is the default operating system now.
If you think your productive using OS 9 way to go. But i don't see anyone still whining because 0S 7.1 was more productive to them.

[Hash]

Are we talking about system 7 here? If you too lazy to read the subject, why bother posting replying at all

[Gul Banana]

Originally posted by Hash:
Gul Banana, i tried your kpdecode app in terminal; not sure about currect usage since there werent any instructions.

The app says

rying /Library/Logs/panic.log
Creating stack map... loading modules and nametables... sh: nm: command not found
sh: c++filt: command not found
done.
Sun Jan 12 14:01:24 2003:
Backtrace 1:
0x000b2e7c: Symbol not found!
0x000affc4: Symbol not found!
0x000af704: Symbol not found!
0x000bc868: Symbol not found!
0x000b647c: Symbol not found!
0x00203a1c: Symbol not found!
0x00092830: Symbol not found!
0x00090009: Symbol not found!
Backtrace 2:
0x0008593c: Symbol not found!
0x00085d6c: Symbol not found!
0x00028b8c: Symbol not found!
0x0008f648: Symbol not found!
0x000926b8: Symbol not found!
Backtrace 3:
0x000b2e7c: Symbol not found!
0x000affc4: Symbol not found!
0x000af704: Symbol not found!
0x000bc868: Symbol not found!
0x000b647c: Symbol not found!
0x00203a1c: Symbol not found!
0x00092830: Symbol not found!
0x00090009: Symbol not found!


Well, it still under development, but it looks promising! Cant wait for final release!

Ahh... I'm afraid the current version (0.1) requires the Developer Tools installed, sorry. It does work, though, if you have them I'll certainly be looking into eliminating the dependencies on nm and c++filt (part of the dev tools) in future versions.

[sandsl]

I have never used a trouble shooting app, I only had 1 kernal panic (on 10.0.0) and I haven't had to use fsck. 1 Kernal panic in 2 years is remarkable.

My opinion is that Mac OS X IS ready for prime time.

Apple has decided that it wants to go OSX only if you don't like it go to Windows or continue using your old hardware. Thats the way its going to be.

But at some stage you'll regret having to use hardware that dates back 10-20 years.

[Kiddo311]

I am still forced to work in MacOS 9 (of course because of quark) and i find it very unfortunate.

Simple example: I have some network drives mounted and am working away on a quark doc. all of a sudden my whole machine freezes, i get a spinning curser, which i can still move, but that's it. so luckily i am expirienced with this kind of behaviour and just wait ONE WHOLE FRIGGIN minute and voila the finder tells me that one of the remote machines to which i was connected had crashed. so while this one minute of terror is really bad, situations where i don't know why things are hanging, OR an app simply freezes and i have to pray, that if i force quit it my whole system doesn't go down are much worse.

I simply hate these kinds of situations and they are common with os9. They NEVER happen in X. At home I'm using X only for the last two years exclusively and the development it is undergoing is uncomparable (in a good way) to anything else i have experienced in OS'ses.

So for me OS X's stability gives me MUCH more security than the fragile thing OS 9 is. Give me Quark for ten, or even let my company switch to a complete pdf-workflow, the X and InDesign here i come.

Quark for X and companies switching to InDesign will give Apple a huge Boost Hardware-Sales wise and OS X User wise - definately!!

[The last paragraph is a little Off-Topic but, well.....]

[Hash]

Let me redefine again the essense of the thread.

i think that for OS to be prime time-ready, it must have all troubleshooting tools for average users ready. I am not Windows fan, but XP has a lot of them, backup system, defrag, disk aid and so on. It can also roll back drivers - very good features, or roll back entire system.

Now, i understand that XP is of course, more mature system, basically Win2k, but for Mac OS X to be ready for average users, i want have all possible troubleshooting/fixing/maintenance apps ready.

As Millenium said, it will require learning. I am ready to learn, but unfortunately except fsck -y what is left for OS X troubleshooting/repair now? Permissions repair is only? And as in such state, i think that OS X is not ready.

You cant entrust mission critical projects to system you cant troubleshoot. Thats my point.

Now i see that many users have very nice experience with OS X, including moki and someone who had no use of any utility for 2 years(believe or not). I am glad that some of you manage to do that well.

Until Jaguar my experience was good but i am bothered by mysterious random crashes. Yes, i always save; but it reminds me of worst features of OS 9 crashes. Yet, i cant fix those crashes. And there is no tools to help. Thats what i am decrying.

[DVD Plaza]

I only switched back a year ago, using a PowerBook 800DVI then the 1GHz SD and shortly the 17" monster - I've always wiped the machines and strictly installed OSX only.

Only had two crashes, and they were caused by Jaguar's rather buggy SMB access.

Otherwise, these babies have been a dream - actually coming home from a day at the office administrating/supporting Windows servers/PCs and simply using and enjoying a machine that "just works".

I use Word, Excel, Entourage, PhotoShop, Image Ready, Illustrator, watch DVDs, iTunes, CD burning (both data and music), Remote Desktop Client and VPN access to a W2K server, PHP programming, etc. etc. etc... oh, and the only time I ever reboot is due to any software updates otherwise always on or in standby... never had any problems? Even Windows would outright sh#t itself if I were trying to do that, that's the hell I got away from

[ngrundy]

Well i've been holding off replying but I guess i may as well put my 2 cents in

The OSX if you trace it's family tree back is a well aged OS, it stems back to AT&T unix via a very messy path. A time forward path looks something like this

AT&T UNIX -> Net2 (Unencumberd) -> bsd-patchkit -> 386bsd -> FreeBSD -> NetBSB (split from FreebSD) -> OpenBSD (OpenBSD Split from NetBSD)

you then get NeXT, FreeBSD and NetBSD combining into OSX/Darwin. The "XP is a more mature OS" could be said to be 'hooey'.

It's almost like some of the sages of os 6,7,8 and 9 need to take their own advice and realise that a mac just works. every time your OSX box boots fdisk will run and check disk integrity. you may notice after a forced shutdown or a non-clean shutdown that the machine will seem to boot twise (chime, disk activity, chime again) if you were in verbose mode you will have seen fdisk do a disk check and fix.

also before you start saying there are no apps for troubleshooting realise that OSX is a very different OS to OS9. Buried away within the /var/log directory is an entire set of logs that your system keeps about errors and system events. even within the apple system profiler there are crashlogs from every app.

an example is a crash of system preferences

Thread 0 Crashed:
#0 0x9068ba54 in objc_msgSend
#1 0x02279710 in -[Aquarium_SaverView updatePrefs]
#2 0x02277f78 in +[Aquarium_SaverView updateAllPrefs]
#3 0x022793b4 in -[Aquarium_SaverView updateAllPrefs]
#4 0x0227b27c in -[Preferences okAction:]
#5 0x930cfe2c in -[NSApplication sendAction:to:from:]
#6 0x9315bff0 in -[NSControl sendAction:to:]
#7 0x93113a38 in -[NSCell _sendActionFrom:]
#8 0x93113fc4 in -[NSCell trackMouse:inRect:ofView:untilMouseUp:]
#9 0x930fef78 in -[NSButtonCell trackMouse:inRect:ofView:untilMouseUp:]
#10 0x9315c898 in -[NSControl mouseDown:]
#11 0x9336dfd4 in -[NSWindow sendEvent:]
#12 0x930ce328 in -[NSApplication sendEvent:]
#13 0x930ca524 in -[NSApplication run]
#14 0x930d2598 in NSApplicationMain
#15 0x00003fcc in 0x3fcc
#16 0x00003e4c in 0x3e4c

and we can see that we can thank the crash on the Aquarium Screensaver.

sure it's not the most *intuitive* method of finding out what happend but we're all here to learn new things. It just needs a little bit of the old 1+1 ability.

of course i'm probably able to understand the above stuff due to having a background in unix

I personaly wouldn't trust OS9 with the life of a cockroach but this here powerbook be my first mac and i formated it the second i got it out of the box to get rid of os9, i've had what i term the 'missfortune' of using OS9 at Uni.

I personaly break out Disk Copy on my home dir each friday night and make a compressed image of my homedir onto my external firewire disk for backups. sure it ain't automated but it saves a lot of heart pains down the track. I also have my home dir on a different partiton of the inbuilt drive so that if i do need to reinstall i don't lose my prefs/settings/data.

to date i've had two kernel crashes due to samba connectivity, i worked out that i probably shouldnt try to copy two files off of the file server and one onto it over wireless at the same time.

finaly at about 2am in the morning daily, weekly and monthly jobs will be run to keep your system in order. to see the output of these jobs you need the permissions for the mail server to be right, there is an article on www.osxhints.com that deals with getting sendmail working properly.

[mrmister]

Hash, have you run Apple Hardware Test and checked your RAM?

[Ron Goodman]

I'm baffled by your claim that there are no troubleshooting tools for X. Norton Utilities and Drive 10 are both available to run under X. Disk Warrior, TechTools Pro, and Norton can all repair X partitions while running under 9. A native version of Diskwarrior will be released within a month and Techtools Pro for X will be here in the spring. These are in addition to Disk Utillity. There are more tools right now available for X then there were for 9. I've been using X since the Public Beta and have seen 1 kernel panic in that time. If you don't want to move to X that's fine with me, but most of your complaints sound like they're based on your own inexperience and lack of knowledge, rather than problems with the system.

[DaedalusDX]

Originally posted by Hash:
Let me redefine again the essense of the thread.

i think that for OS to be prime time-ready, it must have all troubleshooting tools for average users ready. I am not Windows fan, but XP has a lot of them, backup system, defrag, disk aid and so on. It can also roll back drivers - very good features, or roll back entire system.

Now, i understand that XP is of course, more mature system, basically Win2k, but for Mac OS X to be ready for average users, i want have all possible troubleshooting/fixing/maintenance apps ready.

As Millenium said, it will require learning. I am ready to learn, but unfortunately except fsck -y what is left for OS X troubleshooting/repair now? Permissions repair is only? And as in such state, i think that OS X is not ready.

You cant entrust mission critical projects to system you cant troubleshoot. Thats my point.

Well then sir... by that definition of "ready for prime time," heck, Mac OS 9 STILL isn't ready for prime time.

Think back to what Mac OS 9 had for troubleshooting... it came with Disk First Aid... THAT'S IT. No built in app for defrag or anything else....

You had to go ahead and buy 3rd party apps for maintenance... many of which are available for OS X right now.

Geez... now you compare to Windows standards...

I've been OS 9 free for a year now... i run my system very hard. Yes, I've had my fair share of crashes and such, but I've never felt that my system was completely out of control like you seem to.

[Hash]

Yes, i ve run memory tests in OS 9, such as DIMM first aid, but i will recheck all memory again.

I mean OSX-native troubleshooting apps - since from June 2003 (?) we ll be in OS X only booting hardware environment, that really makes me anxious.

[JLL]

Originally posted by Hash:
I mean OSX-native troubleshooting apps - since from June 2003 (?) we ll be in OS X only booting hardware environment, that really makes me anxious.

Have you lost your ability to read?

As said numerous times in this thread:

Norton Utilities: Here

Drive 10: Here

DiskWarrior: Next month

TechTool Pro: This spring

What apps will be missing?

[pliny]

Originally posted by Hash:
Yes, i ve run memory tests in OS 9, such as DIMM first aid, but i will recheck all memory again.

I mean OSX-native troubleshooting apps - since from June 2003 (?) we ll be in OS X only booting hardware environment, that really makes me anxious.

Norton 7.0: "Norton Disk Doctor?, Norton FileSaver?, SpeedDisk? and UnErase? have been rewritten especially for Mac OS X."

Symantec

You also mention rolling back drivers, etc--like OS 9, in X you can simply delete them from the system by drag and drop. The locations have changed but the principle remains the same. And of coruse, X has diagnostics & repair utilities built in to the system, that are quite more robust than anything built into OS 9. Of course you must take some time to learn them and where they are, etc, which is all that can be asked of the "average user."

As far as rolling back the entire system ala an OS function in Windows, this is more a function of corrupt registries, and when you do roll a Win system back, IIRC you lose quite a bit of data not confined to the registry, i.e., your more recent files, and there is no guaranteee of repair. It is a last resort and you're right, there is no analogue on the Mac because corrupted/damaged files can be repaired/deleted in a much more straightforward fashion by the user.

It seems many if not most of your concerns, can be attributed to lack of knowledge of the X file system, which can be learned pretty quickly.

If you have specific questions about problems in your setup, you should ask them, rather than decry the system as lacking utlities, etc, because you do not know how to troubleshoot a problem. (If you need help troubleshooting, you have come to the right place. )

[edddeduck]

To start with I will give people an example of a logical disconnect.

Wood burns on a fire...
My hamster burns on a fire

Thus my hamster is a type of wood.

To many arguments in this thread are based on premises like the on above.

What is the point of debating with Hash if his arguments are based on these.

His main argument seems to be based on these three logical disconnects.

1. I run OS X
2. My Mac crashes a lot in OS X

3. Thus all macs must crash a lot in OS X

and...

1. My Mac crashed
2. I don't know why it crashed

3. Thus nobody knows why their Mac's crash

and finally.....

1. I run OS X and my macs crash often.
2. Other people run OS X and they say it does not crash often.

3. Thus they must be lying.


Cheers Edwin

p.s. No hamsters were hurt during the reasearch for this post

[Hash]

Originally posted by JLL:
Have you lost your ability to read?

As said numerous times in this thread:

Norton Utilities: Here

Drive 10: Here

DiskWarrior: Next month

TechTool Pro: This spring

What apps will be missing?

As i have written earlier in the thread, Norton 7 does more harm than something useful. As about Drive 10, it had pretty slick GUI, but not many useful functions. As for TechTool Pro and DiskWarrior THIS SPRING it is very nice indeed. Still, i would like to see more utilities bundled with OS apps, such as maybe simple backup (not for use with idisk), simple defrag, simple GUI for UNIX maintenance routines, etc. Is it much to ask for?

[JLL]

Originally posted by Hash:
Still, i would like to see more utilities bundled with OS apps, such as maybe simple backup (not for use with idisk), simple defrag, simple GUI for UNIX maintenance routines, etc. Is it much to ask for?

There are no apps bundled with Mac OS 9, so why is Mac OS 9 better in this case?

[mrmister]

"Still, i would like to see more utilities bundled with OS apps, such as maybe simple backup (not for use with idisk)"

Well, those with .mac are all set...if .mac seems to rich, I'd get Toast and simply set a schedule for yourself, or just use Disk Copy in the Finder.

"simple defrag"

Not to open a can of worms, but defragging isn't nearly as important in X as it was in 9 or other OSes.

"simple GUI for UNIX maintenance routines, etc. Is it much to ask for?"

Nope. Try MacJanitor, any of a number of free GUIed tools that do just that. On the whole though there aren't many that HAVE to be run...a X install is generally pretty tame.

I suspect your RAM, frankly.

[Chun Hsu]

Originally posted by Hash:
Let me redefine again the essense of the thread.

i think that for OS to be prime time-ready, it must have all troubleshooting tools for average users ready. I am not Windows fan, but XP has a lot of them, backup system, defrag, disk aid and so on. It can also roll back drivers - very good features, or roll back entire system.

Now, i understand that XP is of course, more mature system, basically Win2k, but for Mac OS X to be ready for average users, i want have all possible troubleshooting/fixing/maintenance apps ready.

As Millenium said, it will require learning. I am ready to learn, but unfortunately except fsck -y what is left for OS X troubleshooting/repair now? Permissions repair is only? And as in such state, i think that OS X is not ready.

You cant entrust mission critical projects to system you cant troubleshoot. Thats my point.

Now i see that many users have very nice experience with OS X, including moki and someone who had no use of any utility for 2 years(believe or not). I am glad that some of you manage to do that well.

Until Jaguar my experience was good but i am bothered by mysterious random crashes. Yes, i always save; but it reminds me of worst features of OS 9 crashes. Yet, i cant fix those crashes. And there is no tools to help. Thats what i am decrying.

Hash, I think the core of your problem is that OSX is crashing for you. It's truly unfortunate because as a Windows switcher and a Unix guy, I can say that I find very little to troubleshoot vs. Windows.

defragging
As far as I know, Unix file systems rarely need defragging. If you don't see a degradation of performance, don't bother. With Windows, I had to spend $60 to buy a nice professional defragger.

backup
Yes, it would be nice to include a backup utility. However, you talk about mission critical systems which I would never trust with simple backup utilities. Are you serious here? Why would you not invest some money into Retrospect for your "mission critical systems"? I am not a fan of Restrospect, but your comments here seem very odd.

drivers
Fair comment to like rolling back drivers, although I am not sure why you want to do this so much. OSX file layout is much more intuitive though. Most things are installed in /Library or ~/Library. Makes it much easier to find and get rid of custom things you have installed. Maybe Windows XP is solving a problem that OSX doesn't have in the first place?

As someone else pointed out Hash, your logic seems to very flawed. You had success troubleshooting in Windows XP so you assume XP works better than OSX. Most of what you mention are not even troubleshooting tools, they are repair tools.

By your logic, the best cars are the ones that include a full set of screwdrives and wrenches to fix when they break down. Maybe they shouldn't be breaking down in the first place.

Your problem is probably beyond your skill to fix. It could have happened in XP as much as with OSX. Get it to someone who can help you. Do a clean install. Making a global statement about the readiness of OSX based on your single experience is absurd. Do you realize that OSX probably comes with as much troubleshooting tools as any other Unix system including Linux, Solaris, and AIX. For production usage, there might be more, but I hardly think that would apply to you.

[greenG4]

Originally posted by moki:
I must be in the minority, but I have never had to run any maintenance utilities on Mac OS X.

You are NOT in the minority. I have used OS X since the day I got the beta copy in the mail. I've had one kernal panic since then. (on the beta) And absolutely no other remotely serious problems.

[greenG4]

non-sequitur arguements. gotta love 'em.

Originally posted by edddeduck:
To start with I will give people an example of a logical disconnect.

Wood burns on a fire...
My hamster burns on a fire

Thus my hamster is a type of wood.

To many arguments in this thread are based on premises like the on above.

What is the point of debating with Hash if his arguments are based on these.

His main argument seems to be based on these three logical disconnects.

1. I run OS X
2. My Mac crashes a lot in OS X

3. Thus all macs must crash a lot in OS X

and...

1. My Mac crashed
2. I don't know why it crashed

3. Thus nobody knows why their Mac's crash

and finally.....

1. I run OS X and my macs crash often.
2. Other people run OS X and they say it does not crash often.

3. Thus they must be lying.


Cheers Edwin

p.s. No hamsters were hurt during the reasearch for this post

[Nicko]

MB this Hash fellow should stop asking why there are not more maintainance tools for OSX (not that there is a shortage of them) and start asking himself what he is doing on OSX to make it so unstable for him. What is with this psychological need to do diagnostics???

[wadesworld]

Now i see that many users have very nice experience with OS X, including moki and someone who had no use of any utility for 2 years(believe or not). I am glad that some of you manage to do that well.

Personally, I believe a lot of users cause their own problems, by running utilities too often, and too many of them. I've known people to own 4 different disk utilities and run them all, frequently. Norton will find an error, which they'll fix, and that will cause a problem in Disk Warrior, etc.

My advice: leave your stinking disk alone. It doesn't need defragging and it doesn't need you running utilities on it on a weekly basis. If you actually experience a kernel panic, fsck will run automatically the next time you start up. You don't have to do anything - so don't. Only run disk utilities when something is reporting disk errors, or perhaps when the machine is crashing consistently in random places.

Until Jaguar my experience was good but i am bothered by mysterious random crashes. Yes, i always save; but it reminds me of worst features of OS 9 crashes. Yet, i cant fix those crashes. And there is no tools to help. Thats what i am decrying.

What are your mysterious crashes? Program crashes? In 99% of the cases, those crashes are caused by a bug, and no "diagnostic tool" is going to fix those, whether on OS 9, OS X or Windows XP.

Don't try to tell me you frequently fixed bugs in programs on OS 9 by running utilities. You didn't. Maybe you got lucky and moved extensions around so that the memory the program corrupted didn't cause a crash, but that's no "fix."

If, on the otherhand, your machine is having frequent kernel panics, that's usually a hardware problem. Exactly what will a diagnotic utility do for you? What would it do for you on OS 9? Not much.

If you really want help, turn on crash logging (in the preferences of Console.app) and post the logs of your crashes. Then some of us here can tell you what the crashes may point to. (Incidentally, that's something that can't be done on OS 9, unless you install a special debugger)

Wade

[BuonRotto]

FWIW, I've only used MacJanitor every so often (when I remember to) as maintenance, nothing else. I haven't had any kernel panics since the public beta, no GUI freezes since one of the 10.0.x releases. I think moki may be on to something when he points out that less is more when it comes to maintenance.

For the most part, people are at least being fairly civil if they disagree here. I'm probably jinxing it, but it's nice to see that.

PS: I don't use any bad Carbon ports either unless absolutely necessary. I think the apps are the biggest wildcard at this point, at least until the next generation of Carbon apps comes out.

[moki]

Originally posted by Hash:
Do you mean Apple? I also remember how iTunes (2 or 3) managed to do things similar to what Safari did on option dowload. Yes i agree. That lack of testing (and this is true for OS updates as well) is just alarming. Any new update breaks so many things that it requires another bug fix update which also breaks something and so on

Well, sure, Apple has produced some apps that aren't quite there yet, but in this case, I was referring to the (good) speed of Safari, vs. the poor speed of IE. To me, this denote the lack of resources that Microsoft devotes to producing truly world-class apps for Mac OS X (not just full-featured, but optimized as well), rather than showing any difficulty in optimizating applications for Mac OS X.

Sorry for the confusion.

[clarkgoble]

Personally I think Carbon gets a bad rap with respect to crashes. Bad Cocoa wrappers over Perl or C routines are just as dangerous. <grin>

If someone is having problems in OSX the first thing I'd do is look in /Library/ApplicationEnhancers. If APE is there then you've installed a bunch of dangerous GUI modifications that will make your system unstable. The only time I ever had an unstable system was when I had APE. As soon as I removed it my problems went to zero. Seriously.

HFS+ doesn't require defragging as much as FAT32, but it isn't nearly as robust as most Linux file systems. Still many people have done benchmarks and found no real-world speed improvements with degragging. In the Windows world using FAT32 it is a whole other situation.

The problem is that for technical issues OSX has at least as many utilities and methods as XP. However they require the user to be knowledgable. If you want a guide to such things that doesn't involve learning then you are intrinsically starting down a dangerous path. Running low level fixes and tuning when you don't know what you are doing is simply dangerous in terms of both stability and security. OSX is following the Unix direction there which is a good thing. It means that it will undoubtedly be far, far more secure than XP. It does mean that solving low-level problems will be more involved and will involve using the command line. However even here a trip to Source Forge will find many utilities, often with X11 GUIs, that will solve things for you.

However the fact of the matter is that utilities to fix such problems in XP instill a false sense of confidence. In general if you are going to need that kind of stability in a critical system you ought to learn what is going on and be aware of technical tools. That will involve some programming skills and learning, whether on XP, OSX, BSD, or Linux. Compared to Linux or BSD I find OSX much easier. However it is true that some issues are more complex than under XP. However by the same token that means you typically know what is going on better because it forced you to read and understand what you are doing.

In general I find OSX far more stable than XP or Win2K. I even have fewer problems than in my BSD system in terms of getting things configured in a stable fashion. With the exception of the APE week, I've never had a crash in OSX. Applications have crashed, of course. But they've never taken down the OS. The worse that happened is one day I had to reboot to be able to mount CDs. But that was because of a problem of a corruped .toast file that I'd backed up.

[moki]

I guess I still do not buy the basic premise of this thread. Comparing the stability of Mac OS X to Mac OS 9 is really not even something I consider arguable.

As for repair/diagnostic tools, there are a number of them out there, and more to come -- but I haven't found a need for them yet. Whereas we always kept a copy of Norton handy when running OS 9, I haven't even bothered to upgrade to the Mac OS X version. I've just had no problems that Disk First Aid can't handle.

Perhaps some of the frustration people who are used to OS 9 encounter is trying to apply some of their past habits to Mac OS X?

[clarkgoble]

Oh, one more thing. With respect to backups, you can do very nice shell scripts for that. Apple also has a nice backup Applescript that I use to copy files to a different server. For serious work backing up multiple systems to a tape or DVD you really ought to be using Retrospect. I've not tried it, but I just got a cheap tape drive off eBay and will be getting a SCSI card and Retrospect soon. That, however, is true with XP as well.

Windows95 came with a cheap backup program that I used a lot when I was doing IT. However I quickly upgraded to a script that used .zip files as it was far more efficient. (This was a backup of remote accounting systems which were them emailed and then centralized by a script at our main site) Typically backups require some forethought and scripting is involved. In this regard Unix has always been a leg up over XP or other Window utilities. Yes it involves shell scripts or, more powerfully, Perl or Python scripts. However right now I back up our servers and workstations with a Python script running on Windows. It would take only a few modifications to run under OSX. OSX even has the advantage of having Python in all systems. With Windows it is slightly more involved.

If you don't want to mess with all that, consider the following utilities.

Backup User Prefs
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10151

Backs up your preference files for each user. (An Applescript could do this just as easily, mind you - its a simple command)


Deja VU
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/9221

System Preference Pane that performs a backup to a WebDAV server or local server.


DV Backup
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10521

Backs up to a DV recorder. (I haven't tried this yet, but I just got a DV camera, so I'll see how it works)


There are lots of other programs available, typically for free. Check MacUpdate, Version Tracker, and Source Forge. However if you are needing serious backups you ought to do some custom scripting or use Retrospect. That's true on any platform. If that DV program works I plan on scripting it along with tar and gzip to backup my system.

[undotwa]

OS X has been ever so stable for me, just a few tips of mine to help you improve your experience:

�_Don't install themes. They have danger written all over them.
� Don't login as root, never. Logging as root launches processes as root - bad idea. Buggy processes can trash your system easily as root bypasses all permissions.
� Don't install UI hacks like Application Enhancers. There is no need to. UI additions like menu extras, DragStrip etc. are OK.

The structure of UNIX directories is less flexible than OS9's, so don't mess with them. Just mess with the folders that you have permission to access. You'll make life so much easier. Just get this in your head $HOME IS YOUR HOME. $HOME IS YOUR HOME, /Macintosh HD is not my home, $HOME IS MY HOME. I do what I like with $HOME but I leave / alone. It's not mine.

[Hash]

You can bet that i never have installed haxies, APEs and other exotic things. And, yes, i always have backups of home directories, some folders of application support and so on.

Yes, i agree that OS 9 was not an example of stability. However, what i compare is
availability of maintenance/fixing/repair, maybe some diagnostic tools, for AVERAGE user and possibility to troubleshoot system installations. And what i imply by that is that since Apple makes the OS X default system now and will cease basically support of OS 9 and move to unified OS X usage, bundling few repair/maintenance utilities would greatly benefit consumers, ease pressure on Apple support, reduce costs of support, and still leave a lot of room for commercial, more powerful utilities. OS X manuals from Apple are, as well known, just a joke. So is the built in Help.

So, at least give the average user simple tools to troubleshoot and fix possible problems, if they are of not too deep level.

If apple can bundle iLife, i find it surprising not to find other usage/maintenance utilitiles bundled. They can have immense impact on easyness of use as perceived.

[clarkgoble]

I guess what many of us are having trouble wrapping our minds around is what tools you feel are missing? I mean there are only a very limited subset of problems that most tools can find that are really fixable by the "average user." Most of the things that tools for XP fix are either done automatically under OSX or aren't necessary.

About the only problem I can see is that some of the automatic routines aren't run if you shut your computer down every night.

So what do you feel is missing?

My feeling is that Norton Tools is a joke and is unnecessary on the Mac platform, just as their anti-virus software is unnecessary. Apple certainly could put some utilities for this that don't really do much in practice. But I'm not sure that is helpful.

Please realize I'm not saying people don't have problems with OSX. What I am saying is that I doubt any program for the average user could find and explain those problems. At a certain point, whether on XP or OSX, you need to involve people who know what they are doing. That's what warrantees are for. Further these sorts of problems typically crop up within the first couple of weeks of a system. They also are, more often than not, related to bad hardware.

[ShotgunEd]

I bought an iBook 500 upgraded to 384MB in october of 2001. My parents helped me fund the iBook to use for programming in my uni degree course. The iBook came with both 9.1 and 10.1 installed. Having installed 10.0.4 on my fathers Beige G3 I had fiddled with X, but only a little, i certainly hadn't been running it full time. With my iBook, when I first got it I was amazed by OSX. Everything was so pretty, and so advanced and so intuitive. Booting into OS9 made me frown. For the first couple of months I was using X 75% of the time, booting into 9 to play Unreal Tournament and Deus Ex. Since about March of 2002 I haven't booted into 9. X is fabulous, and Apple keep suprising me with programs like iCal, X11 and Safari.

[Graymalkin]

Two things haven't been mentioned yet though many really great things HAVE been mentioned.

The first is enablers. Most serious problems on Macs that I have been the result of using enablers. Particular enabler versions would bork if certain extentions were installed. Extensions at that were a hassle, everything ran at the root level of the system which meant any slightly finicky extension was going to turbo bork your system. Every Mac I've ever used long enough to need to troubleshoot it had a "safe" extension profile that was the bare minimum of stuff I needed to boot and fix the system.

X doesn't need enabler updates to run, it merely needs new drivers for whatever particular hardware was updated. Something as simple as a speed bump and video card update doesn't even need a driver update. Finally revisions can be made to the system in a modular fashion, a speed-up of some Quartz routine doesn't need to worry about some particular enabler for a particular processor not being compatible with whatever.

Also my favorite repair utility for OSX is the command line. If I can't fix a problem in X by firing up Terminal.app I know I really screwed something over seriously. I can also figure out WHAT is going wrong because the system log is much easier to grep with grep than trying to hack an Applescript to do it requiring a regular expression processing library of some form. I can also log into any machine hooked into a network to repair or diagnose its problems. Using Unix tools makes this whole process MUCH more efficient than what I used to do with AppleScript over IP and AppleTalk.

The only KP I have seen in the past year was from removing a Firewire PC Card while my system was asleep in 10.1.4. Besides that I have had no problemson my practically unsupported Lombard.

[Hash]

Thats precisely what i mean. Not any average user can use CL for such easy troubleshooting as you described; many probably never would touch terminal or even know about CL existence; and thats right thing, cause thats not intended for average users.

OK, what i mean by the utilies? I already wrote about them earlier; simple GUI s for UNIX maintenance/repair/troubleshooting/maybe optimization. Windows XP has a lot of small handy utilities. I am not saying that OS X should have more than XP; but if it wants to demonstrate to average user its easiness of use, its must be easy to troubleshoot and repair it, at least for some basic troubles.

Yes, there are all kinds of freewares, developed to troubleshoot OS X, such as Cache Cleaner X, Carbon Copy, MacJanitor, and dozens others, but shouldnt Apple itself in first place have them ready for users? While it may seem stupid, average users will have to do a lot of reseach before they can even learn about existence of jag cache to clean, they have to find them, which sometimes is not easy, and use them without any warranties.

Apple should at least maybe bundle best freeware/sharewares or buy them and make system tools, as it was in OS 9 days, when many features of OS 9 were originally developed by not Apple.

And the reason is that while there is a lot of any tools to repair or to troubleshoot any kind of software/hardware troubles in OS 9, inclduing Apple`s own "confidential" utilities, there is not anything like it in OSX. Yes, with DiskWarrior and TTP it will be much better, but there are many other troubleshooting needs, some of them are purely UNIX related and so on.

[itai195]

So you're basically saying that OS X is 'not ready for primetime' because Apple doesn't bundle troubleshooting utilities with it? OK, is this the part where we go over what the actual parts of an operating system are? Apple also doesn't bundle Solitaire with it, an app that 90% of the world would have you believe is an essential part of any computing experience.

[MickS]

You only need troubleshooting tools if you are having trouble.

I've not had sufficient problems with OS X the needed to do it. This is using only OS X since 10.0. I'm not a casual user either, I work in IT and my laptops are my interface to the world.

I would say that an OS that requires diagnostic tools isn't ready for prime time (whatever that is). People are far too forgiving of computer problems providing you give them a way to fix it.

[eno]

Originally posted by Hash:
But i have few worries. I think that OS X itself is not ready for prime time.

Laughable.

[Hash]

Originally posted by MickS:
You only need troubleshooting tools if you are having trouble.

I've not had sufficient problems with OS X the needed to do it. This is using only OS X since 10.0. I'm not a casual user either, I work in IT and my laptops are my interface to the world.

I would say that an OS that requires diagnostic tools isn't ready for prime time (whatever that is). People are far too forgiving of computer problems providing you give them a way to fix it.

Yes, thats said well. I agree with such statement.
As about the first part, you dont need troubleshooting tools cause you never had troubles with the system. While this is great to hear, you dont have warranties that it will continue forever. Someday something may break; what you gonna do then? I think you will appreciate if you have as many troubleshooting tools ready as possible, and it will be best if they come ready with the OS, same way as Disk Utility comes, dont you? Look at apple.com discussions to see what kind of troubles average users are facing. Granted as Millenium said, that doesnt represent all users, or even large share of them. But anyone someday somehow will have to troubleshoot, its just question of time.

[Hi I'm Ben]

Exactly what free utilities shipped differently with OS 9? To my knowledge it's the same stuff... I guess Mac will never be ready for prime time =(.
Oh my cube is so worthless all of a sudden I should just set it on fire.

Hash, do us a favor and just delete your thread so we don't have to see it anymore. It's filled with uneducated arguements because you don't like OS X. Go post your findings in the OS 9 board... oh wait.. no one really posts there anymore.

Originally posted by Hash:
Yes, thats said well. I agree with such statement.
As about the first part, you dont need troubleshooting tools cause you never had troubles with the system. While this is great to hear, you dont have warranties that it will continue forever. Someday something may break; what you gonna do then? I think you will appreciate if you have as many troubleshooting tools ready as possible, and it will be best if they come ready with the OS, same way as Disk Utility comes, dont you? Look at apple.com discussions to see what kind of troubles average users are facing. Granted as Millenium said, that doesnt represent all users, or even large share of them. But anyone someday somehow will have to troubleshoot, its just question of time.

[diamondsw]

Originally posted by Hash:
But its not ready.

Well, I'm not sure if this is a troll or not (the subject line certainly is), but given that you acknowledge that huge numbers of people have no problems, I'd say it's something in your system. But let me respond to your points and give some advice.

1. Lack of any real troubleshooting apps, which can run in OS X only. What you gonna do without Disk Warrior when you cant boot into OS 9? Disk warrior is only one example: Apple's Disk Utility, while useful on few occasions, is the only available tool. Norton ruins more than it fixes; Drive 10 is pretty but useless; MacJanitor and some others are fine IF you manage boot into OS X; what if you cant boot at all? Install CD's disk utility is a lone available tool again; what about permissions? If something happens and you cant boot into Jaguar, for average user, choices are limited. They cant use UNIX commands to fix permissions, delete corrupted files, or remove broken system files. Then, the whole issue of system maintenance. Frankly, frantically running Disk Utility after installing even mouse driver is overkill. Yet, OS X manages to frag the disc and corrupt its own preferences at similar frantic pace.

DiskWarrior is coming out next month, and full TechTool Pro in April. You're covered there.

It's trivial to restore your system with Jaguar, using the "Archive and Install" option (which I had to use after mangling the system by playing with some command line tools I didn't understand, but that was my fault). I was back up exactly as I was beforehand in about an hour, including restoring my /Library folder. Worked perfectly, and a lot easier than OS 9.

As for permissions, it IS sickening that we have to fix permissions all day long and worry that every install we make will munge them. Apple needs to fix its installer system to be safe in this regard, and then other companies need to use it instead of God-awful InstallerVISE and Stuffit-based and other hacked products.
2. Too much kernel panics, freezes and strange problems no one can troubleshoot. Beside of few already used to death unplug all USB peripherals, check permissions and run fsck and pray - nothing can be done. There are almost no solutions except reinstalling OS AND even that doesnt guarantee anything. Lately i read few fora on OS X usage - it reads like horror book. I never seen so many troubles and problems with OS 9 usage. What about folders and data disappearing without trace? I lost myself few gigs of data with some Jaguar freeze; what about absolutely RANDOM crashes and kernel panics? so on and so forth - there are reports on apple forums about that on many computers

3. I cant now trust Jag to handle any important work. Anytime there can be kernel panics of two kinds; freezes; crashes; disappearing data; corrupted files; some apps (mostly Apple apps!) can wipe out whole partitions and home directories!

As I said before, your system needs help. I never freeze, never crash, and haven't lost a single bit of data since moving to X. As for bugs, well, yes, there have been bugs (shame on Apple) but there have been many, many things over the years that could do catastrophic things to your system, more often third party than not. No real difference, except permissions will usually save you from bad things, where OS 9 wouldn't.

And there is almost nothing that can be done to prevent, troubleshoot and fix those things! Its too much uncertainty with OS X usage. Its more fragile than OS 9. I think that using OS X as the ONLY os is too scary. It can break anytime, anyway, after each update, after each driver install, after just using it for a while. OS X is really not ready. One cant trust this OS.

Anything can break after an update. OS X has been much more resiliant to it in my experience. The only damage I've seen I've done myself on accident.

Try installing a fresh copy of Jaguar - clean install. Install the 10.2.3 updater immediately. Install other iApp updates as you want/need them. Configure your built-in system settings. Add external hardware slowly, and only ones that use built-in drivers at first. At this point, everything should (nay, *will*) be working perfectly. Now, as you add extra drivers, do it slowly to see if some third party piece of equipment is causing trouble. It's not Apple's fault if they can't write drivers. Once all your hardware is up and running, start to get your apps and utilities up. Again, do it slowly, as you have something causing trouble, and I sincerely doubt it's OS X.

Good luck!

[Hash]

Thanks for nice reply and understanding!

The truth is that i find Jaguar an extremely good OS and I WANT to use it on everyday basis! Too bad that something with my setup is messed up (i am researching it and thats why i have visited a LOT of mac troubleshooting fora of all kinds) - btw, it leaves rather strong impression to find all kind of unimaginable errors and crashes i never heard about. My ONLY problem is cold boot kernel panics, which somehow really persist despite all fresh installations and so on and only in OS X. Go figure. Random crashes are much rare, though. Checking RAM doesnt give any hints, all OK.

To be honest, i really wish i had more troubleshooting apps available for OS X, since its in OS X i have the problems, not in OS 9..

[clarkgoble]

Realize that the utilities you mention are pretty much built into OSX. MacJanitor just runs utilities that Apple runs automatically in the background. Carbon Copy by and large can be replicated by the Finder or its disk tools. I don't know what Cache Cleaner X does, but if it just cleans the caches of 3rd party browsers, that hardly seems like something Apple ought to provide.

Let me ask again. As compared with either Sys9 or XP, what needed utilities ought Apple supply? The above three simply don't make sense. One isn't a diagnostic tool at all but simply a disk backup program which Apple already supplies tools to do.

It sounds like your system has problems that simply aren't fixable by a regular user. I can understand you not wanting to take it into the shop. But just like as with a car, sometimes computer malfunction and require a mechanic. Simply saying that the operating system isn't ready for prime time because it doesn't provide a nice point and click solution to all problems is unrealistic. Take it to your local Macintosh dealer and have them look at it. It is almost certainly a hardware problem.

[Hash]

Most of all, i want something with either fixes or at least gives hints for kernel panics factors. Now this is purely OS X matter. The damn thing just makes me mad. Even looking through crash logs doesnt give me much information.

I think that OS 9 has a lot of utilities which can be used for troubleshooting anything, from RAM to IDE, from extensions to font, pretty covered anything.

But OS X doesnt seem to be well covered - at least, to me. Gul Banana, one of members of the MaCNN fora, has been working on kernel panic troubleshooting utility. I wish him success and cant wait for final version!

[unimacs]

by including a reasonable backup solution to *every* Mac user and maybe even providing some inexpensive backup hardware.

At least give the .Mac Backup program the ability to backup to Hard drives and make it free.

I'm a little worried by the fact that Apple is encouraging home users to store all their photos and video on their computers and not providing *for free* a good, simple way to back them up.

But I disagree with Hash. OS 9 is no better is this regard. You can fiddle with extension manager but OS X doesn't allow extensions that can conflict in the same way they can with OS 9 anyway. There is no need for an equivalent troubleshooting technique.

The *Average* user's idea of troubleshooting is to reset the computer and then call somebody that knows more than them if the problem doesn't go away. It is *far* better that the computer doesn't have trouble in the first place. OS X beats OS 9 hands down as far as this goes.

Anyway, OS 9 also doesn't provide much more in the way of disk tools than X does. There are 3rd party tools available but even with OS 9 I had come to question their usefullness. Regular backups is your best bet.

Hash, a lot of people who've experienced many kernel panics had problems with RAM that Apple's ram tests didn't find. Start taking out a stick at a time and see if things get better.

XP has built in backup, which OS X should have too. Defrag is of questionable value in X. It's far overrated in the PC world. I know support people that will tell you to do that when they're out of ideas. It might make your system a bit faster but it doesn't fix any bugs. It also might land you in real trouble if something interrupts a defrag in progress.

[Adam Betts]

Originally posted by Hash:
To be honest, i really wish i had more troubleshooting apps available for OS X, since its in OS X i have the problems, not in OS 9..

Just can it already please. Lot of people tried to explain to you why Apple didn't include troubleshooting apps by default but you chose to ignore them. The truth is that average user doesn't need any troubleshooting apps.

Just bring your computer to nearby Apple Store and ask them to check for the problems. Genius Bar will check your computer for any problems without any cost.

Let's say it with me:

TROUBLESHOOTING APPS IS NOT NECESSARY ON OS X

TROUBLESHOOTING APPS IS NOT NECESSARY ON OS X

TROUBLESHOOTING APPS IS NOT NECESSARY ON OS X

If I were you, I would just shut up and go to nearby computer repair center. It's pointless to whine, whine and whine.