Kasper Jade and Katie MarsalExclusive: With the release of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard pushed back to October, Apple has bought itself more time to tie loose ends in the current Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger operating system and will put forth those fixes via its first "dot ten" software update in quite some time, AppleInsider has learned.
The Mac maker hopes to stabilize the software to the point where it can begin seeding copies of the software update externally to its thousands of Apple Developer Connection members as early as next week, those same people say.
At this time, specific fixes and feature enhancements are unknown. However, in speaking to editors recently, company representatives vowed to provide a fix for at least one Mac audio-related issue in a "forthcoming update."
Apple may also tap the impending Tiger update to lend software support to an upcoming series of Mac hardware updates that will include refreshed MacBook Pro notebooks and redesigned 20- and 24-inch iMac all-in-one desktop systems.
Although the company had originally intended to disperse its next-generation Leopard operating system around the same time as those hardware product launches, urgency in meeting its self-imposed June launch date for iPhone directly translated into a multi-month delay of Leopard.
Apple last updated Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger in March, when it released Mac OS X 10.4.9 with improved camera RAW support, improved DVD playback, enhanced Bluetooth support and more.
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74 Comments
It's The Apocalypse!
Let the arguing about 10.4.10 begin!
Wait, is that 10.4.1 again? I'm confuuuuuzed. Oh wait, I'm not.
Why don't they just call it 10.5, ship it on time in June/July, and be done with it?
I believe we were heading this way regardless of Leopard's delay. The iPhone is probably the driving force and Apple will want 10.4 users to have the basic environment available for them. While a lot of the iPhone software will come on a CD (for both Mac & Windows users) there will probably be some changes and 10.4.10 will keep everyone on the same page.
10.4.10 would probably also be needed for any new hardware that needs some of the code from Leopard. MBP and a iMac would be at the head of the list. I don't see Apple doing this for the Mac mini!