os x Apple retires Snow Leopard from support, leaves 1 in 5 Macs vulnerable to attacks

[Shadrack]

 

No reason to be snide, Shadrack. Both Mavericks and 8.1 were free updates, but unlike Mavericks, Windows 8.1 will be supported for a fair amount of time.

Microsoft's (mainstream and extended) support for Windows XP is not very different from its support for subsequent versions of Windows.

Windows XP was released in 2001. Mainstream support ended in 2009. Extended support is to be terminated this year (2014).

Windows 7 was released in 2009. Mainstream support is expected to end in 2015. Extended support is to be terminated in 2020.

In other words, mainstream support for Windows XP lasted approximately eight years; mainstream support for Windows 7 will last almost six years. Extended support for Windows XP, once terminated this year, will have spanned almost thirteen years; extended support for Windows 7 will last almost eleven.

 

Hats off to MS for supporting Windows for so long.  Does it really surprise you though?

 

Anyway, this is a crappy deal (the actual topic).  I was being snide because you are using this one crappy deal as an opportunity to go on (and on) about how awesome MS Windows support is (judged only by how many years they issue security patches for it).  Do I really need to do some web research to find something that MS released and did not support for very long as my ONE data point to harp on MS for a few posts just to counter yours?  No thanks.  I'm sure MS support is 100% 7+ years across the board.

[Eric Veteran]

Please stick to the topic. This has nothing to do with Windows.

[seafirex]

Well if anyone as a operating system for 10 or more years like windows xp and can't put 200$ in a new operating system i call them cheap people. I can understand the fact of not wanting to put 200$ every  2 to 3 years but if they had xp and never upgraded since and now complain that windows 8 or 8.1 will cost them and refuse to upgrade then it is there lost, i feel no pity for them at all.

 

200 to 300$ to upgrade after that many years is really cheap. They should get there priority in order at this point.

 

For Apple it is very good that users get it free or at 15$ but the reason why they get it that cheap is that it is design to work on apple machine and if installed on something else then no support i think is given to them at that point. But for pc it can be installed on any machine with the minimum requirement. And parts can be change at any time for a fraction of the price apple parts cost. That is the main difference, can't compare the 2 OS in this case. They are for 2 different kind of machine.

 

Edit : back to topic , You should try to see if you can upgrade i am pretty sure you could 

[beanboy89]

The sad/ironic thing is, all of these Macs that will be abandoned by Apple can run Windows 8.1 or any modern Linux distro without problem.

[sanctified Veteran]

The sad/ironic thing is, all of these Macs that will be abandoned by Apple can run Windows 8.1 or any modern Linux distro without problem.

 

What Macs are abandoned by Apple? Most Snow Leopard machines can upgrade to Mavericks for free O _o The few that run SL but wont run Mavericks (Very early core duos and core solos) can still find software for SL.

[beanboy89]

What Macs are abandoned by Apple? Most Snow Leopard machines can upgrade to Mavericks for free O _o The few that run SL but wont run Mavericks (Very early core duos and core solos) can still find software for SL.

Anyone who doesn't want to/can't upgrade to Mavericks (not too many users fall into this category, but some still do) can still run an up-to-date OS (Windows 8.1/any current Linux distro) if they want to.

[sanctified Veteran]

Anyone who doesn't want to/can't upgrade to Mavericks (not too many users fall into this category, but some still do) can still run an up-to-date OS (Windows 8.1/any current Linux distro) if they want to.

 

As a free update that can run every universal binary released I truly, honestly, cant think of an scenario that would make anyone not want to upgrade to mavericks. It's even faster than Snow Leopard on old machines.

[Order_66]

As a free update that can run every universal binary released I truly, honestly, cant think of an scenario that would make anyone not want to upgrade to mavericks. It's even faster than Snow Leopard on old machines.

 

Some will cling to it because it can run some of the PPC stuff with rosetta and has X11 even though Xquartz is out, others don't like the messenger integration in newer versions of OSX.

 

None of it bothered me, Mavericks is great.

[Brian M. Veteran]

First off, I highly doubt their "1 in 5 run Snow Leopard" claim. 

 

Plus, unless you're running pretty old hardware, there's always a free upgrade to Mavericks. I see that as "providing updates" essentially. But that would get in the way of Computerworld's sensationalist headlines!