OS X Lion: First impressions

Apple launched it’s shiny new Lion operating system yesterday, for the first time available via Apple’s Ap Store–for $29.99.

I am an early adopter.

I had made some of the recommended preparations (such as repairing file permissions), so I was ready to go yesterday afternoon. After reading a couple of reviews and tweets, I bit the bullet and decided to install it on this 2008 (2 GHz, 2 Gig) Macbook.

Here are my first impressions:

Installation

Downloading from the Ap Store took about 15 minutes. Then came the actual installation—a 30 minute affair, during which I sweated that I’d clicked on the wrong thing, because I have no Time Machine backup for this notebook. Apple, who simply advise “follow the instructions on the screen,” could do a better job of explaining the procedure. Perhaps there’s a better explanation somewhere on the site, but I’m lazy.

I recommend choosing carefully. Decide whether you want to do a clean install. In the end, it appears I did the right thing (second option) because here I am with all my aps and data in tact.

Features

My first impression of Lion is very positive. There are over 250 changes in the new iteration, so I’ve just skimmed the surface. The multi-gesture navigation is the most noticeable change, of course. I like the new e-mail features and layout, full-screen aps (using right now w/ browser); Launch Pad shows all the aps on your computer, just like on an iPhone; Mission Control instant switching reveals all open aps on the desktop (available via 3-finger gesture) and is for me a big improvement on Exposé/Spaces that I rarely used … all pretty cool and well thought-out as usual. Apple invented the GUI (graphical user interface) way back when, and Lion roars into the future of computing.

Goodbye to the Mouse Age.

Some people are whinging, but I had no problem getting used to, “reverse” scrolling. It helps if you’ve been using an iPad or iPhone, but the new direction is actually more logical: you push up (with two fingers) to move the page up (scroll down in old sense) and vice versa.

I’m Looking forward to trying out stuff like wireless AirDrop, to move files from computer to computer. No WiFi needed.

Issues

I have none really to report, other than the one that just caused me to loose the original draft of this paragraph! 🙂 I made a clumsy gesture that swiped back to the preceding page and when I swiped back the editing page wouldn’t reload—something to watch for when editing, however, when using other aps, such as Pages, note that Lion autosaves your documents and you can navigate through versions. I recovered most of the lost work through the autosaved versions in WordPress.

All my other applications–iLife 11, iWork 09, Office for Mac 2008–work just fine. There was a small issue with an older copy of Dreamweaver (CS3) I have on this computer, but a prompt to install a Java runtime (whatever that is) solved the problem.

There are bound to be some applications left behind. A Twitter friend reports MacLink Plus, Quicken, and Hourworld didn’t make the cut. Check compatibility of your aps here.

I plan to install Lion on my office iMac, as soon as I replace the sticky, aging mouse with a Magic Trackpad. I’ll add any other observations and issues as updates here.

Update

July 30: I installed Lion on my 2007 20″ iMac, running 4 Gigs of ram. Paired with the trackpad, it is humming along. Full-screen aps are especially appreciated on the larger screen.

The first day, I reflexively reached for the mouse. I’m so over that now.

Have you tried Lion? How do you like it (or not)?

Detailed Review from Daily Telegraph | Be prepared to install

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