[Leica] Re; El Capitan

[lrzeitlin at aol.com]

 It is always difficult to switch from one operating system to another.


I have two laptop computers that I use most frequently. One is a Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard, the other a new Macbook Air running the latest version of El Capitan. They are entirely different. Snow Leopard is a traditional operating system, relatively fast and bomb proof, that lets you access and tweak most of the settings. If you are familiar with Unix you can configure it to your hearts content. Most of the photo aps I own will run on it. Unfortunately few developers now craft software for a half dozen year old operating system and you are pretty much restricted to legacy stuff.


Mavericks, also on my machine, seems to be Snow Leopard on steroids. It has several mew features and will accept new software but Apple hardly supports it anymore.


But then Apple made a philosophical shift in operating system software. Yosemite seems to be designed for iPad and iPhone users, not people who actually use computers for real stuff. Many features are locked away from the users. El Capitan corrects many of Yosemite’s faults but is, in itself, a restricted system. Very little of your experience with the older systems will transfer. Photo, the photo cataloging ap is inferior to iPhoto on the older systems.


If you are buying your first Mac computer you might as well get used to El Capitan. It has been updated several times and is now version 10.11.1. It works well on MacAirs and, I presume, the new Macbook. If, on the other hand, you have a lot of photo software released last year or before, including Photoshop and Gimp, don’t upgrade to either Yosemite or El Capitan. Wait until version 12 is released. Remember, if you have enough memory, Macs will support several operating systems. Just select the one you want to use on the Disc Startup option in System Preferences.
 
But, of course, YMMV.


Larry Z