Apple announces its new operating system Mac OS X Snow Leopard

Apple has announced today that next Friday, August 28, it will launch the next version of its operating system. Mac OS X Snow Leopard will go on sale on Friday as an extension for Mac OS

Apple today announced that Mac OS X Snow Leopard will go on sale on Friday, August 28. Snow Leopard brings hundreds of refinements, new core technologies, and built-in support for Microsoft Exchange. Snow Leopard will be released as an extension for Mac OS X Leopard users at the recommended price of 29 euros (VAT included).

To create Snow Leopard, Apple engineers have refined 90 percent of the more than 1,000 projects that make up Mac OS X. Users will find improvements in many facets, including a more responsive Finder; a Mail that loads messages up to twice as fast; Time Machine that performs the initial backup up to 80 percent faster; a Dock that integrates Exposé; QuickTime X with a redesigned player that allows users to easily view, record, trim and share videos; and a 64-bit version of Safari 4 that is up to 50 percent faster and resistant to plug-in crashes. Snow Leopard is half the size of the previous version and frees up up to 7 GB of disk space once installed.

For the first time, system apps like Finder, Mail, iCal, iChat, and Safari are 64-bit. And Snow Leopard's 64-bit processor support addresses huge amounts of RAM, increases performance and improves security, while maintaining compatibility with 32-bit applications. Grand Central Dispatch (GCD) gives software developers a new way to write applications that take advantage of multi-core processors. OpenCL, an open standard based on the C language, allows developers to exploit the incredible power of graphics processing units for tasks beyond graphics.

Mac OS X Server Snow Leopard

The new version of Apple's server operating system will also go on sale on Friday, August 28. Snow Leopard Server includes new features such as Podcast Producer 2 and Mobile Access Server and its recommended price, more affordable than ever before, will be 479 euros (VAT included) for an unlimited number of client machine licenses.