By Erik Anderson

Oakland Post Technology Blogger

Apple Computer recently released a major update to its Macintosh operating system. Mac OS 10.6, better known as Snow Leopard, is a recommended upgrade for Apple Computer users who are currently running the older Mac OS 10.5 (Leopard).

For the most part, Snow Leopard is an “under the hood” upgrade. The casual Mac user will most likely not notice a whole lot of difference between Leopard and Snow Leopard. Apple says Snow Leopard is not a major upgrade to the OS. Instead, the upgrade is considered to be a fine tuning of Apple’s previous Leopard OS.

One major thing to point out is that once Snow Leopard is installed, most users will see 5-10 gigabytes of hard drive space free up. Snow Leopard runs using less hard drive space than Leopard.

Apple claims the Snow Leopard install process is faster than Leopard. During my install experience, the Snow Leopard process took about an hour, which is how long it took me to install Leopard.

If you’re considering upgrading to Snow Leopard, make sure any hardware that’s connected to your Mac such as a keyboard, mouse, or printer is compatible with Snow Leopard. If you upgrade and the hardware isn’t compatible, the hardware won’t work. Check with the manufacturer of your hardware to see if they have a Snow Leopard update for the drivers used to make your hardware work with your Mac. If an update isn’t available, you may want to consider postponing the upgrade to Snow Leopard until an update for your hardware is available.

Also, if you do decide to upgrade to Snow Leopard, make sure to install any system updates that have come out since Apple released the original software. Apple has already released update 10.6.1 which will fix some of the bugs that came with the original 10.6 software. It’s important to install this as well as any future system updates when they become available to keep your computer running as smooth as possible.

Snow Leopard is available now for purchase from any major retailer or online shopping site. The software is $29 for a single-user license or $49 for a family pack which is good for up to five computers.

Erik Anderson blogs about technology related topics for oaklandpostonline.com. He can be seen throughout the month hosting “Best Tech” on OUTV, and can be heard Mondays from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. on 88.3 FM and wxou.org.