There is no doubt about it any more in my mind: my upgrade from OS X 10.2.8 (Jaguar) a few months ago to OS X 10.3.3 (Panther) has been a mixed blessing.
True, Panther is faster in all respects: startup, shutdown, and while I'm using it.
But, it has one feature that Jaguar didn't: an almost daily crash of my Safari browser, for no apparent reason.
Now, my computer (a 17" flat-screen iMac, purchased new) is as clean as a computer can be.
I hired a senior Apple engineer, at significant expense, to come to my house, clean out all that was on my computer, and install Panther from scratch.
There's nothing Microsoft-related on my computer: no Windows, no Outlook Express, no Internet Explorer, nothing that could conceivably interfere with the smooth functioning of Safari.
My mail program is Apple's proprietary Mac Mail, so that's clean as well.
And yet, at least once a day, Safari simply quits. Sometimes more than once a day.
And I get the "gray screen of death," a.k.a. kernel panic, about two to three times a week as well.
Now, I was tempted to think it was just my computer that had a few issues, until I got to chatting with the tech support guy from my ISP a couple days ago re: a problem with my email being held up on the server (not the subject of this post).
I mentioned my daily Safari crashes in Panther, and he told me that he had two Macs, one G4 and one G5, one running Jaguar 10.2.8 and one running Panther 10.3.4.
He told me he has the precise problem I do re: Safari crashing for no apparent reason on the one running Panther.
He also said that he does a lot of stuff with iPhoto, and that iPhoto in Panther occasionally crashes, a behavior he didn't see in Jaguar.
He said it's gotten to the point that he's decided to remove Panther and go backward, to Jaguar 10.2.8, in the one computer.
Pretty convincing evidence that Panther is simply buggy and never gonna be ready for prime time.
He said that Apple supposedly had been about to release a fix for the Safari crash problem in Panther, but at the last minute held back because it really didn't fix the problem.
I asked the tech guy what he though I should do: he said wait till next year, when Tiger - OS X 10.4 - comes out.
Perhaps Apple's next ad campaign should borrow from Jethro Tull:
"Bungle in the jungle."
Article comments
1 - Seth Werkheiser
Weird. I'm been using Panther since May 15th or so and I think Safari crashed on me maybe twice in that time.I havent had any problems at all :(
2 - Michael Croft
yep, wierd. I'm not having any similar problems. do you have any logs? Any unusual peripherals? Have you had the memory checked?
3 - Phillip Winn
I'm sure you'll get a ton of useless comments from people suggesting that they've had no problems whatsoever with iPhoto or Safari on Panther... and this is one of them.
I've had exactly one panic on my iMac in more than a year, and it was the second week I owned it, running OS X 10.1. Bummer things suck for you, though. :-(
4 - Erick Calder
for me it's been far worse. I can't seem to hit any major site (cnn.com, yahoo.com, slashdot, etc.) without an instant crash... I'm running Safari 1.2.4 (v125.11) on a powerbook I recently bought that came with Panther and thus far I must say I've been disappointed. it's my first time with a Mac and I must admit to feeling cravings for (gulp!) Windoze...
the Mac doesn't even hibernate! yikes!
5 - Greg Smyth
Safari crashed now and again with me on my iBook but generally when I was running too many things at once. Have recently switched to Firefox and like that much better... how about trying it to see if you still get the same problem?