Installing the games on the kid's computer this weekend was the first time that I had to run Classic in a long time. Since on all of other computers, I had deleted the Mac OS 9 system folder, I had to go and find one of my old Mac OS 9 CDs.
This was a pain, as I hadn't used these CDs in several years, so it took me a while to find them. Also when I did find them, it was a pain to install it as I had to reboot the computer while booted from the CD and do a clean install.
I think that Apple should make a disk image available to their .Mac subscribers. This disk image would contain a Mac OS 9 system folder. It would only need to contain enough to allow Classic to run, but wouldn't need to be able to boot a computer. This could be another benefit of being a .Mac subscriber, and to justify the $99/year cost.
I think Apple should just go ahead and release OS 9.2 as unsupported freeware. They don't sell it at all any more, so there's no lost revenue from releasing it. Recent Mac hardware won't run OS9 except in classic, so there's no lost sales. I suppose that a stubborn few might use the availablity of a free OS9 to postpone upgrading to OSX, but even that's hard to imagine. The only possible downside for Apple that I can see is that the market for used Macs, already robust, might strengthen even further. Even so, most people drawn into the Mac world through used hardware will eventually want to upgrade, providing Apple an opportunity for another sale down the road.
ReplyDeleteIf nothing else, why not sell the disk image through iTunes?
The main problem with OS9 is the web browser. IE5 is out of date and crashes and or locks-up the computer constantly. iCab and Opera are a little better, but not much.
ReplyDelete