Apple has posted the latest update to Mac OS X “Tiger” bringing it to version 10.4.8. The update can be installed via the Software Update menu item in the apple menu or you can download a Combo Updater from apple web site:
The combo updaters include all previous 10.4 updates and have historically resulted in a “better upgrade experience” (i.e. less screw-ups) than the incremental updates alone. They are also quite large (on the order of 200-250 MB) so a high-speed Net connection is essential.
Detailed notes about the changes in 10.4.8 can be found in this article:
Note that one issue mentioned is “Resolves performance issues that could occur when connecting to a Comcast network.”
There is also a new security update for Mac OS X 10.3.9 users:
Owners of iLife 06 should also find new software updates for its component applications. Most seem related to Aperture v1.5 compatibility but presumably there are other fixes and improvements as well.
2006-Sep-30 Update: Changes to Screen Zoom
Apple has changed the way you access screen magnification (Zoom) in this update. There is now a checkbox and associated options in the Keyboard & Mouse system preferences pane to allow zooming the screen via a mouse scroll wheel. The default is CONTROL + scroll wheel and actually works fairly well. The same feature is supported on laptops with a trackpad that supports two-fingered scrolling.
Unfortunately, in the process of adding this feature the old method of invoking screen zoom (via hot keys) seems to have been broken either intentionally or accidentally. Previously you could assign a hot key (COMMAND-OPTION-8 by default) to toggle zoom on and off and two other keys to zoom in or out by a single step. While these three hot keys are still available they operate differently.
The on/off key turns zoom on and off but no longer zooms in to your previous zoom factor. The Zoom In key will do this and additional presses increase the zoom as before, however the Zoom Out key now zooms all the way out when pressed, there doesn’t appear to be any way to reduce the zoom incrementally via a hot key, you must use the scroll wheel method (not terribly useful if you don’t have a scroll wheel equipped mouse.)
I’m not sure why this was changed since both methods could co-exist quite well, the the old hot key scheme was very handy. I’m hoping it was a mistake and will be fixed in the next update.
2006-Oct-01 Update on Comcast Fix
Wow, they weren’t kidding about a fix for Comcast connections. After installing 10.4.8 I’ve seen peak download speeds on the order of 12-16megabits/second, more than double what I was seeing previously which was roughly the maximum rate Comcast says we should expect (6 megabits/second.) My guess is that Apple’s fix makes Mac OS X compatible with the PowerBoost feature Comcast has been advertising on television for the last few months.
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