Make sure your Mac’s startup drive is in good health: To do so, open Disk Utility (in /Applications/Utilities), select your startup drive in the list on the left, click the First Aid tab to the right, and then click Verify. Perform the following tasks before the upgrade and you’ll have a much better chance of actually enjoying a pain-free experience. Pre-install tasksĭescribes the process of upgrading to Mountain Lion as a simple download and install, those of us who’ve been doing this for a while know that a major OS update is never that simple. (MacBook users, of course, all have a trackpad already.) I personally prefer a mouse or large trackball for general “mousing,” but I keep a Magic Trackpad within reach, as well, just to take advantage of OS X’s gesture-based features. The systemwide gestures introduced in Lion last year are only going to become more pervasive as OS X evolves, and you likely won’t enjoy the full benefits of Mountain Lion without a trackpad. Magic Trackpad ( ) if you don’t already have one. Also, wow.)įinally, although it’s not a requirement, if you’ve got a desktop Mac, I highly recommend picking up Apple’s (If you’ve got one of the two Mac models that originally shipped with OS X 10.4 Tiger and support Mountain Lion, and you’re still running Tiger, you definitely want to go the Snow Leopard -> Mountain Lion route-the alternative is very messy. If that isn’t an option for you, for whatever reason, stay tuned-we’ll explain how to install 10.8 over Leopard, assuming you have the right to do so, much as weĭid with Lion last year. You’ll still be paying less than $50 for a huge OS upgrade. Purchase Snow Leopard for $29 and install it now, then upgrade to Mountain Lion when it’s released. What if you’ve got an otherwise compatible Mac that’s still running Leopard (OS X 10.5)? The easiest option is to Provided some specific suggestions for freeing up drive space. WhatSize or GrandPerspective to help you find big files you can get rid of and we recently If you need to free up space on your drive, you can use a utility such as You may also find, especially if you’re upgrading from Snow Leopard, that some of Mountain Lion’s features require more “everyday” free space, as is the case in Lion. Similarly, Apple recommends having at least 8GB of free space on your Mac’s drive, but I recommend playing it safe by aiming for 15GB or more-the Mountain Lion installer itself is over 4GB and you’ll need some room for temporary files. Most reputable vendors will make it clear which RAM they offer is specifically compatible with Macs. Some third-party RAM that’s not up to Apple’s specs will cause problems when you upgrade your OS. A word of advice here: If you don’t buy your RAM directly from Apple, be sure you get RAM that’s specifically guaranteed for use in Macs. If you have only 2GB installed, you might consider a hardware upgrade before installing OS X 10.8. (Note that while the above computers can install Mountain Lion, some features, such as Power Nap, AirPlay mirroring, and AirDrop,Īpple also says you need 2GB of RAM (memory), although in my experience, you’ll enjoy better results with at least 4GB. MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer).Apple says Mountain Lion requires one of the following computers, already running OS X 10.6.8 or any version of OS X 10.7:
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