Another comprehensive Leopard review

What I like most about ARS Technica is that when they do reviews, they do reviews. John Siracusa really took a lot of time and effort to give us one of the most comprehensive, if not THE most comprehensive, review of Leopard ever. I really cannot give a summary of each of the points he makes. Some parts had my eyes glazing over. I'll just get a snippet of his conclusion:

"Leopard is absolutely packed with improvements. It seems that not a corner of the OS has gone untouched. Perhaps that's not as clear to the casual user who just sees the surface changes and the major new features in Leopard. But even in that case, there's more than enough to recommend it. if you're wondering whether you should upgrade to Leopard, the answer, as it's been for every major revision of Mac OS X, is yes.

I'm most excited about Leopard's internals. They're the star of this release, even if they don't get top billing. There's a good reason we've already seen so many prominent Leopard-only software announcements. This is where developers want to be.

I'm hard pressed to think of a single Mac user I know who wouldn't benefit from Time Machine's hassle-free backup magic. If you're looking for one reason to upgrade, this is it. Yeah, backups are boring, which is why you're probably not doing them regularly right now. No more excuses.

In many ways, Leopard feels like a new beginning. Leopard charges bravely forward, choosing one particular new look and mandating it everywhere, redesigning all of the most prominent visual elements of the interface, and shedding old technologies like cat fur.

What's emerged is quite a strange beast: beautiful on the inside and, well, a bit unlovely on the outside.

It's the Mac development community's opportunity to shine. Whether it reigns for two and a half years, like Tiger, or even longer, I'm looking forward to my time aboard starship Leopard."

Siracusa's review of Leopard is a must read.