The install, at last

Here it is! The install. Kelly Dumont was the first person on our team to receive the Leopard DVD. The install took about 45 minutes and he was off and running, trying out new features.

I wanted to install Leopard so badly, but I know from past experience that I should always backup my entire hard drive before installing a new operating system. That night (Halloween) I used Carbon Copy Cloner (thanks to Bombich Software) to do a complete backup of my laptop.

Nov 1st arrived, and I installed Leopard. I got the blue screen of death that I have been reading about. I waited about 25 minutes and finally said Ah Heck, restart. My laptop seemed OK and I began using this new cat. My first impressions of Leopard are as follows:

• QuickLook is visually stunning
  
• Mail and iCal work together so well
• Mail has beautiful templates
• Spaces are fun
• Time Machine is worth the upgrade to Leopard

• I am not fond of the reflection in the dock
• Not crazy about blue folders
  
• Transparent finder menu a bit of a nuisance
  
• Side dock a bit dark for my tastes
  

But I do give Leopard 2 thumbs up. Overall it is great. While I find certain visual aspects disconcerting, I am enjoying Leopard a lot. Thanks Apple.