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Editorial - DR. Mac 
Dr. Mac - Mac OS 9 is DEAD !! - Long LIVE Mac OS X !!
By Bob LeVitus
Mac OS X has changed the way I use my Mac.
Today I do more with my Mac than I ever did using OS 9, and I do it in less
time, and with less stress.
Under Mac OS 9, extensions and control panels could only be enabled or
disabled by restarting. Virtual memory could only be enabled or disabled by
restarting. Many popular utilities could only be enabled or disabled by
restarting.
In OS 9, everything I did was predicated upon the restart, which I consider
an affront to my productivity. Restarting OS 9 wastes five or six minutes,
so I always took great pains to avoid it.
That was then. Now, OS X restarts two or three times faster than OS 9. And
OS X doesn't make you restart to enable or disable software. In fact, Mac
OS X almost never forces me to restart for any reason. I burn, rip, view,
edit, listen, type, surf, install and render without restarting even once.
Heck, I sometimes do them all at the same time, just because I can!
Right now I am listening to Elvis in iTunes, typing this column in
Microsoft Word, and updating my iPod via FireWire. In the background, I'm
printing some digital pictures in iPhoto, downloading a file in Internet Explorer,
and backing up files to my iDisk in Backup. Furthermore, iChat, Mail, StickyBrain, QuicKeys,
LaunchBar, DragThing and System Preferences are running in the background,
waiting quietly for me to need them again.
I love having 15 or 20 programs running, and switching back and forth
between them. My address book, calendar, e-mail, word processor, image
editor, and all the other tools I use over the course of the day remain one
click away at all times.
This is totally unlike how I worked in OS 9, where any program, extension,
control panel or even a change in the moon's phase could crash my Mac
completely, instantly and fatally, and take all my unsaved work with it.
With OS 9, I crossed my fingers and ran only necessary programs.
Today I run backup software 24/7. It backs up my hard disks and important
document folders as often as three or four times a day. It has almost no
effect on other applications; I even can't tell if it's running unless I
look closely. And I print whatever I want, whenever I want, regardless of
file size or complexity. Doing any of those things in the background under
OS 9 resulted in annoying jittery cursor.
Today I burn CDs and DVDs in the background while working in other
programs. I might have gotten away with this in OS 9 but it was risky.
Today I take it for granted that I can burn, render, record, and save audio
and video without quitting other programs or reconfiguring in any way.
To be fair, Mac OS X programs, system preference panes, the Classic
application, and background processes do still crash. But they rarely
affect the OS or require a restart.
OS X saves me at least three or four hours a week. I rarely restart. And I
rarely wait for programs to launch -- the ones I use frequently are already
open. And running certain background tasks doesn't make my Mac jittery and
unusable.
You couldn't pay me enough to go back to OS 9 now.
Bob LeVitus is a leading authority on Mac OS X and the author of 39 books,
including Mac OS X For Dummies and Dr. Mac - The OS X Files, (or, "How to Become
a Mac OS X Power User").
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