Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard

Apple showed a near-final Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard on June 11, 2007. On October 16 it announced release for October 26 at 6 p.m. and opened preorders. The October 30 release already described the previous Friday's launch and copies sold or delivered: this separates the announcement from availability retrospectively confirmed by Apple, without counting maintenance deliveries or new-computer bundles as standalone retail boxes.

Original typographic card; not a historical screenshot.

Family: Mac OS X
Version: 10.5
Minimum RAM: 512 MB
Historical US price: US$129

Apple · Leopard · 2007-06-11 · Apple · Leopard · 2007-10-16 · Apple · Leopard · 2007-10-30

Stacks organized folders from the Dock, Finder gained Cover Flow and Quick Look previewed files without opening their creator application. Spaces separated groups of windows and applications into custom desktops. These were different roles: organization, previewing and workspaces, not alternative names for one feature. The October release describes a Downloads stack collecting web and mail downloads, alongside custom stacks for folders, documents or applications. Spaces could be navigated with mouse or keyboard. Web Clip brought part of a page into Dashboard as a widget, while iCal added shared calendars based on CalDAV. These are distinct functions: a stack is not a backup and a space does not add another computer.

Apple · Leopard · 2007-10-16

Time Machine automated backups and recovery of files or the system; the release required an additional drive sold separately. Boot Camp moved from beta to a full release for running Windows natively on Intel Macs and required a copy of Windows XP or Vista. Its inclusion did not make PowerPC Macs compatible with Windows through Boot Camp. Mail gained more than thirty stationery designs, notes, tasks and an RSS reader. Its data detectors recognized phone numbers, addresses and events for adding to Address Book or iCal. iChat Theater showed photos, presentations, video or files in a conference; screen sharing allowed viewing and operating another Mac. This describes 2007 software and services, not a guarantee that all their connections still work today.

Apple · Leopard · 2007-10-16

Announced requirements were 512 MB RAM and an Intel, PowerPC G5 or G4 processor at 867 MHz or faster. US prices were $129 for one user and $199 for five users in one household. The table selects 10.5.1 (November 15, 2007) and 10.5.8 (August 5, 2009) from Apple's security archive. It does not claim a complete revision sequence or include builds.

Apple · Leopard · 2007-10-16 · Apple · 2005-2007 · Apple · 2008-2009