The upgrade battle between Apple and Microsoft

As we all might know already, the two big OS company continue their battles. Apple to release latest Mac OS X 10.6, Snow Leopard, in September while Microsoft to release Windows 7 on October 22nd. Despite their enhancement and hardware requirement, let’s first look at the upgrade chart.

Microsoft’s Windows 7 upgrade chart:

Not difficult to see that, for most of the previous systems, if you would like to “save some time” and upgrade to Windows 7, you might find out that it’s not so easy as for most of the previous OS by Microsoft direct upgrade is not possible. You will first need to back up your files and then do a clean installation of Windows 7. Then you can transfer all your files and applications back in place.

Now, let’s take a look at Apple’s upgrade chart:

Nice and simple, no matter you are using Tiger (Mac OS X 10.4) or Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5), you will just need to obtain a copy of Snow Leopard and do the upgrade, everything will be put in place for you. A side note for Leopard users that Apple will offer a upgrade version of Snow Leopard for only $29.99 USD.

However, there is a bad news though, that is, Apple’s new OS will no longer support PowerPC-based machine, even they are brand new or very close to Intel-based generations.

I am not sure how many will actually do the direct upgrade, but if you really need to, you should know all these before you put your DVD in and press the “upgrade” button. Probably you would like to do a clean installation, but if everything is as simple as the Apple upgrade, why make it so troublesome, right?