MAC UPGRADE - THE TECNICAL STUFF

I have successfully managed to upgrade the software for my Mac (OS X) which I purchased 6 years ago.   What I have proved is that it is, indeed, do-able.  With a fair amount of searching on the internet every time I came across a hurdle - and there were a few - I found solutions on the internet simply by googling my question enough times using various keywords.

As I found my searches very helpful I wish to pass on some information that might help the next person in my position.  Update:  I continue to come across odd (small) things which have been changed i.e. behave differently.  As I successfully sort them, I post the problem and the outcome or workaround at the end of this post.

This shows the type of machine I have which is an iMac. This website helps to identify the type of computer you have. 

I upgraded from Tiger to Leopard and then to Snow Leopard.  Now all was well, i.e. didn't affect anything negatively, i.e. speed was better but no files or software were affected.

Then I upgraded to Lion.  Now I was told ahead of time, and there is lots on the net about this, you lose certain types of software, i.e. "we [Mac] do not support this software" message comes up.  This is a shock if you are not prepared.  I used the desktop publishing software Quarkxpress 6.2 and it gave me 7 days' notice to say "You will no longer be able to use this software."  Too right.  A big Do Not Enter sign is across the icon.  End of the line!  (I replaced it, for £20.00, with iPages which is good enough for the type of work that I do.) 

Worse, was that the same happened for Photoshop CS2 that I was using but no 7 days' notice. Again the reasons are all on the net in various discussion sites.

The good news, however, is that it is possible to upgrade to Photoshop CS5.1 and I did this successfully.  Because I had the old software CD with the serial number I signed into the the Apple Account using this serial number, bought the Upgrade (I did not have to buy the whole new suite) and it accepted it with no difficulty.  I downloaded it off the net as opposed to buying the boxed CD and it was fine.  Well ... nearly fine.  The only thing to say is that their instruction run scheme doesn't quite match what you see on the screen but by guessing what they mean it worked.  And yes, I am very happy with the final "functionality"!

So the moral of the story is: probably best to upgrade sooner rather than later.  My stuff was 5 years old and, I guess, that is pretty old for today's software!

March 15, 2012: NO SOUND (after upgrading to Lion).  Solved this way: Mac System Preferences,  clicked the "sound" icon.  There are 3 tabs in Sound which are "sound effects", "output" and "input." Click "output".  The Mute box was ticked; untick it.  That sorted the problem.

April 3, 2012:  SCANNER WON'T WORK.  My scanner is a HP Photosmart C3180.  Now Apple and the Hewlett Packard websites have addressed this problem and eventually I was able to scan.  My workaround:  Turn scanner on (and you get error saying not connected).  Go into the Mac System Preference - Print/Scan - Open Scanner.

April 15, 2012:  WHEN CURSOR  TOUCHES TOP LEFT CORNER OF SCREEN THE SCREEN DISAPPEARS AND "DASHBOARD" SCREEN APPEARS: You need to know the jargon here: this is a manifestation of HOT CORNERS.  What's that?  When the cursor touches (accidentally, in my case)  the upper left corner of the screen it caused the aforesaid action and doing it again toggled the action (i.e. went back to the way it was).  Solution: Click on Apple - System Preferences - (Personal) Mission Control - Hot Corners (bottom, lower left). This shows "Active Screen Corners" Deactivate ( " - " ) or change. Done!