Apple offers free OS X upgrade to prep for switch to iCloud

19.04.2012
Apple is offering Mac users a free upgrade to OS X 10.6, better known as Snow Leopard, in an attempt to prep them for the June switch from MobileMe to the newer iCloud online sync and backup service.

Snow Leopard, which debuted in 2009, does not support iCloud -- only OS X 10.7, or Lion, does -- but with the free upgrade to the former, users will have to pay only one upgrade fee, the $29.99 for Lion, to use the service.

Lion is available through the .

The offer only makes sense for Mac users running OS X 10.5, aka Leopard, or earlier, on systems powered by Intel processors: Neither Snow Leopard or Lion support older PowerPC processor-equipped Macs.

About 18% of all Mac users, or fewer than one-in-six, ran Leopard or one of its predecessors last month, according to Internet metrics company Net Applications.

, a move it announced last year.