Re: 2007 hardware obsolete?
I have 3 "vintage" macs which are not capable of running 10.8+.
It's one debate to have about the decision to have 32-bit firmware on 64-bit machines, but Intel (whom y'all love to pieces) deserves some of the gong for that. It is wholly another debate about how long to support a discontinued piece of hardware.
The older Intel Macs support LION, and LION is still supported. So, it's not like the Snow Leopard folks are being given short shrift. If my car has bald tires and I continue to drive on them, it's not Oldsmobile's fault I'm in peril. I can buy new tires.
Look folks, at some point they have to stop supporting things, and I think N-2 is not bad. I'd rather the (sadly) finite resources be spent supporting a fair number of releases, and developing new ones, than to have them only plotting the future by the limitations of the past. If MS had dropped 16-bit support in XP, it'd have been smaller, faster, and more stable and have inconvenienced not that many people. Reg readers would have bitched about how Visicalc ran just fine all the way from DOS 2 through WinME, but it's because you're not getting laid enough.
You can't buy new tubes for your Hallicrafters.
You can't buy new batteries for your Noka 2001.
You can't buy a new engine for your Wright Flyer.
Move on, people. Buy Lion, install Linux, or buy a new computer. If you really must get Mavericks running on your polycarbonate MacBook, start writing the driver. Send me a copy, I need to upgrade.
PS: Just for shits, grins, and giggles, I ran the same HandBrake job on a MacPro2,1 (quad-Xeon 2.6) and a new 2013 MacBookAir (1.3Ghz i5) and they finished within 3 seconds of each other.
New shit > Old shit