Mountain Lion Dev Preview upgrade path

[rmt5]

Hi! I am thinking about plunking the down the hundred dollars to have access to the mountain lion developer's preview, and I had a few questions I hadn't seen answered elsewhere...

1. When the final public release of 10.8 happens in the summer, will I be able to upgrade organically from the developer's preview (without losing all my data, etc.), or will I have to downgrade to Lion or restore the system first?

2. Actually, I also want to confirm that the dev. preview will install over my current lion and (assuming nothing whacks out) retain my data, yes?

3. If I do get the preview version, will I still have to pay the (likely) $30 for the final version? (I imagine yes.)

Thanks!

 

[Pooshka]

Sorry, too lazy tonight, but here are the answers:

1. Yes

2. Yes

3. No

 

[Chundles]

Pretty sure the notes for this preview build said you WOULD NOT be able to upgrade to the final release. I'd go check your release notes first.

 

[maflynn]

If you're only joining the developer program for the beta, I'd say hold off and save your hundred bucks.

If you want to spend it then
1. apple will release a final build to the developers which will be the gold master for the consumer

2. yes and that's the typical preferred method by apple. Work arounds exist to do a clean install however

3. no see point 1

 

[rmt5]

I guess my concern is that I don't want to knock myself off the standard upgrade path for good. If the developer preview ultimately updates to a final release that is indistinguishable from the consumer release, then that is great. But would that then get the updates that the standard release gets? And what about eventually updating to 10.9, etc.

I say all this knowing that people who have gone to mountain lion haven't been having much luck rolling back to lion.

 

[farmermac]

anyone can go back to their previous OS easily by making a Time Machine or CCC clone of their previous config. IMO, you should be installing Mountain lion on a separate partition for testing, not upgrade your main machine with your main account, if you dont have a CCC clone to easily and quickly restore the machine to a stable final release OS.

 

[rmt5]

My understanding is that people were having difficulty even using time machine, because the ML installation actually altered some of the firmware. No?

Basically, I'm eager to join, but just want to make sure there's a not-overly-convoluted way to get back on the standard ML upgrade path when the time comes. How do all the Devs plan on doing this?

 

[pdjudd]

My understanding is that people were having difficulty even using time machine, because the ML installation actually altered some of the firmware. No?

Not to my knowledge. The only firmware update I have heard of is a Thunderbolt update which doesn’t install properly and fails. That has nothing to do with TM though...