Mountain Lion Becomes Most Popular OS X To Date

Apple has announced that its OS X Mountain Lion has topped three million downloads in just four days, making it the most successful OS X ever.

The system boasts several features seen in iOS 5, as well as closer iCloud integration, Power Nap, AirPlay Mirroring, and adds popular social network support within applications.

Big cat

Apple calls its Unix-based OS X 10.8, otherwise known as Mountain Lion, “the world’s most advanced desktop operating system”. It was released just a year after the successful introduction of Lion, and is the first operating system from Apple to completely drop the “Mac” prefix.

Mountain Lion incorporates some features seen in iOS 5, such as the Game Center, Notification Center and support for iMessage. It features more thorough iCloud integration than its predecessor, allowing users to synchronise their mail, calendars, contacts, reminders, documents and notes across all Apple devices.

Another interesting feature present in Mountain Lion is the Power Nap. Even after a Mac with the latest OS installed goes to sleep, it periodically updates email, calendar, reminders, notes and other relevant content, without switching on computer lights or fans.

Also new in Mountain Lion is AirPlay Mirroring, which lets users wirelessly send a secure stream of video content from their Mac to an HDTV using Apple TV, or send audio to a receiver or speakers that use AirPlay.

The latest OS X already features Twitter integration, and Apple promises to add Facebook integration to the system sometime in autumn, enabling users to post photos, links and comments right from within applications.

“People are going to love the new features in Mountain Lion and how easy it is to download and install from the Mac App Store,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.

“With iCloud integration, Mountain Lion is even easier to set up, and your important information stays up to date across all your devices so you can keep editing documents, taking notes, creating reminders, and continue conversations whether you started on a Mac, iPhone or iPad,” he added.

The new OS will compete with Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8 operating system, which will be released on October 26. Similarly to Mountain Lion, Windows 8 incorporates a number of mobile features and promises to work equally well on both desktops and tablets.

The new system is available through the Mac App Store as an upgrade to Lion or Snow Leopard users for £13.99.

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