Because a New World ROM was required for Mac OS X Panther, certain older computers (such as beige Power Mac G3s and 'Wall Street' PowerBook G3s) were unable to run Panther by default. Third-party software (such as XPostFacto) can, however, override checks made during the install process; otherwise, installation or upgrades from Jaguar fails on these older machines.
Panther still fully supported the Classic environment for running older Mac OS 9 applications, but made Classic application windows double-buffered, interfering with some applications written to draw directly to screen.
New and changed features
Apple advertised that Mac OS X Panther had over 150 new features, including:
Finder was updated with a brushed-metal interface, and given a new live search engine, a customizable Sidebar, secure deletion, colored labels (resurrected from classic Mac OS[5]) in the filesystem and Zip support built in. The Finder icon was also changed.
Fast user switching was introduced; it allows a user to remain logged in while another user logs in, and supports quickly switching among several sessions.
Exposé is a new feature that helps the user manage windows by showing them all as thumbnails.
Font Book is a font manager which simplifies viewing character maps, and adding new fonts that can be used systemwide.[6] The app also allows the user to organize fonts into collections.
X11: Compatibility[6] for applications based on the X Window System, commonly used for UNIX applications, is available through an optional install, found in the install disk. Mac OS X Panther is the first macOS version to officially support X11. It utilizes Quartz to provide hardware accelerated graphics[7] and is based on the XFree86 implementation[8] of X Window System.
Safari is a new web browser that was developed to replace Internet Explorer for Mac when the contract between Apple and Microsoft ended, although Internet Explorer for Mac was still available. Safari 1.0 was included in an update in Jaguar but was used as the default browser[3] in Panther.
Built-in fax support.[9]: 1 Sending a fax can be done using the native Print dialog.[9]: 2 To receive faxes, users must pre-configure in System Preferences on how the system should handle an incoming fax, with options[9]: 4 including selecting a folder to save the incoming faxes, to automatically email to an address or to print via a selected printer, upon receiving of the fax.
Secure Empty Trash is a feature added in Mac OS X Panther[10] to ensure, through the use of data erasure techniques, that deleted files cannot be recovered.[11]
Panther added support for WPA and WPA2 level security on wireless networks (with the AirPort 4.2 software update).
^"One more cool cat". The Baltimore Sun. October 30, 2003. Archived from the original on October 8, 2021. Retrieved October 8, 2021. Those nostalgic for Mac OS 9 will celebrate the return of colored file labels in this menu.
^Sellers, Dennis (October 27, 2003). "X11 for Panther available". Macworld. Archived from the original on January 10, 2023. Retrieved January 10, 2023.
^"X11 for Mac OS X 1.0". Apple. October 28, 2003. Archived from the original on January 10, 2023. Retrieved January 10, 2023. Based on the open source XFree86 project — the most common implementation of X11...
^Latour, Frédéric (2003). "Panther : Finder". Frédéric Latour's web site. Archived from the original on July 20, 2008. Retrieved January 10, 2023.
^Tognazzini, Bruce (January 2004). "Panther: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly". AskTog. Archived from the original on August 14, 2022. Retrieved January 10, 2023. ...overwrites the sectors on the disk seven times...
