As indicated, macOS Sierra shall be hitting the Macs of everybody who can run it in autumn. And you may wonder whether you should upgrade your Macs to macOS Sierra, so we've rounded up some reviews or opinions in order to give readers like you a look at the macOS Sierra from the perspective of other authoritative websites.
The roundup includes reviews from Macworld, Digitaltrends, 9to5mac, Yahoo, Cultomac, and other large websites. The reviewers generally agree that Siri is the biggest addition in macOS Sierra and some other features like Apple Pay, Auto Unlock bring us convenience. You can read the detailed information of the below roundup of reviews about macOS Sierra.
It's too early for a definitive verdict on macOS Sierra - the developer preview isn't a finished piece of software and, as Apple itself warns, features are subject to change. Our thoughts on whether Sierra is a hit or a miss will get firmer as successive beta versions are released, each one bringing us closer to the OS's final shape.
But early signs are quietly promising. Siri's debut on the Mac is a pleasing headline feature, auto unlock looks brilliantly convenient and Universal Clipboard is the sort of feature you never knew you wanted but then can't do without. How well all these parts will get together is something we'll discover with time, but early impressions of macOS Sierra are good, and we're looking forward to its final release in autumn.
Though the operating system’s name has changed, the strengths and weaknesses of MacOS Sierra are essentially the same as OS X El Capitan – or Yosemite. MacOS is great if you own iOS devices and want them to work closely with your computer. If you need app selection and a more powerful interface, however, Windows easily has MacOS beat.
Although it hasn’t garnered the same level of excitement as iOS 10’s unveiling, there are quite a few compelling additions to be found in macOS Sierra. Along with a rebranded and more modern naming convention, macOS Sierra adds Siri, a Universal Clipboard for sharing clipboard contents between iOS and macOS, and many more underlying features.
If it feels thin, that’s because it is. There’s not a lot of meat in this update. Siri is the only significant new feature, and while it’s nice to have, the implementation is about what we expected.
Updates to Apple’s desktop operating system go a lot further than just the name change. One of the biggest additions is Siri, allowing you to multitask more effectively. On top of that there is automatic unlocking, Apple Pay for the web and Universal Clipboard.
Picture-in-picture is also coming to the Mac, although I wasn’t able to get this feature working in this beta. But new features such as Optimized Storage seem to work great.
One of the most important innovations macOS Sierra was to support voice assistant Siri, ready to help in any situation. With the help of “smart” assistant Finder you can search files, search for emails, launch music, send messages and even search for movies to view on taste preferences. Siri is also capable of running the picture-in-picture.
However, Siri is definitely getting smarter about finding and delivering information. In addition to searching Bing for news, it can now also search Twitter, and it uses your account (with your permission) to personalise the results it gives you. This is the fruit of Apple’s acquisition of Topsy, the Twitter search and analytics company, and it’s highly welcome.
The biggest problem with Siri is nothing to do with the technology, as such: it’s simply that in an office environment, talking to your computer still feels a bit weird. The plus point is that it allows to you to more effectively multitask, looking up information without breaking your flow in whatever application you’re in.
The features of Sierra I’m most excited about have to do with its interoperability with the Apple Watch and iPhone, which I haven’t been able to test directly yet. The opportunity to sync more stuff to iCloud Drive is welcome, though I’m not sure I’m willing to change my habits just to gain syncing of my Desktop folder—and I’m also not sure I’m ready to let Apple delete my files automatically and rely on cloud backups.
As for Siri, I’m glad to see its arrival on the Mac at long last. The implementation is more than I’d feared, but less than I’d hoped. The access to the same data services as on iOS is great; I hope the development of more Mac-specific features continues, including better integration with the powerful automation features already built into advanced dictation. (And yeah, I kind of wish it could optionally be activated by a trigger word, as it is on iOS.)
To look at macOS Sierra on the surface, it looks pretty similar to OS X 10.11 El Capitan. The only obvious clue that something is different is the addition of the Siri icon in the dock, and at near the top right hand corner of your display where Spotlight used to reside on its own. However, the addition of Siri alone makes it worth the upgrade, as it will help to effectively automate a lot what you used to have to type in. Using a Mac will never be the same again, and this in fact a really good thing!
In fact, we can see everyone who upgrades to macOS Sierra using nearly every new feature that Apple has built into it, if not all of them. They all make sense, and are useful additions to what is already the best desktop operating system on the planet. Coupled with the upgraded Apple File System beneath the hood, which features built-in encryption, we strongly recommend that you make the upgrade when it rolls out later this year.
When it does come out this fall, though, you’re going to want to upgrade. It’s free, it includes some security updates, and it’s not like Apple has nutty Windows 8-style ideas about changing everything at once. You can safely upgrade. You’ll want to, too: After using Sierra for a week I’m already missing picture-in-picture and tabs in apps. I’m really looking forward to Apple Pay on the web, unlocking my Mac with my Apple Watch, and sending gigantic emoji to everyone in my Contacts.
Rosa has worked in Mac software industry for more than eight years. She believes that the purpose of software is to make life better and work more productively. In addition to writing, Rosa is also an avid runner.
