There’s still a Messages for Mac link at the bottom of Apple’s Downloads page — as you can see below — but again, it just redirects to the Mac OS X page, where a Messages beta cannot be found.
It’s likely that Apple is now happy with how beta testing has gone, and that it has already prepared a final release that will launch alongside Mountain Lion in July.
Apple has not removed the download entirely, however, as it is still accessible via direct download (63.8 MB). It is unknown how long Apple will continue hosting the download, but text strings found within the app earlier this year suggest that the app itself will expire once OS X Mountain Lion is released and Messages will be a Mountain Lion exclusive.
Apple announced yesterday that OS X Mountain Lion will launch in July and be priced at $19.99 through the Mac App Store. Users of Snow Leopard and Lion will be able to upgrade to Mountain Lion for the same price.
Users of the Messages beta for Lion have complained of a number of issues including crashes and problems with syncing across devices, failure to send, and disappearing messages. Many have been hoping for an update to address some of these issues, but it appears that Apple is focusing its Messages efforts on the final version it plans to include with OS X Mountain Lion.
Thursday October 31, 2024 9:42 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Apple is set to release iOS 18.2 in December, bringing the second round of Apple Intelligence features to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models. This update brings several major advancements to Apple's AI integration, including completely new image generation tools and a range of Visual Intelligence-based enhancements. There are a handful of new non-AI related feature controls incoming as well.
...
Wednesday October 30, 2024 8:01 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Apple today announced new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models featuring M4 Pro and M4 Max chips, alongside a new entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro powered by the M4 chip.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.
The new M4 Pro and M4 Max machines come with a minimum of 24GB of Unified Memory as standard, up from 18GB in the previous models. Both models feature three...
Thursday October 31, 2024 7:06 pm PDT by Joe Rossignol
The first Geekbench 6 benchmark results for the M4 Pro chip surfaced today. Impressively, the results that are available so far show that the highest-end M4 Pro chip is faster than the highest-end M2 Ultra chip in terms of peak multi-core CPU performance.
Here is a comparison of the results:
Mac mini with M4 Pro (14-core CPU): 22,094 multi-core score (average of 11 results)
Mac Studio...
Wednesday October 30, 2024 8:04 am PDT by Joe Rossignol
Apple today in its new MacBook Pro press release announced that the MacBook Air lineup now starts with 16GB of RAM, up from 8GB previously.
This change applies to the 13-inch model with the M2 chip, the 13-inch model with the M3 chip, and the 15-inch model with the M3 chip.
In the U.S., the MacBook Air lineup continues to start at $999, so there is no price increase associated with the...
Apple today announced fully redesigned Mac mini models featuring the M4 and M4 Pro chips, a considerably smaller casing, two front-facing USB-C ports, Thunderbolt 5 connectivity, and more.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.
The product refresh marks the first time the Mac mini has been redesigned in over a decade. The enclosure now measures just five by five inches...
Wednesday October 30, 2024 9:24 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Apple this week made three key Mac product announcements: new iMac, Mac mini, and MacBook Pro models. These machines bring the M4 chip series to Apple's Mac lineup for the first time, but each in its own way offers several new features and changes that go beyond processors.
Below, we've compiled a recap of all the highlights.
New iMac
Apple on Monday announced its latest 24-inch iMac,...
I'm looking forward to the day when Apple (just to rub it into Microsofts face) decides to sell their next MacOS for 99 cent.
You obviously don't understand the difference between making money on hardware or software.
For your clarification:
Apple only allows their OS to run on Apple made hardware. Therefore they are making tons of money on the hardware side. Technically, they could give the OS away for free and still make enough money.
MS is only selling software which means that they have to make all their money by selling software... So, there is no option for them to sell their OS for a low price... On the plus side they typically don't force their users to upgrade to a new OS by claiming that new add-on applications can only run on the new OS even though it has been beta-tested on the current OS...
Stinks that the Beta will be inoperative eventually, because my girlfriend's Mac Mini won't be able to update to Mountain Lion and she's getting alot of use out of Messages.
I bet they charge .99 for it and put it on the MAS, like facetime.
:apple: Buy Apple "I'm a mac" T-Shirts here :apple: :apple:
Guess where I think you should stick your MERCHANDISE!!!
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I've encountered some weird quirks too. Overall, I like it a lot. I've been using it as a replacement for Yahoo! since the day it was released in Beta.
The only feature that I really miss is the ellipses when someone is in the middle of typing. I wish that worked with Yahoo!.
I liked the concept... it is terrible at staying synced.