The long and sometimes rocky history of the America Online client for the Macintosh -- a saga stretching back to the original AppleLink Personal Edition service, with a detour through a place called eWorld -- has now moved on to a new generation with the 1.0 release of AOL Desktop for Mac last week. We noted the test version (Cheshire) and the beta last year. For users of the online service, the rebuilt-from-the-ground-up client is worth a look.
New features include a revised AIM client that includes some of the bells and whistles long familiar to Windows users (Expressions), a Webkit-based tabbed browser, and a revamped Mail tool that strongly resembles the existing AOL webmail interface. Users of the older client can transfer AOL Favorites and AOL Mail from their local datastore with ease. AOL/AIM is free for BYO-broadband users and charges a monthly fee for customers who use AOL as their internet service provider.
The new version of the client requires a G4 or Intel machine and Mac OS X 10.4.8 or higher. If you prefer the "classic" client you can still download it from AOL, but it may look kinda clunky next to the new version. More screenshots and details at the AOL Mac blog, and see the continuation of the post for a video preview of the client.
AOL is the parent company of Weblogs, Inc. and TUAW.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
5-15-2008 @ 1:56PM
Luigi193 said...
What is the advantages of using AOL? Just curious...
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5-15-2008 @ 4:57PM
Ethan said...
It simplifies the internet. Unfortunately my grandma doesn't have a mac.
5-16-2008 @ 10:14AM
eric f. said...
precisely. perfect for the totally tech ignorant. I'm gonna have to get my grandma a Mac.
5-15-2008 @ 1:58PM
Ryan Kuhn said...
How does AppleLink or eWorld have anything to do with AOL on the mac? From what I remember it's totally separate. I was a beta user for the AOL client on the mac way back since the early 90's (AOL client used to be ONLY for the mac, then 2.0 came color!, 2.5 web browser yay, 2.6 TCP stack...). From what I remember, it hasn't been that rocky except for the fact that their clients have really been poorly implemented for the past 10 years.
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5-15-2008 @ 2:07PM
Michael Rose said...
The AOL "Quantum Link" client application was used to provision the AppleLink Personal Edition service from Apple. Later, Apple's eWorld service was built on similar AOL-licensed code via the APE contract.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL#History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EWorld
5-15-2008 @ 2:03PM
Zee said...
It will be a cold day in hell before I ever download this...
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5-15-2008 @ 3:11PM
Ben said...
Here here. I second that. Ugh.
5-15-2008 @ 5:24PM
Matt said...
I will never touch another AOL product again...
5-15-2008 @ 3:54PM
Quine said...
thirded.
aol is so bad my family canceled the service even after they offered 3 more months free. no joke. it's that bad.
5-15-2008 @ 2:06PM
juniper said...
AOL has been struggling to stay alive it seems for quite a while... why don't they drop their old products and move on to the new, like that Video application they release... http://www.apple-group.com
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5-15-2008 @ 2:07PM
Troy McClure SF said...
...but why?!
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5-15-2008 @ 2:16PM
Nay said...
And I would use this why?
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5-15-2008 @ 2:20PM
Luigi193 said...
I almost feel bad for ragging on them... I feel bad for the dude in the video...
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5-15-2008 @ 2:32PM
okto said...
Come on, Time Warner! How many people are smart enough to use a Mac, but dumb enough to pay AOL for a crap version of what the regular WWW gives you for free?
This has ALWAYS been true, actually. I guess before the WWW, AOL did have some sort of appeal, but I feel like after that they only survived on convincing technophobes either that the Web was scary, or that AOL provided better content.
So essentially, for the last decade-and-a-half of their existence, they've survived on lies and deceit.
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5-15-2008 @ 2:36PM
Blu-Sam said...
All I can give the PRO about new AOL which much better and quick loading than classic AOL.
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5-15-2008 @ 2:41PM
Blaktornado said...
"AOL is the parent company of Weblogs, Inc. and TUAW."
So I guess you can't give us a fair review of it :P
Ah well, it does look good, I must say, but I'm not an AOL user so I can't and don't really want to use it, lol.
although I like the unity of it all. It's basically Safari, iChat and Mail all in one, which is cool. Saves you opening all those apps and just having them unified :)
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5-15-2008 @ 2:49PM
Bill G said...
I don't think I'd ever use that application, but since aol.com mail is accessible by any IMAP application, and has infinite storage, I think it's the best free email option out there.
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5-15-2008 @ 2:54PM
Nay said...
Last I checked, I was able to access gmail via IMAP, and it's free.
5-15-2008 @ 3:04PM
iamdigitalman said...
"requires" a G4? I'll pass. AIm is all I need, and adium handles that quite nicely. I find it funny I can still download a raggedy old copy of AIM 4.7 from the Mothership, and it installs and runs just nice in Mac OS 9. Unless they change the protocol, it will work forever.
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5-15-2008 @ 3:13PM
Boyo said...
Wow! The First Mac Virus.
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