Kontakt 5.3 (as well as Reaktor 5.9 and Guitar Rig 5.2, and everything, I believe) will work under Snow Leopard, it just doesn't install normally. You can get an app 'Pacifist' which is shareware (if you haven't coughed up the $20 it will make you wait 15 sec) which will extract whatever you want from the.pkg. The standalone won't work from that. But there is someone that has made it work through a program 'Snowify' which has an aspect 'fix apps' which will run a script in Terminal to fix the standalone.applications., in addition to creating 10.6 installers running a Terminal script which runs by opening the installer in the Snowify folder.
I don't have links. You can find it at KVR Forums.
But if all you need is the plugin, Pacifist will make it work, easy to find via Google. Yeah, my 6 yr old iMac and me were happy on 10.6, 10.8 is a disaster. First Kore didn't recognise NI VST's anymore, now after a clean install Logic crashes multiple times a day using NomadFactory plugins and even Safari crashes ten times a day in the latest update (even did while typing this, good thing it keeps whatever I typed). I'm going to change my setup somewhere this year and return the iMac to 10.6, will have Vienna Ensemble Pro and my MBP (and later on a Hackintosh) for 10.8, Win7 and eventually 10.9 stuff. Need 10.6 for backward compatibility. Was a very happy Apple user for 8 yrs. 10.6.8 works, & if it ain't broke don't fix it.
I started looking around for 10.7, and Apple has reduced it from 30 to 20 USD, but I don't perceive any need to 'upgrade' for this work and I expect problems. I expect plugins to cause problems, there must be some difference in architecture as I noticed at least one plugin (Flux Bittersweet) where the x64 version update installed but isn't seen by anything. Later I saw these Flux updates require 10.7. Doesn't much matter as I'm running that in VE Pro 32-bit instances using Amplitube 2, as Amplitube 3 at first wouldn't work in VEP, was just a total PITA at every step for me and I'm never going to bother with it again. VSL starts to recommend 10.8.4 I think, but it doesn't mean anything except that's what the developers are using. They do not recommend 10.9.
There is nothing about the current NI plugins that requires 10.7 except that the installer balks. None of the updaters or installers from october 2013 on work in 10.6 anymore. You should be able to find that somewhere, i cannot see why they would not give you that. I had to install an earlier version of live once and they sent me a link for the download less than 24 hours later. 10.7 sucks, got forced into it and i hate it.
10.8 is just 10.7 with a big f#ck u from apple to the persons who are holding out from their business plan. Try some of the sample maker sites as well, like 8dio or heavenocity. Keep in mind that anything created in/for 5.3 may not run anymore in 5.2. So perhaps it would be best to patch version 5.3 of the player by editing the system version in the info plist of the app package using Xcode or plist editor launced in sudo mode via the terminal. And another system crash.
All I did was create a patch in Kontakt 4 in Logic 9. Safari was the only other program open. My two previous Mountain Lion installs had system crashes that in the end damaged the file structure beyond repair, I needed to reformat the disk.
First time that happened I did a system restore from Snow Leopard and upgraded to Mountain Lion, second time I did a fresh install of Snow Leopard (so I could install my stuff with ML incompatible installers) and upgraded to Mountain Lion. Is it time to replace my iMac hard drive or is it a Mountain Lion problem? I have heard nothing but bad about 10.8, it is the finish of 10.7.
Should have called it 10.7.8 instead and made notifications an app you can elect to auto launch at login by preference. Apple's plan of releasing a new os ready or not is not a very sound one, 10.8 was a false new system release with just notifications added and a few other additions using the same exact core of 10.7. If you can, stick to 10.6 or 7 until and wait until all the bugs in 10.9 are worked out. 10.9 is a good system just like 10.5 and 6 were.
10.7 and 8 are terrible, at least 10.7 does not have the notifications running in the background you cannot even at the least schedule to turn off and not bother you. You can run 10.6.8 server seamlessly with vmware in 10.9, though it does slow the entire computer running 2 systems at once. It is possible your hard drive remapped some blocks that went bad, most hard drives ship new this way. But yes, usually when you have to start reformatting, that is the first sign.
I almost never had crashes in 10.6.8 on my desktop, but on my laptop, i did have them, more so stalls that seem like crashes usually when waking from sleep which i attribute to the power management of the laptop. They also say to reboot every once in a while to give the system a chance to update it's disc settings it writes when it is restarted. If you can, try to run a disc program like norton or tech tool to see what it says. Safari actually causes a lot of issues and the earlier version have security holes that can be exploited like malware, causing temporary havoc and disappearing after you reboot. Most of my issues in 10.7 are with safari, apple mail, and major brand usb flash drives - all bugs you would have thought apple would have worked out. NI m2 scan app, peak pro 7 are buggy as well.
Also, often after crashes you should repair your disc permissions, these are usually bad and contribute to the crash or corrupted from it. You could try setting up an external firewire boot system drive setting it up and testing it. If all works fine, then simply use this disc to replace your internal drive. Not using the internal or boot drive at all except for the read only activities of the system and apps does help, leaving at least 25% of the drive free and using an independent high performance AV grade drive for work. Creating multiple partitions helps as well, putting your user directory on that. Btw, i just got Maschine 2 to work in 10.6.8. Ran fine after 4 hours of preliminary crash free use on an old mac pro duo core.
I had the patch method right the first time, i just needed to have the system rescan the apps to update the status of the apps and remove the null sign. Thanks!I don't have Techtool or Norton.started checking with Disk Utility, it says 'Invalid extent entry Keys out of order Invalid extent entry The volume Macintosh HD was fount corrupt and needs to be repaired. Error: This disk needs to be repaired using the Recovery HD. Etc' Yeah, no time for that crap, I need to finish my sheet music assignment. Did everything in Sibelius 6 so I can continue on my iBook if I must.I think I prefer to put an SSD in my iMac instead of using an external boot drive if the HD is bad, the optical drive needs to be replaced as well.What do you mean with user directory on a different partition?
Connect To All: Path Finder (snow Leopard 5.5 For Mac Mac
There is also disc warrior. Little pricey since it costs more than a top of the line western digital 1TB (750GB mobile) black drive. And almost as much as some of the 250G ssds. But a good tool.
Connect To All: Path Finder (snow Leopard 5.5 For Mac Download
Hope you get it all worked out oh, if you go into advanced user and group options in the system prefs. Control click on your user name and the options come up.
Where is says home directory, you can change this, but you have to set it up first and create all the folders. I usually do this when i first install a system and leave a virgin user folder i copy to the new location. This keeps your personal files on a separate disc or partition with an independent directory and file structure and confuses anyone that hacks into a computer that does not have a password and user name if they access the system drive or partition, all they find is nothing important where they would expect to find documents (you could even set a trap and put a virus in a file called something like 'my banking passwords'. (most routers get many attempts a day to get into their systems, most are windows).) it also give you a back up and test user folder. Don't change your user directory unless you have one set up at the location you point it to.
Also, it is good to set up a second admin account that uses the default user directory if you do this.