How to Make Your Mac Ready for Mountain Lion

Apple's new version for Mac OS X i.e. Mountain Lion is going to release this July, and the long wait of  Mac users is going to end. But is your Mac prepared to welcome new OS?

Though Apple hasn't released the detailed specifications on the system requirements for Mountain Lion, specifications as per developer releases recommended that your Mac should be one of the following models in order to run Mountain Lion:

• iMac (mid-2007 or newer) 
• MacBook (late 2008 Aluminum, or early 2009 or newer) 
• MacBook Pro (mid/late 2007 or newer) 
• MacBook Air (late 2008 or newer) 
• Mac Mini (early 2009 or newer) 
• Mac Pro (early 2008 or newer) 

How to Resolve 'Overlapped Extent Allocation' Issue in Mac OS X

Apple’s Disk Utility can perform a range of disk-related tasks in Mac OS X. This inbuilt tool allows verifying a disk’s identity. If errors are found, it repairs the disk to fix the damage. You may come across the following error while performing a repair using Disk Utility:

‘overlapped extent allocation’

The term ‘overlapped extent allocation’ implies that two files are stored on the same area of your hard disk. This condition indicates that you have already lost some of your data stored on the disk. You may try to fix the issue using any of the following methods:

How Disk Utility Verifies and Repairs Permissions

Disk Utility is an Apple's inbuilt tool that facilitates a variety of disk-related tasks, such as creation of disk images, mounting or unmounting hard disks, enabling journaling, etc. Apart from these functions, Disk Utility can help you verify and repair your Mac OS X disks. It also allows verifying and repairing disk permissions to resolve a range of application errors. Let us delve deeper into the process followed by Disk Utility to check file permissions.

A majority of installations done in Mac OS X are typically done through package files (the files with '.pkg' extension). For every installation done from a package file in Mac OS X 10.5 or earlier, an associated 'Bill of Materials' (.'bom') file is created and stored in the '/Library/Receipts/' folder. These files consume a small amount of disk space. Every '.bom' file includes a list of files that were installed by the package. These files also contain proper permissions for each installed file.