Brief Hands-On Report--Apple makes over Its Web Site

Apple's Web site has a brand new look across the board on all pages. The new look is largely black with a medium gray navigational bar that has fewer buttons so is generally more hierarchical. An exception is that "Downloads" is moved up from a sub-menu under "Support" to be a main bar button.

We generally like the new look a lot--check it out. However, we find the Support section and, in particular, the Downloads section to be less easy to use because of its increase diversity. The new equivalent of the old Support->Downloads page is now Downloads->Apple in the left sidebar.

But most diversity has many benefits and this is true of Apple's new Downloads page. There are many categorical entry points to look for what one needs, if not a list of the latest Apple downloads. Apple's Downloads page also provides categorical lists that include non-Apple software which may be submitted by the developer for inclusion. Non-Apple software includes freeware, drivers, shareware, widgets, demoware, etc. [Bill Fox]