Actually h.264 hardware acceleration was introduced in 10.1 mid 2010 and it had a public beta in the months before. It was Windows only with Adobe saying: "Mac

Actually h.264 hardware acceleration was introduced in 10.1 mid 2010 and it had a public beta in the months before. It was Windows only with Adobe saying: "Mac OS X does not expose access to the required API" [1]. Apple opened up the hardware API while 10.1 was on the finish line [2] and so the Mac only got support in the next 10.2 release. So another interpretation is: Apple was well aware that smooth video playback was coming to other platforms and Jobs piece (and opening up the acceleration API) was an reaction to that. [1] http://www.adobe.com/cn/devnet/flashplayer/articles/fplayer10_1_hardware_acceleration.html http://www.adobe.com/cn/devnet/flashplayer/articles/fplayer1... [2] http://kodi.tv/osx-gets-h-264-acceleration/ http://kodi.tv/osx-gets-h-264-acceleration/