We’ve been hearing for a while that OS X Mountain Lion would be released in mid-to-late July, and Apple confirmed a July release for Mountain Lion at their WWDC keynote this month – but nailing down a specific release date can be a tricky task.
While there have already been a number of rumors regarding possible release dates, MacRumors points out something very interesting that seems to hint at a July 22nd release for the next version of OS X: A vacation blackout for all Apple employees during the last week of July!
MacRumors has now heard from several employees at a third-party firm offering technical support for Apple products that their company has imposed a vacation blackout from July 22 through 29, requiring “all hands on deck” in its desktop and portables division to support an unspecified event.
This makes a great deal of sense, allowing Apple to launch Mountain Lion on the 22nd, and giving them a full week to handle the extra rush for support and customer assustance following the release. That week could also be used to release new Mac hardware, such as new iMacs or Mac minis (or a 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro), which were absent from mention during the WWDC keynote. This supports our previous report that Apple is planning to release new Macs in mid-to-late July.
As always, this is just speculation at this point, but it does make a lot of sense.