Apple's Leopard causing 'blue screen of death'

Following its release on Friday, Mac OS X Leopard users have been encountering the dreaded "blue screen" error when trying to install the operating system.

Some Mac users upgrading to Mac OS X Leopard over the weekend have reported their systems becoming frozen on a blue screen while trying to reboot after the initial installation of the software, and losing data, such as photos, stored on the machines as a result.

According to the Apple support site, the error may have been caused by a conflict with third-party "enhancement" software for previous versions of OS X that some users had installed.

However, according to posts on discussion forums over the weekend, the problem is not confined to users with third-party software installed on their systems.

Apple has since posted a fix for the problem on its support website, suggesting that users perform an "archive and install" installation of the upgrade, which relocates all existing Mac OS X system files into a folder labelled "previous system".

The issue is currently the top search on Apple's support site, with a link being posted to the solution via its top 10 ranking.

Apple declined to comment on the issue.