At last we have a new version of CentOS but if you’re expecting CentOS 6 you still have to wait for a while as the next version most likely to be released is CentOS 5.6 followed closely by CentOS 6. If you need a clone of RHEL 6 to use, the closest one ready for a release is Scientific Linux 6 which is currently in RC2 with the GA version most likely to be released within two weeks.

The CentOS development team is pleased to announce the release of CentOS 4.9 for i386 and x86_64.

This release corresponds to the upstream vendor 4.9 release.

Also released in the updates repository for CentOS-4.9 are all updatesthrough March 1st, 2011.

If you are currently using an older CentOS 4 version, using this command will upgrade you to CentOS-4.9:

yum upgrade

NOTE:  The upstream provider did not respin media for the 4.9 release and therefore the CentOS project will also not respin our install media.  Installs moving forward will be off the 4.8 media and an upgrade will move you from version 4.8 to version 4.9.  We do this to maintain compatibility with 3rd party kernel drivers which are designed to be installed as part of the installation process.

This is the last expected set of changes to add new functionality to the CentOS 4.  We will continue to provide security updates and bug fixes for CentOS 4 until its End-of-Life scheduled for February 29, 2012.

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Major changes for this version are:

* The kernel-utils package provides microcode_ctl utility code and the microcode data itself — supplied by Intel — to assist the kernel in updating the CPU microcode at system boot time. This microcode supports all current Intel x86- and Intel 64-based CPU models and takes advantage of the mechanism built-in to Linux that allows microcode to be updated after system boot. When loaded, the updated microcode corrects the behavior of various Intel processors, as described in processor specification updates issued by Intel for those processors. In the CentOS-4.9 release the kernel-utils package has been updated with the 2010-09-14 version of Intel’s microcode.

*  OProfile in CentOS 4.9 now supports Intel Xeon (formerly codenamed Nehalem) processor performance events.

*  The KornShell (ksh) package in CentOS 4.9 has been upgraded to the upstream release version ksh93t+.

*  CentOS-4.9 provides an updated coreutils package, containing checksum utilities for the whole SHA-2 family, allowing a user to easily count or verify SHA-224, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512 checksums.

* CentOS-4.9 features version 3.6.13 of the Mozilla Firefox open source web browser.

*  SystemTap in CentOS-4.9 has been updated to version 1.3. Most notably, this update provides support for the newer kprobe capabilities.

*  OpenOffice 2.0 is now included in this release as a Technology Preview. This suite features several improvements, including ODF and PDF functionalities, support for digital signatures and greater compatibility with open suites in terms of format and interface. In addition to this, the OpenOffice 2.0 spreadsheet has enhanced pivot table support, and can now handle up to 65,000 rows.

For these and other changes, please see the CentOS specific release
notes here: http://wiki.centos.org/Manuals/ReleaseNotes/CentOS4.9

the detailed upstream release notes here: http://docs.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/4/html/4.9_Release_Notes/index.html

CentOS-4 Documentation is here: http://www.centos.org/docs/4/
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All previous released CentOS versions are available at: http://vault.centos.org/

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To stay current with CentOS:

Visit our website at http://www.centos.org/

Join the CentOS mailing list at: http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos

HowTos and other items on the wiki: http://wiki.centos.org/

Remember there is no new media for 4.9; which is why http://isoredirect.centos.org/centos/4.9/isos/i386/ still lists 4.8 install media