As most of our readers are well aware, macOS 10.15 Catalina was released to the public this past Monday. And as many of you are also aware, the installation process hasn’t gone very well for some people. (Check out the comment section on this post.)
Though our OWC development team and IT department have Catalina up and running on various machines for testing purposes, and I have a secondary Mac running the OS, as a company, we have not yet rolled it out to all employees. Why not? For starters, it is a corporate policy that we wait until at least revision X.1 (e.g., 10.15.1) of any new software release. This allows us to see how it fares with the general public – helping us make sure it’s stable. Thank you, public!
It is also crucial for us to thoroughly evaluate all of the corporate applications we use, as any hiccups or interruption to our workflow could critically impact our business – and that would make us sad. It could also create delays in the development and release of our awesomely cool products – and that would make you sad. So basically, OWC is waiting to update to Catalina so that no one will be sad.
Yes, there is a much higher percentage of people successfully completing Catalina’s installation – failures affect a small minority of users. But for those experiencing issues, it is incredibly frustrating. Especially considering how difficult it is to revert to Mojave.
Some of the issues that users are running into include the dreaded “macOS Catalina Won’t Install” error, the “Unable to Write Information to Disk,” and “Could Not Create a Preboot Volume” errors. For some unlucky people, the installation freezes or simply fails to complete. You can check out the Rocket Yard article “How to Fix macOS Catalina Installation Issues” as it details some of the most common and a few not-so-common Catalina installation problems you may run into – as well as several potential solutions.
If you are waiting to update to Catalina, please share your thoughts with other Rocket Yard readers in the comment section below. Heck, even if you didn’t wait and installed the new macOS right away, let us know your reasoning as well! After all, the more informed we are, the better. And the better we are, the less likely we are to be sad.
Since the latest update (Mac OS 10.15.6), my 2015 MB Air with an OWC Aura my Mac does not boot anymore from a deep sleep (showing the folder symbol with a question mark). This led so far that my MBA would not boot at all, so I had to do a fresh install, since the restored TM backup would also not boot.
Today, with the freshly installed 10.15.6, with my Air going into deep sleep, I had the same issue. It never came back (folder symbol with question mark). Unfortunately, there are no compatible firmware updates for the Aura for the new MacOS versions.
Are these issues known? Any advice would be great. Thanks!
Hi Daniel. These are not known issues, nor are there any firmware updates for anything like this. Seeing that flashing folder and question mark is telling su the drive is not being recognized, so it is likely that the drive is starting to fail. I would advise to take a back up when you are able, and then contact our technical support line for assistance in verifying warranty coverage and replacement options!
I have a Late 2015 iMac 21.5″ that currently is running Mohave. Can you tell me if the IOS Catalina is compatible and if it’s okay to do the update?
Yes, your iMac is compatible! One thing you will want to do is make sure that all of your software is 64-bit compatible. We have a blog post about that here.
unless you need the latest xcode, I don’t see a compelling reason. I have has some serious problems and am in the process ov reverting to Mojave right now.
Since Catalina does not support 32 bit apps, upgrading is OUT OF THE QUESTION.
When I did briefly need the latest XCode, I attempted to run Catalina from a fast Seagate hard drive on my 2018 Mac Mini, and it was too slow to tolerate.
So I purchased a 2TB Envoy Pro EX Thunderbolt SSD to get tolerable performance.
I don’t like Catalina. The battery lasts about 20 minutes using Catalina and my Overdrive app for library books won’t work because they didn’t follow apple requests to upgrade. I don’t like it.
I’m tired of Apple’s games. I’d like to uninstall if it were easier to do,
I did it cuz it came up in my updates – and it is TERRRRRRIBLE! Slow SLOW – half my funcuntions either dont’ work or have to be restarted to work – I HATE it – how do I uninstall it.
Hi Dorothy, try this:
How to Downgrade from macOS Catalina to Mojave or Earlier
OMFG this apple store thing is driving me insane. Over and over and over and over on all my family’s myriad apple devices with a known good password.
Want Libre back. Tried to upgrade to 62-bit, and get message from malware that developer has not verified. Have many files that I can’t access.
I will wait for somebody to solve the issue of QuickTime Player 7 replacement, before updating to Catalina.
I just spent hours saving photos and videos I had been organizing for years on iPhoto. I transferred all docs and get a correct service from Photos.
But I cannot do the equivalent with videos or films on Quick Time; and I do not want to risk losing all those. Since nobody can tell me whether some or all documents on QuickTime willl be readable on Catalina, i will just wait so that at least I know what to expect.
QuickTime Player 7 (Pro) is one of the huge number of 32 bit apps on which I am dependent.
As I previously indicated, I will not be updating to Catalina.
2019 Imac Core i9
The install of Catalina went ok. Had to power cycyle is once since it turned off. All the problems started after the install. My Mac would crash every 5-10 minutes. Different processes every time. I looked on some blogs and found others with the same issues. It turns out the OWC memory I added is not compatible with Catalina. Once I removed the RAM it stopped crashing. I ran EtreChrck and it see’s the memory but can’t tell anything about it. It’s like there are no drivers for it. Now I only have 8 gig of ram. I am hoping the next update fixes the issue, but I’m not counting on it.
Omg if only I had found your post earlier; I am glad I am not the only one! Sad part for me is, well it’s a long story involves Mac support, 4 wipes and reinstalls and a trip to the Mac store. Thank you for your post! Glad I am not the only one!
I upgraded to Catalina from Mojave on my 2015 MBP. I am having huge email probs, latest Suitcase Fusion works but won’t open all fonts automatically in indesign, ai and psd.
Sloooow font rendering, inability to attach files to email, Applications won’t open and won’t save to removable HD’s. Rendering font in apps is slow, and the reason I upgraded, the sidecar (using iPad as 2nd monitor for feee) feature does not work on a mid 2015 MBP (missed by 6 months).
There are a lot of funky hoops one needs to jump thru to get an app to be able to write to Internal/external HD(‘s). It took me 3 office365 reinstalls and allowing O365 apps in system prefs, security to access something???. Then turned on/off the right Helvetica, that all worked but 4 hours to figure it out. I know it’s for security but still.
Right now because email does not work I bought Spark email app and after a long time to figure how to make it work, it works fine, fingers crossed.
Still I think one of the probs as a graphic designer I am seeing is that some of my customer fonts are very old. P1. Normally the old rips ran off of P1 fonts bets. New rips will run pretty much everything. But customers still use old fonts and don’t change. That’s another subject.
As a result, all the new and old Helvetica’s conflict in system fonts for Excel Neo Office, Numbers, Pages, Mail and probably a huge cast of other apps that don’t like the conflict. They all seem to use a different Helvetica. TT, OT, Ps2, Ps1 then you have Neue, ITC, 55, bold extra bold. It’s no different then it was before but now made more complicated because of the learning curve because Catalina is so very different.
It’s challenging and when I need something done I have another High Sierra station because it’s the last OS the 2010 iMac will run. I wonder how long before the Adobe Creative Suite upgrades so that indesign won’t run the same file off of High Sierra as it would on Catalina. That’s progress! Good Luck All!
My 2009 Mac Mini runs Mojave just fine, thanks to a patcher tool.
It will very probably work with your 2010 iMac.
Checkout http://dosdude1.com/mojave/
The old consultant’s heuristic for advising on a computer purchase is:
1 – Discover what the client needs or wants to do
2- Help the client buy or build software that will meet the need.
3 – Recommend hardware that will run the software
Many only want to do simple things like wp, spreadsheet, web, email. Any hardware will do because the apps for those things are almost universally available.
Those of us posting have more specialized needs and chose a Mac because the best software for us ran on Mac. We are not buying Macs to make a fashion statement.
Apple would do well to remember that the average user would do just fine with Windows, Linux, Android, etc. If the cost and pain of being repeatedly frozen out gets too great, those folks will switch. It will cost less than a Mac and do what they need.
Those posting here are anxious to have the latest, fastest hardware, but not if it means sacrificing functionality or having to spend additional hundreds to thousands upgrading apps and peripherals just because Apple is to “pon-headed” to abandon 32-bit.
The hardware is a dead-end no matter how you look at it. Apple will eventually abandon it and it’s next to impossible to run any other OS on the bare metal.
Personally, I am very conflicted about my Mac use and keep a Windows 10 running along side the Mac to to all those thing that the Mac can’t handle.
The original Mac ad promoted Apple as a way of ‘ saving humanity from “conformity”‘. They seem to have lost their way.
If Apple keeps designing hardware for winning design awards rather than true improvements, I will likely abandon the platform as my gear wears out or is left behind in updates.
The only things I can see being Catalina’s purpose is to offer toys few of us will use (Apple TV and gaming being two examples) and to force upgrades.
For me, I didn’t see any REAL improvements. All I got was Catalina arguing with me over a known-good password.
I posted a response earlier and have to report that the problems keep getting worse with Catalina. I have installed it on a 2018 15″ MBPro, 2017 13″ MBPro and a 2018 Air, all of which showed the same issues.
Music is a disaster. Because the Catalina install on one machine trashed my music library and play lists which promptly propagated to all my other machines (including a 2017 i7 iMac which is still running Mojave) I had to rebuild my library which has around 20,000 tracks.Not only could I no longer upload all my library to iCloud (unknown errors) but when I came to download the library to each machine various random errors for tracks were encountered. On top of that the matching insists that, for instance, Help on the Beatles Help album is a duplicate of Help on the I album, so I end with incomplete albums. I find it amazing that for each version of the iCloud music library, odd tracks keep being left out of the library, tracks that were fine before. I end up restoring them from a local back up to each machine (this last effort had 60 tracks it claimed it could not download).
I encountered problems with my Apple ID sign in. I am one of those unfortunate souls who, due to an Apple problem early on when iCloud was first introduce, have a different ID for iCloud and for my Apps and iTunes/Music store. The system kept going round and round asking me to sign in. I also could not check the option to sync Keychains until I rebooted.
Music would not let me check the option to sync my music library with iCloud until I rebooted the machine.
Messages syncing does not work any better than the last OS version. Not only does it not sync all messages to all machines but also I still get text in the message box that I entered for the last message.
One positive note, FaceTime does not crash on my 2018 i9 MBPro now. Hurrah.
My iMac is staying in the land of Mojave until I see evidence that all the bugs have been removed.
I am happy some of you had a successful upgrade, but this has wasted hours of my time and I am not at all happy (we have 7 Macs, 4 iPhones, 3 Apple TVs, 5 HomePods and 2 iPads) and they are severely testing my commitment to Apple. It will be expensive to change, but I am seriously looking at my next moves and a gradual move away from the Apple infrastructure. I am a computer professional and this is not acceptable. It is why I left Microsoft and now Apple are just as bad. Software that is carelessly tested and with little or no support to help you out (try calling Apple with these issues….).
Rumor has it that Catalina will be renamed Vista! /ducking
As a user of both I can report that windows 10 has only 1 problem. It will occasionally blue-screen and become unbootable. I deal with that by keeping several clones of my boot drive (which is in a removable bay). I update the clones whenever I make a major config change.
My latest build is a Ryzen 7 2700 with 64 GB on an Asus MB. It has never so much as burped.
I use a program called Finale to write music. THEY informed us to NOT upgrade until they have verified that their software will run correctly under Catalina and they specifically said their previous versions (and they specified which ones) would NOT run on Catalina. I happen to be running one of those versions and there is a cost to upgrade anyway. I’ll wait until they say to upgrade. It will probably be 10.15.1 or later anyway!
MuseScore runs under Catalina. Still, I went back to Mojave because Catalina argued with me about a known-good password.
To all,
I was running High Sierra(HS) just fine until one day it just would not shut down. I could force the shutdown with the power button and on a restart, the MB Pro worked just fine, no problems but it would not shut down. I worked with Apple Care+ techs and tried closing down EVERY app running before trying to shut down. No JOY! Apple had me reinstall the OS. NO JOY! Still, it would not shut down. Apple had me do a complete RESTORE from Time Machine backup from a date that preceded the start of the shutdown problem. Still, NO JOY!
Finally, Apple told me to just ‘bite the bullet’ and upgrade to Catalina. Of course, I was really afraid to try an upgrade with a known problem plaguing me but I figured I could always restore from backup again if everything went sideways.
So, I held down the power button for more than 5 seconds to shut down the 2018 MBP with Touchbar. When it was totally restarted I closed out all of the non-essential running apps and did the update to Catalina. It took a while and I was rather anxious about the end result.
The update finished just fine and the shutdown problem was gone. It was a total success. YEAH!
I have been using Catalina for over a week now and I have had no problems of any kind.
If you’ve attempted a Catalina install and have a pre-existing Boot Camp on a fusion drive, go to the linked article about Catalina installation difficulties.
I’ve left a rather wordy comment there that I don’t intend to replicate here :-).
Adding a link for folks if they’d like to read your comments:
How to Fix macOS Catalina Installation Issues
Very well stated, BTW!
I have upgraded to the latest OS for the following devices. Have any user faced a Target Display issue after pressing Cmd+F2 on iMac? (Intension to project Macbook Pro Display to iMac as a secondary screen) – iMac screen goes black but doesn’t allow display extension)
Ipad Mini 4: iPad OS 13.1.3 (Sidecar doesn’t work as it applies only to iPad Mini 5, no biggie but scratch head! Why?)
iMac 27in 2013: MacOS Catalina 10.15
Macbook Pro 2017 (Touch Bar): MacOS Catalina 10.15
I recently purchased a Xerox Phaser 3260 printer. It served me well until I installed Catalina on my 2019 iMac. Catalina only supports 64-bit apps, drivers, etc. Xerox doesn’t have a 64-bit driver for the 3260 printer and hasn’t announced that they will. So, no driver, no printing.
That’s my tough luck. Thanks a lot Xerox.
You might be able to use a cups driver.
https://www.openprinting.org/driver/Postscript-Xerox/
I have a rather similar story, though at least Brother produced a print driver and a scanner driver for my MFC-L8850CDW multifunction laser printer.
It looks like the device manufacturers will have a difficult time overcoming the 32 bit extinction, and the recovery time may be significant depending on the complexity of the software.
Installed Catalina on my 2015 iMac 27″ with no installation issues, even though a few of the reboots scared me a little — had one 10 minute period where it restarted 5 times. Just let it do it’s thing, and it finally decided things were good and booted into the new OS.
Post- installation I’ve only ran into a couple of issues. One was with signing on a library file for Reality (That is a render interface for DAZ CGI software). That particular one was interesting to fix, as initially there was no dialogue box option to bypass it, the only options were delete and ignore. By selecting ignore, I was able to go to the file and open it with BBEdit, which allowed me to add it to the ‘ignore’ list on the security checker.
The second issue is with a game from the Apple Store – it’s a freebie, so no money lost, but the end-of-game dialogue overlay does not render. Funny part is, I can continue to the next game if I click in just the right spot (the spot where the ‘new game’ button SHOULD be).
My Thunderbay 4 was plugged in during the whole upgrade, and has made it through with no issues.
In general, it has gone smoothly; Apple has been warning developers for multiple years that they were going to 64 bit only in the future, and have been making it clear that Mojave was the last OS to support 32 bit. It makes sense when you realize that the hardware has been true 64 bit on iMacs (their main line) since 2007. (Verified with MacTracker) I think 12 years was more than enough time to allow developers to update their code; the issue is corporate management not taking the multiple statements of Apple seriously, so now they are having to scramble to fix something which should have been handled within the last 5 years.
Having to support 32 bit means an extra layer in the operating system – by deleting the layer, the OS ends up being more stable once the undocumented dependancies are all traced down and updated. That is where Catalina is at now – programs accessing features that nobody documented (*nix libraries used by MacOS for example) are causing errors that were not caught be Apple OR the Beta testers. We went through this with Tiger (The PowerPC to Intel switch), and by the .2 or .3 release of Catalina the worst of the exceptions should be handled.
Also, from a security standpoint, once the final bugs are sorted out the overall security of the OS should improve, as with 32 bit code removed there is a greatly reduced chance of the legacy code having security holes in libraries that are no longer maintained. On all platforms, not just Apple, the push is to 64 bit; most developers do not maintain their 32 bit versions once they port things over, so any flaws in the old code are just left there.
you didn’t even mention that Catalina totally leaves 32 bit behind. So no 32-bit Apps will run.
Yes, there are only a few of them left, but in my corporate environment, there is one critical app that is, thus preventing me from upgrading to Calalina.
Clearly, I am not the only person who depends upon some 32 bit apps.
This raises an interesting question. Support for 32 bit apps was working in Mojave. So, why did Apple remove this support?
Was there a cost in leaving this feature in the OS?
Did Apple decide to remove it because it was no longer cool?
Did they remove it to force people to purchase newer software?
Just wondering.
Along with removing Ethernet ports; going to oddball connections for USB; uncomfortable micro; and flimsy keyboards to allow ever-thinner computer cases, it’s just more of Apple’s Firm Over Function design philosophy.
Mice, not micro.
Yes it’s both Firm (Apple) over function
and
form over function
:)
I have a feeling that the move to remove 32 bit applications may be due to a future planned move to their own processors which may not support 32 bit. Otherwise I can see no reason for the move.
I would not be at all surprised to see Apple move to their own ARM based processors so that they can control the cadence of their releases and not be controlled by Intel and their release cadences and woes.
That may very well be but 64-bit processors can runs apps in a vm-like way that could just as easily emulate a 16-bit, 32-bit or other non-native code.
MS hs been doing it for years. It’s called WOW (windows on windows0.
I’m still happily chugging along on High Sierra on my late-2013 Mac Pro, and will be until Apple releases the new Mac Pros so I can make hardware decisions for the future. That may mean waiting longer to see what they come up with to fill the gigantic void between the old Mac Pro and the new Mac Pro. And it’s not an iMac…
I quit loving all-in-one designs with the Mac SE30. I have a good investment in high-quality monitors (by EIZO and ASUS) and OWC RAIDs. I don’t want laptop-style guts with ports, graphics and bandwidth limiting my desktop computer just for the sake of a sleek design, and shrinking to a 27-inch screen from my 32-inch 4K monitor makes no sense to my eyes.
Hopefully Apple will understand that lots of designers want ample power for modern software, but don’t need to run four 8K monitors for massive video FX compositing.
Until then, my OS upgrades are for application performance only, not for eye candy… or worse, like I’m trying to get my desktop computing done on a big cellphone.
I’m not updating to Catalina.
I have a number of 32 bit software applications that I’m very happy with that are not available in 64 bits, the Amazing Slow Downer being one.
I love Apple’s Pages and use it for writing, but occasionally I need to use Microsoft Word. My Office 2011 works just fine. The only option I see for Microsoft Office with Catalina is a subscription to Office 360. I’m not interested in paying Microsoft every year for something I already own.
I’ll be 80 in May. Mojave may be my last MacOS.
You may be happy with Libre Office as an alternative to Microsoft Office. They do ask for a donation if you wish to use it but it is voluntary. Very nice program with some of the bells and whistles missing but very capable to Microsoft Office. Files are can be used in their native format.
Thanks! I’ll give it a try. With Mojave of course.
I’m having flashbacks to the transition from OS9 to OSX. For a long time Apple provided “Classic” mode under OSX, which allowed all my OS9 applications to run. In fact, I still have a G4 system which runs 10.4 (Tiger) with Classic, and my grandkids still play Zoombini.
I understand why Classic couldn’t continue once Apple switched to Intel CPU’s. But now? I don’t see a reason for excluding 32 bit apps.
This may interest everyone here:
From Overdrive:
“ On August 26, 2019, OverDrive notified library partners that we would be discontinuing support for the OverDrive for Mac desktop app. On September 4, OverDrive removed the app from app.overdrive.com and eliminated the download option for MP3 audiobooks on Mac via your library’s OverDrive website. This change unfortunately frustrated users who were using the app to download and transfer audiobooks from your library to MP3 players.
“OverDrive made this decision in anticipation of Mac’s new OS, expected for release this fall, called Catalina. The macOS Catalina will require all apps to be 64-bit. The OverDrive for Mac app is 32-bit, which will make it incompatible with the upcoming macOS.
“When we decided to end support for OverDrive for Mac, we failed to appropriately gauge the number of users that would be impacted and how. We are sorry for this mistake and the inconvenience it caused for your patrons and staff.”
Catalina has an issue with Audible, at least for me. Both in the initial install of Catalina, and the 15 Security update, which should have been 15.1, since it used a full installer, with post install dialogs such as Send Apple Diagnostics? Both times Catalina removed 70+ Audible Audiobooks from my iPhone 10XS, and they were difficult to reload.
The first time I spent nearly four hours with an Applecare Senior Advisor and we finally gave up. But the next morning I found iBooks on the iPhone mysteriously had 70+ audiobooks installed.
All looked good until the Catalina Security update. I then told another Applecare Senior Advisor that the 70+ audiobooks were again erased, despite that the setup of selected Audiobooks in Finder was correct, nothing synced to the iPhone. I suspected the authorization of this 2017 MacBook (from OWC) with Audible was faulty even though this had been properly authorized in Mojave, and links to Audible said this Mac using Catalina was authorized by Audible. After struggling, we deauthorized the Mac, and reauthorized it in iBooks. This was tricky, in that it appeared it was successfully reauthorized, but we had to redownload an Audible file, and double click on the downloaded file in Downloads. At that point Audible put up a dialog saying Authorize this Computer on Audible to enable use of the file in iBooks on the Mac. Then Syncing the 70+ Audible audiobooks all loaded into iBooks on the iPhone with no further problems, even seem in fast in 10-15 minutes.
Summary: I my case, Catalina broke the MacBook authorization previously established in Mojave, and it is not apparent. No dialog says this Mac is not Authorized on Audible. There is no help, and the Audible Helps files are only partially updated to show Authorizing the Mac with iBooks, vs with iTunes. Perhaps that is the issue. Apple/Audible have not cleanly (or attempted at all) to transfer the Authorization from iTunes to iBooks/Finder. This was a major change to eliminate iTunes in MacOS, and the two companies did not handle it well.
If you are making an OS upgrade without a BOOTABLE backup, you are asking for trouble. You may want to keep that bootable backup in case you want to run some 32-bit applications…
I like using Tech Tool Pro and their latest version only works on Mojave or earlier macOS’s. So I’m reluctant to upgrade until their product is capable of addressing issues that might occur in Catalina.
Hello OWC..
Trying to reply to Mark C’s response triggered some cyber limbo for my post.. I had to modify a duplication notice to unstick it.. Then it posted both lol
Well … still a few 32 bit stuff that I require … Wait is good but the biggest problem will be the 32 bit stuff …
It has been a challenge this time…
First of all, it had to re-download the upgrade file… the first one failed integrity tests. Installation of Catalina triggered language prefs exceptions a couple of times.. It got lost once or twice, and had to restart… Opposite corner keyboard commands function is still confused about shut down vs sleep and restart :)
There is some kind of file mess going on with the OS, not knowing where to place system files/folders and adding a relocated files folder.. …That can’t be eliminated; as the OS requires it.
I had a root level app installed, that the OS has finally found and evicted, while performing the OS upgrade/install: Applejack
..I hate to say goodbye to old friends!
Maybe they’ll upgrade soon and make a compatible security patch..
Viewing movies, and/or playing video slots online, has triggered three total system freezes so far; that required a hard restart..
I did finally locate my iPhone in the ‘finder’ menu lol
I do like the music, movies/TV and DVD player separation.. Apple ingenuity :)
There was also the OWC SoftRAID/OS-bug work around, it required several restarts and using Terminal in R-Mode to disable/enable the CSRutil.. This all took an additional hour…. I love to play with technology though, so good practice and entertaining too!
Hi Walter, I’m not sure if you saw, but OWC released SoftRAID 5.8, so you should have conmplete Compatability without any workarounds needed!
Thanks Mark,
..sadly, I had Catalina installed already, so it required the work around to install 5.8
Drat – well, I’m glad you got it figured out!
I gladly used the instructions from OWC… Not a free lancer yet!
I am not updating to Catalina until I find a suitable substitute for Excel in Office 2011. I have a large number of useful Excel workbooks, have been using Excel since 1986, and resent Microsoft changing to a subscription approach for Office 365. I am trying Numbers, Google Sheets, and Open Office (so far with little success).
I’ll not install Catalina until I have a useable 64-bit app for spreadsheets/charts.
You may be interested in Libre Office. See my post to Gil Steil.
I’m over in Libre Office now. I really didn’t mind the subscription for MS Office until they greatly revised the EULA.
I know a lot of the programs I have paid for (came with a disk ) will not work on Catalina. I am also leery about upgrading because I am in courses right now and I would hate to lose my adobe connect. Too many times I have upgraded or rather started to upgrade and my computer stalled. Not a good feeling. So I usually wait 6 months and sometimes longer to upgrade. I just wish the programs we have would keep up with the upgrades. It would make life so much simpler.
As many have pointed out in the past. Your computer and programs work just fine now. Did they come with a guarantee that they would run forever on unforeseen OS upgrades? How many products do you buy come with upgrades? Cars, clothes, apartments.
Enough whining.
And in part this is what subscriptions are about, paying for keeping up.
https://blog.macsales.com/54532-why-waiting-to-install-macos-catalina-might-be-a-good-idea/#comment-109895. Excel still working fine after 8 years; that’s a good run and it will continue to work for many more years.
I used to use Excel and it’s an incredible product. Stick with it. No need to change. Just buy a couple of pre-Catalina Macs as backups.
What are disks? Oh those things you throw.
I am not whining. Apple is perfectly free to remove a working feature (32 bit support) from the operating system, and I am perfectly free to decide that because they have removed this support, I will not upgrade.
However, it is really annoying to continually receive arrogant notifications from Apple that this app and that app must be upgraded. They do NOT need to be upgraded, because I am not upgrading the OS. I am not aware of anything in Catalina that is more important to me than my working apps.
Good point.
https://robservatory.com/remove-the-macos-catalina-guilt-trip-from-macos-mojave/
Another reason to avoid upgrading is the more frequent security nags. E.g., I have to allow my iPhone to access my computer every time I plug it into the computer.
Thanks for the tip, Greg. I will be turning off that arrogant message after I do my next backup.
Not sure I’ll ever “upgrade” to Cat. I use my Macs for personal home automation that I developed the last 20+ years (hardware, software, sensors, cameras, integration with various commercial HA products). To have to change it all just because of the 64 bit requirement just isn’t worth it.
I’m sure at some point I’ll have to set one of my Cat-capable Macs (that would be 4 of my 33 Macs) up with 10.15 to use my iPhone & iPads. Maybe next year…
I’m glad most of you did not have trouble with your upgrade.
I did, and it was ugly! The (clean) install on a MBPro 2014 went fine w/o issues. No software other than Apple was installed.
Two days later, the computer literally stopped working completely and required a forced power down. When restarting, we got the faint gray folder instead of the Apple logo, and unable to boot. The only recovery option that worked was to boot from a USB drive, from which the SSD had to be wiped. It sounds simple, but it took hours. In essence, Catalina corrupted both the “Data” partition and the “Base System” partition.
Apple will get this right, but I’m waiting until the dust settles until I re-try the upgrade on my (thankfully non-critical) laptop.
Great suggestion
Thanks
updated a few days ago, then got the update to the update. but after the second update my photoshop no longer works correctly. I can’t cut out a background and save a PSD file, only a layered tiff that won’t open on some of the other machines in our office. Fortunately i have a PC with wWindows 10 that i can make up the lost functionality of my Mac.
My photoshop cs5 won’t save any of my photos on the MacBook pro. I am looking at alternative programs with one time fee such as affinity photo.
There’s GIMP, of course
I do a lot of CGI work, and have found that the Affinity Photo / Affinity Designer combination actually works better for me for post-production than the Photoshop subscription that i was paying for. Both work well on Catalina, and are updated regularly, along with having iOS / iPadOS versions that are actually quite functional. The support for 64 bit Photoshop plugins helps too!
Before upgrading my 2013 MacBook Pro, used Parallels to create an OS 10.14.6 virtual machine to keep a few legacy 32-bit programs alive – and just in case there was a problem with version 15.0. Made one with Windows 10 for similar reason. Haven’t had any issues other than getting used to new Music interface.
I’ve chosen not to update to Catalina for reasons mentioned here and by several others as well. All have their own reasons (and compications) to be cautious and withhold the zeal to get the very latest up and running, particularly when it’s likely to be up and not running. I’ll wait for bugs to be fixed and stability to be had.
I’m waiting for the dust to settle before I upgrade. I’ve been through the early upgrade problems before and have no desire to repeat the experience.
Waiting to upgrade, for several reasons: 1) I still have 32-bit applications I use. 2) I have been burned by other, beta software, and even though this is a public release, problems have appeared, as noted above. 3) I never buy a new model car in the first year it appears; let others do the shakedown cruise. 4) If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. (My current OS serves all purposes at the moment.)
Hello, I have been informed by 2 Music Industry companies to postpone installing the new update. These 2 companies are Native Instruments and UJAM. Because I so heavily use these to companies’ products via Logic, I’m waiting for the ‘go-ahead’ from either of them. So far, I don’t NEED an OS update, do you? I am running an iMac desktop, now running Mac OS 10.4.6. Good luck readers!
Am waiting for my trading platform to become compatible. However, with the Apple Mail issue, I’m glad I am waiting. I use Apple Mail.
Normally, all Apple system upgrades, for me, go smoothly, except once 2-3 years ago, but it was resolved.
Successfully loaded Catalina on 2012 Mac Mini and on 2012 MBP. Purchased data doubler for MBP and installed Catalina on 2nd internal drive. Was difficult as it didn’t want to be on secondary drive but it’s up and running along with El Capitan still on primary boot drive. No problems other than older 32 bit apps don’t work.
I think it’s always a good idea to use a tool like Superduper or Carbon Copy Cloner to make a clone to an external drive before doing any major upgrade. (Two clones wouldn’t hurt.)
I consider it essential, especially when there are shenanigans going on, as with Catalina. Always good insurance; it has saved my hide on more than one occasion!
Not sure when I’ll do the upgrade, due to 32-bit reliance, but I’ll definitely have some fresh clones done.
Anyone who used a 32-bit tax prep program should probably wait 3 years to upgrade unless they are 100% audit-proof and sure they’ll never need to file an amended return. Either that or buy an old mac from MacSales just for contingencies.
Or install Mojave on a partition (or an entire drive) and the needed programs on a hard drive-External or Internal.
https://www.econtechnologies.com/chronosync/guide-bootable-backup.html is one way. Creating a copy of your current drive which then includes your current apps and data. Nothing specific to ChronoSync. Old Mac not needed. Just another drive. I partitioned an 8TB Seagate I’m using for other backups.
PS Haven’t upgraded main machine iMac. Waiting until an update comes without another following a week later. MacRumors yesterday: “Apple Seeds Second Beta of Upcoming macOS Catalina 10.15.1 Update to Developers.”
My bookkeeping software is currently 32 bit but they are promising 64 bit code in their 2020 update. I am hoping their 64 bit fix will be able to read my old 32 bit backups but I think your advice is best.
Installed first day on non-critical 2012 MBP. Smoothest upgrade I’ve had in a long time. I almost always have stalls/freezes during the upgrade requiring a force reboot and sometimes starting over. This time installed first time and just worked. I think one screen to go through.
Will wait on my more critical iMac. But I just installed Epson Scan 2 on both units and it works. Previous version was 32-bit. Software works on both Catalina and Mojave.
I should add I did no real prep on the MBP, but the iMac will get double backups and a clone before upgrading.
My install on my 2012 i7 13″ MacBook Pro went flawlessly, although it took longer than Mojave did.
What I think I may be having a problem with is Photos.
It’s been “gathering favorites,” “Curating Best Photos,” “Detecting Duplicates,” “Composing Layout,” “Analyzing Scenes,” “Gathering Favorites,” “Going Out for Pizza and Beer” for nearly 24 hours.
The little progress bar at the bottom has only progress about 25%, and there’s an instruction under it saying “Leave device connected to power”
I suspect that’s a threat. “Leave this thing plugged in AND turned on OR ELSE!!!”
I saw another message somewhere that said I could actually quit Photos and the Mac would do its stuff behind the scenes, undercover and undoubtedly without alerting the media.
It didn’t take this long for FileVault to encrypt my 500 GB SSD after I’d already occupied it with 260 GB of stuff!
I have installed Catalina on the new MacBook Pro I just bought from you and my wife’s Mac Mini, primarily because they were set for automatic updates. I’m sticking with 10.14 because too many of my frequently used apps won’t run on Catalina. No trouble was experienced with the installations, but I am unhappy with the “new finder window” rearrangement and wish they had left it the way it was. I don’t use iCloud as I have plenty of storage and am still dubious about security. I heartily agree that waiting a while to upgrade to a new OS version is wise. I have been a Mac user since 1988, (OS3.0) and the change to OS7 was difficult, and it took waiting to 10.3 before I felt leaving 9.2 behind was worthwhile.
The upgrade from Mojave to Catalina was quite uneventful for me and Catalina is working quite well. As usual I :
1. Did some homework ahead of time checking out Catalina Public Beta around Beta 2 or 3 with critical apps and reported any issues I saw to the developers.
2. Did a full system clone after all apps and all Mojave updates were complete so I could reboot to a working system if something ran amok. An a big thing, verify that the latest clone will boot.
3. Downloaded the Catalina upgrader but did not immediately install. Saved a copy of the installer to my home server and created a USB installer as well.
4. Backed up all iDevices. While this may not have been necessary, with the changes in syncing and backup I wanted to make sure the Mojave install “knew” these devices.
5. Also, separately backed up all my critical data and iTunes Library, which usually gets done daily via automator actions anyway.
6. One last thing I always do, run Disk Utility Disk First Aid on both the physical drive itself and any other volumes from recovery.
6. Ran the Catalina upgrader.
FWIW, when upgrading to Mojave in something of a preparation for the macOS that would come next I did a clean install. I had been doing in place upgrades and system migrations that started with 10.7.x so I figured it was a good time to start fresh without any old baggage.
I have installed Catalina on 3 MacBooks. 2018 Air, 2018 15″ MacBook Pro (i9, 32 GB memory 1 TB SSD) and a 2017 13″ MacBook Pro (i7, 16 GB memory and 1 TB SSD). All were upgrades from Mojave. The results on all 3 were nearly identical.
Install went well. In one case (the Air), it froze on the setting up my Mac screen. I forced a shut down and restarted and then all came up as expected without a new prompt to set up my Mac. Everything seemed OK until I noticed that it had not set the sync option Keychain and Photos in iCloud. This was the state that I found for the other two MacBooks who setup correctly but then I observed that iCloud was not syncing correctly. I could check the options to sync the missing options.
System preferences showed a setup issue for iCloud which required me to enter my Apple ID for iCloud and then my MacBook log in. However upon entering they went back to the prompt for the Apple ID and login password. It kept going in a loop. No resolution.
So I signed out of iCloud and back in. This corrected the login and sync issues but of course I had to deal with iCloud and its painful resyncing for Photos which takes days to resolve.
This is possibly worst upgrade of an OS from Apple I have seen. So I am not touching my 2017 5K iMac. It has all my photos etc. and I cannot afford to possibly lose everything. It stays on Mojave until I am convinced that the upgrade actually works.
I’d like to know how and where to download an image of Mojave to keep off to the side in the event something Goes Bang.
Hellppp! Thanks!
https://support.apple.com/downloads/mojave
Make your own: Attach a big-enough (and empty) external HD, buy SuperDuper: https://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper The best Mac back-up software around. It will make an exact clone of everything you have now. (Be aware: it takes hours.) But most importantly, it will be BOOTABLE. If update goes bad, just reboot from the external and you’re back in business.
I will not be updating. I depend on too many 32 bit apps.
Ditto. Not all apps have 64b replacements
I, too, was laden with 32-bit apps. Most notably, Adobe’s Creative Suite. I bit the bullet and cut the cord.
Despite the steep learning curve for the open source alternatives, I refuse to rent software from Adobe, Microsoft or anyone else. I hate the subscription model with a deep and abiding passion.
I’m trying to think of it like a Marine would: adapt and overcome.
I’m not missing Photoshop nearly as much as I thought I would, but I do miss InDesign a bunch. Pages sucks, and I’ve not yet found a decent alternative to ID, but I’d as soon use BareBonesEdit for page layout before paying Adobe one more thin dime considering the thousands of dollars I’ve given them over the last 30+ years for just their upgrades!
Try the Affinity suite: Photo, Designer, Publisher. Quite a learning curve but I’m getting there. Outright purchase with updates till major upgrades. Significantly less that US$80 ea. Publisher still needs developing to provide full support for interactive output, but output for printing or pdf is excellent.
A wise policy.
I wait for the 2nd or 3rd bug fix update on new OS versions and have system preferences set to not auto install OS updates.
With Jobs gone Apple has gotten a little sloppy and rushes out software before it is ready to meet annual deadlines.
I wish Apple had a choice to auto update all but OS versions.
I don’t allow auto updates either. Especially since one can’t back it out. Once installed, one is stuck.
My only 32 bit stuff seems to be Epson drivers.
OWC’s corporate policy is wise—I discovered it is unwise to install an X.0 version of an Apple OS a long time ago. Apple keeps wanting more control, becoming less user friendly, especially if you do anything “different”—like using apps that Apple didn’t sell you, or not liking the apps Apple supplies. While a certain amount of this behavior is justifiable in terms of protecting against malware, it seems a lot of it is motivated more by a desire to increase profits.
Frankly, I do not trust Apple, because their dominant motivation is profit. They do this by controlling what and how users can use hardware, and software, the users have paid for. Apple’s objective isn’t just “everything Apple,” it is “everything belongs to Apple,” including your data and how you use it.