anyone else running old macOS on purpose?

[firelighter487]

i have a 2015 MBP and i've noticed that Big Succ and Monterey are both a lot slower than Catalina, presumably because they are optimized for M1, where Catalina is intel-only. has anyone else noticed this? for the time being i'm keeping Catalina on it, as it's pretty zippy still.

 

[kd5jos]

i have a 2015 MBP and i've noticed that Big Succ and Monterey are both a lot slower than Catalina, presumably because they are optimized for M1, where Catalina is intel-only. has anyone else noticed this? for the time being i'm keeping Catalina on it, as it's pretty zippy still.

I don’t know if you were around for the transition TO Intel. A LOT of people said/did the same thing around 10.4.

I have a core 2 Duo Mac Mini. It’s running OS X server 10.6.

As long as you understand the risk/benefit, and are willing to accept the risk to attain the benefit, what else is there?

 

[firelighter487]

I don’t know if you were around for the transition TO Intel. A LOT of people said/did the same thing around 10.4.

I have a core 2 Duo Mac Mini. It’s running OS X server 10.6.

As long as you understand the risk/benefit, and are willing to accept the risk to attain the benefit, what else is there?

when apple started the transition to intel i was 6 years old lol.

i do own a PowerMac G5 and an iMac G3, the G5 is running 10.4 and the G3 is running OS9. the G5 is a total dog running 10.5, it's truly horrible compared to 10.4, i guess that's similar to the current situation...

 

[panzer06]

My i9 MBP 16 with AMD 5500m is running Catalina. I remember I didn't upgrade for some reason but can't remember exactly why. I have a M1 Max MBP 16 that's up to date. The older one will stay on Catalina until I sell it or it dies.

 

[Fishrrman]

Yes.
I've purposely "held back" my 2018 Mini on Mojave -- the last Mac OS that can run 32 bit software. It's one of the best Mac OS releases, in my opinion.

If Catalina is working fine (and fast) for you, and you have no "software reasons" that would require an upgrade, my advice is to "stick with it".

What works... works.

 

[dinobear]

I'm running Catalina on my mbp 16" loaded with 64gb ram and 5600m. Runs great.

Unfortunately I'm starting to run into an issue where some software I'd like to get is being made for Big Sur+ only (Unreal Engine 5). I think I'm going to jump into Ventura when it's released and hope for the best... But I'm still thinking about it. Unreal Engine looks fun to play with but I dont need it for work so might change my mind depending what I read upon it's release.

This laptop still feels super speedy and has been great for working on all my client projects so I really don't want to run into any issues with things like my printer, MIDI controls, software... I have no desire to get the new M laptops yet and expect to run this machine for 2 more years.

If I upgrade to Ventura, I can always reset my machine to Catalina right?

 

[firelighter487]

Yes.
I've purposely "held back" my 2018 Mini on Mojave -- the last Mac OS that can run 32 bit software. It's one of the best Mac OS releases, in my opinion.

If Catalina is working fine (and fast) for you, and you have no "software reasons" that would require an upgrade, my advice is to "stick with it".

What works... works.

mojave was a f*cking fantastic OS, i could run that instead but eh, catalina does fine and it's a lot newer in terms of the version of Pages that it runs...

 

[ahurst]

Yes.
I've purposely "held back" my 2018 Mini on Mojave -- the last Mac OS that can run 32 bit software. It's one of the best Mac OS releases, in my opinion.

If Catalina is working fine (and fast) for you, and you have no "software reasons" that would require an upgrade, my advice is to "stick with it".

What works... works.

I'm still at Mojave on my Late 2013 iMac too: it only officially supports up to Catalina, so for a minor increase in security and software compatibility I'm losing out on 32-bit app support, the loss of old-style iTunes, and other minor annoyances.

I've got a 2021 MBP running Monterey for newer apps and whatnot, so it's more useful to hold back the iMac on Mojave so it can better fill the few gaps my MBP can't handle.

 

[hallux]

I WAS holding off on Monterey because reports were that the map update software for my car navigation system was unable to see the USB drive to build the update. Someone with the same car then said they had it working, so I went and updated. Apparently it works fine on M1 Macs but not on Intel Macs so now I can't build the update drive (next time one comes out, I did one right before updating my Mac) unless I build a USB stick to boot Big Sur or they update the software to work properly.

and of course, as I go to verify this I see there's an update to the map downloader app and it seems to be able to access the USB drive! So, no, I don't have a need for an older OS now...

 

[Jack Neill]

I have been using 10.9.5 on a 11" air and its fantastic as far old OS on purpose. I found on my 2015 Big Sur was a little bit smoother and faster than Monterey and I have downgraded it to 11.6.7. I have Big Sur or Monterey on every 2012 and newer I have. Catalina just doesn't do it for me. Big Sur on my 2012's feels night and day compared to Catalina.

 

[Nermal]

I'm running 10.14 on my 2015 MBP. It does what I need, and what I need is to be able to edit large files in TextEdit without it getting confused. I'm not sure which version it broke in, so I dare not install a newer version!

 

[Isamilis]

i have a 2015 MBP and i've noticed that Big Succ and Monterey are both a lot slower than Catalina, presumably because they are optimized for M1, where Catalina is intel-only. has anyone else noticed this? for the time being i'm keeping Catalina on it, as it's pretty zippy still.

I still use Mojave on almost all my Macs (iMac, MBP, MBA). Only my MBA 2020 use Catalina. It’s all on purpose due to better performance and non-critical new features on the newer MacOS.

 

[Isamilis]

I have been using 10.9.5 on a 11" air and its fantastic as far old OS on purpose. I found on my 2015 Big Sur was a little bit smoother and faster than Monterey and I have downgraded it to 11.6.7. I have Big Sur or Monterey on every 2012 and newer I have. Catalina just doesn't do it for me. Big Sur on my 2012's feels night and day compared to Catalina.

Yeah, Big Sur smoother than Catalina but it much slower (in my experience - intel MBA 2020). Already tried reinstall few times but still end up with same results.

 

[nvmls]

Yes.
I've purposely "held back" my 2018 Mini on Mojave -- the last Mac OS that can run 32 bit software. It's one of the best Mac OS releases, in my opinion.

If Catalina is working fine (and fast) for you, and you have no "software reasons" that would require an upgrade, my advice is to "stick with it".

What works... works.

Mojave was pretty solid yea, later macOS versions went downhill though sadly.

 

[sracer]

I'm still running Mojave on my 2017 iMac. (High Sierra on my 2014 iMac that I use for my Plex server and as a 2nd display to the 2017 iMac via target display mode) For as long as I use this system, it will remain on Mojave.

But I know that even if these systems will physically be able to continue, it will be software requirements that will force me to prematurely retire them. The latest versions of MS Office and iWork are not available for Mojave. I don't NEED those versions yet, but if I do, then I'll be forced to upgrade my current systems or buy a new one.

 

[theMarble]

I run Mojave on my 2015 MacBook Pro, not because I use any 32-bit apps or I prefer the old OS but because it seems that it has a heart attack if I update to Catalina, Big Sur or Monterey. I've had no problems with all 3 on different Macs of mine (Catalina + Big Sur on a 2010 White MacBook and Monterey on a ThinkPad X270) but this MBP has hourly kernel panics if it has anything newer.

Apart from that, I maintain a collection of vintage macs (see my signature) which I still use on a day to weekly basis. A few are running PPC or Intel versions of Linux (PPC Void and Ubuntu 22.04) but the rest run OS 9.2.2 through Snow Leopard.

 

[Pilot Jones]

Still running Catalina on my Early 2015 13" MBP. I did try upgrading to Monterey back in December 2021 but it completely and fully bricked my device to the point that I had to get a complete system reset & date wipe from an Apple Store.

It's definitely not something I'd like to repeat again, so until I upgrade to a truly modern machine, I'm going to keep my OS update cycles in equivalent check.

 

[pshufd]

My 2015 MacBook Pro is running Mojave. I ran into one really annoying bug and a slightly annoying bug though it's possible that they are fixed now. I have a 2007 MacBook Pro running El Capitan and a couple of really old iMacs running High Sierra. Nothing wrong running old operating system. Just practice secure computing.