Apple Stops Offering Standalone Update Packages in macOS Big Sur

[Nogi Memes]

Kinda makes you wonder if there will be a variant of RT/S-mode in macOS in the future for a 'SE' Mac...

I think it's called iPadOS.

 

[britboyj]

I hope they don't want Enterprise customers for much longer...

 

[MacCheetah3]

This article is getting a bit confused between full and delta installers. Standalone installers are still available via the Mac App Store or via the "softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer" command (new: "softwareupdate --list-full-installers" shows you what you can download with "softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version X.Y").

It's the standalone delta updaters that are no longer being made available by Apple, so you have to download the full 12-13GB each time.

So, where do "Combo" updates sit? Those are the only standalone installers I cared about -- beyond the full OS installers, of course.

 

[Shirasaki]

Still, why? Why change it now.

Easier for them to do so with highly integrated hardware and software. Not so much with third party hardware components.

 

[Shirasaki]

in extreme cases report you to the police for investigation.

Seriously? Downloading uploading terabytes of data in a month can alert the company and prompt police investigation? Where?

No surprise and as I have been saying for over a year just wait till Apple decides you can't downgrade your OS once they stop signing it just like they do with iOS and iPadOS. The switch to Apple Silicon will make this easier to pull off.

MacOS is now looking like iOS and sometime in the future it will probably share a similar update policy.

Exactly this. Dunno why those people either don’t understand or insist that won’t happen jut because Craig said so in WWDC2020. Mac App Store only mode will come soon enough.

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

Easier for them to do so with highly integrated hardware and software. Not so much with third party hardware components.

Then why close it down now? 99.9% of the hardware getting the updates, and the major bumps, have been Apple hardware. So changing it now is just abusive...

 

[Mr.PT]

They are three low end systems into the transition, the three lowest priced machines that Apple sells and they are benchmarking almost as fast as the high end pro machines that Apple sells for in some cases triple the cost. And a pro machine doesn’t need a high end dedicated GPU, that’s the nvidia marketing team getting into your head. A pro needs something that will get the job done fast and efficiently and so far, the Apple Silicon Macs deliver that on the “low end” Apple made powerful pro machines back during the PowerPC days without Intel and now that they have more control then they ever did with PowerPC, they will do it again. And for you, there’s always Windows and plenty of Linux distributions to play with.

Although you’re right, and things look promising on the ARM Mac’s line, you shouldn’t understate the “work” made by nvidia gathering developers around their GPU computing, I.e. unlike Apple, they really did a “great” job pushing CUDA all around, something Apple neglect with Metal, that needs to be truly embraced by developers if we want real ARM Pro machines. Hopefully Microsoft will help by not providing an ARM version of windows or some kind of “bootcamp” alternative, forcing development of ARM MacOS versions of products that currently rely on bootcamp to offer MacOS poor supported alternatives.

 

[Tech198]

Ya, we knew this mus of been coming right ?

First they take internet recovery away from M1 Macs, and now this...... All to save bandwidth on them... I mean Mac OS Big sur is 12 Gig's. Now the name matches the size.

It's freakin' huge! These delta updates may be small, but they all add up

 

[JoeInMilwaukee]

Could the Big Sur installer now be 12 GB in size because it's a universal binary?

 

[Shirasaki]

Then why close it down now? 99.9% of the hardware getting the updates, and the major bumps, have been Apple hardware. So changing it now is just abusive...

We have no idea knowing the underlying thought process behind this strategic decision but it is the most reasonable and logical next step by apple given their nice track record of hunting down “hacking” and active actions against the concept of an open ecosystem.

Abusive? Apple fan will just slap you “worship apple or go away”.

As much as I like apple hardware’s raw power, such behaviour is bad, but nothing can be done about it.

 

[dumiku]

Somebody please correct or confirm for me.

Didn’t I read a while ago that Apple were going to change the way macOS updates, making it quicker (only downloading smaller ‘packages’) and you wouldn’t have to normally reboot?

What happened to that?

They did not say that you have to reboot, the update will be download then install in the background, and when you are ready to apply it you reboot.

I download updates through the terminal and when it reaches about 60% it stops downloading and by 100% the installation is complete you can keep using your mac for days but if you reboot the update is they applied, I think it creates a system snapshot that replaces your current system when you reboot it does change everything without rebooting at least that what I have noticed.

 

[dysamoria]

It's not specific to the M1. The update system in Big Sur has changed to be much more like that of iOS/iPadOS, and as we know, Apple doesn't release incremental updaters for those platforms, either.

Then why are there some forum users suggesting doing an iOS update via iTunes instead of via the device itself?

 

[chrfr]

Then why are there some forum users suggesting doing an iOS update via iTunes instead of via the device itself?

I don't understand how your question relates to my statement, but Apple doesn't release downloadable incremental updates for iOS. Any update done via iTunes or in Finder is actually installing the entire operating system again. It's the equivalent of downloading the macOS installer from the App Store and installing that.

 

[mikehalloran]

Combo updates are a long time (and still useful) troubleshooting step. Couple that with the massive bandwidth requirements....yet another example of 'inside the bubble' thinking.

Does anyone remember downloading the Combo Update for 10.15.1 or 10.14.1? How about 10.13.1, 10.12.1, 10.11.1 or 10.10.1 etc.?

If you remember any of those, guess again. Those never existed. Apple Combo Updaters always begin with 10.x.2. Standard updaters only for 10.x.1

Here's where you want to search if you think I'm wrong—good luck with that.

MacOS Downloads

 

[mikehalloran]

Creators don't really care about the hardware if the machine can deliver the performance they want. With intel, dedicated GPUs are needed because intel integrated GPU has very low performance. The M1 integrated GPU shows huge promise. When even the iPad Pro can handle 4K 10-bit videos better than the most expensive intel machine, that tells you something.

Reality check: So, you think that the released M1 has made $80K – $150K Win10 MAYA rendering stations obsolete? No, it hasn't. The $50k MacPro with all the accelerators did that. Apple Silicon does have the potential—and I'm looking forward to it—but it ain't here yet.

I don't understand why Apple cannot just create an app like Microsoft that fetches whatever latest OS version they have and automatically create an image or USB boot disk form it. I mean why make it so convoluted to get the OS?

Oh yea, let's switch to the MS method that can lock up your workstation for hours at inopportune moments when you're trying to get work done. Been there, lived with that crap for years… No thanks.

Where is that? The US? I live between the UK and France mostly, and have broadband packages in both countries, neither are capped, neither are fiber. If capped packages exist, they’re rare! Even mobile packages whilst capped are still huge, my French plan has 100gb. At least that’s a little more understandable. I’d be pretty annoyed if my broadband package was capped I have to say.

There are parts of the Silicon Valley within walking distance to the new Apple campus and HP on 768k dialup. Their only other choice is DirecTV satellite at a whopping 5 Mbps max speed. I live about 3 miles from Google, both Apple campuses, HP, Microsoft, E=Mc2 and others. The best internet I can get is 24 Mbps from AT&T — and when I worked for them, I couldn't get that at all. Most of the Valley is copper and phone lines with slooooow internet. I'm not moving just to get optical.

There's actually no such thing as truly uncapped internet anywhere really, if you look into your ISP's terms and conditions they'll have a fair use clause with the amount of data you can actually download/upload per month (it's usually in the terabytes), which if you do go over, they'll either throttle your connection, strongly encourage you to upgrade to a "business" plan, cut you off completely, or in extreme cases report you to the police for investigation.

If you can even get that where you live — see my earlier response.

Yes, I guess I'm ultimately going to have to go back to Windows and PCs. Just can't afford to keep up with Apple anymore. And to think I liked the system.

Your Windows Clown Car awaits!