Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Catalina on iMac 2010

M

maltau571

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Hi
I am new to this forum and I would like to know if it is possible to install the Catalina on my old iMac 2010
I have attached the specs of my iMac

Many thanks
 

Attachments

  • Screen Shot 2022-04-02 at 15.43.16.png
    Screen Shot 2022-04-02 at 15.43.16.png
    101.6 KB · Views: 388
Last edited:
maltau571 said:
Hi
I am new to this forum and I would like to know if it is possible to install the Catalina on my old iMac 2010
I have attached the specs of my iMac

Many thanks
Click to expand...
Officially, no, your iMac will only run up to High Sierra.

Unofficially, yes, it can run up to Monterey using various patchers. For Mojave or Catalina, check out dosdude's website for the patching tools. Read through the instructions before you start, and be sure that you have a good backup in place before you begin.

For Big Sur and Monterey, you'd want to check out Opencore Legacy Patcher. I have my own 2010 27" iMac running Big Sur well enough. Realize that any patched version of Mac OS will come with its own tradeoffs, things that may not work perfectly, etc. Be sure to read through the patcher websites thoroughly before starting down this path 🙂
 
MultiFinder17 said:
Officially, no, your iMac will only run up to High Sierra.

Unofficially, yes, it can run up to Monterey using various patchers. For Mojave or Catalina, check out dosdude's website for the patching tools. Read through the instructions before you start, and be sure that you have a good backup in place before you begin.

For Big Sur and Monterey, you'd want to check out Opencore Legacy Patcher. I have my own 2010 27" iMac running Big Sur well enough. Realize that any patched version of Mac OS will come with its own tradeoffs, things that may not work perfectly, etc. Be sure to read through the patcher websites thoroughly before starting down this path 🙂
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply. Can I use another graphics card in order to make this work safely?
 
maltau571 said:
Thanks for your reply. Can I use another graphics card in order to make this work safely?
Click to expand...

Of course you can.
But it's not a walk in the park.
Starting with thorough reading the first post of this thread, and all the links to that post.

forums.macrumors.com

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

iMac 2009 to 2011 MXM3 graphics card upgrade (Lastest update 10/13/2023 - this is the official documentation page - you found it finally!) This is the single and only documentation post. During the last years we constantly updated this post to reflect the lastet development of vBIOS and OCLP...
forums.macrumors.com forums.macrumors.com
 
maltau571 said:
Thanks for your reply. Can I use another graphics card in order to make this work safely?
Click to expand...
You can, but it’s not worth it in my opinion. Metal GPUs for those machines are at least around $100ish, and they come with their own sets of weird quirks. I’d personally just stick with the patches if you’re looking to go that route. The graphical oddities really aren’t that bad.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Hombre53
MultiFinder17 said:
You can, but it’s not worth it in my opinion. Metal GPUs for those machines are at least around $100ish, and they come with their own sets of weird quirks. I’d personally just stick with the patches if you’re looking to go that route. The graphical oddities really aren’t that bad.
Click to expand...
So will the Opencore Legacy Patcher work if I decide to go that way?
 
maltau571 said:
So will the Opencore Legacy Patcher work if I decide to go that way?
Click to expand...
Yes, it will work with both a newer GPU and the stock GPU. My 2010 27" still has its stock ATI Radeon HD 5750 1GB in it and it's been running Big Sur for the last year now. Again, there's little graphical oddities, particularly with transparency effects, but that's about it at this point. And apps that expect a Metal GPU in order to run will not run because no amount of patching will make an old GPU support APIs that it doesn't 🙂
 
  • Like
Reactions: Nguyen Duc Hieu
MultiFinder17 said:
Yes, it will work with both a newer GPU and the stock GPU. My 2010 27" still has its stock ATI Radeon HD 5750 1GB in it and it's been running Big Sur for the last year now. Again, there's little graphical oddities, particularly with transparency effects, but that's about it at this point. And apps that expect a Metal GPU in order to run will not run because no amount of patching will make an old GPU support APIs that it doesn't 🙂
Click to expand...
Sorry to ask again as I am no techie.... So it is safe to use the OCLP to upgrade at least to catalina? I saw on their video that you can also partition the disk and install it on that partition in case something goes wrong
 
maltau571 said:
Sorry to ask again as I am no techie.... So it is safe to use the OCLP to upgrade at least to catalina? I saw on their video that you can also partition the disk and install it on that partition in case something goes wrong
Click to expand...
You're good 🙂

It should be, yup! Though if you're going with Catalina, I'd use the dosdude1 patcher for Catalina instead. Dosdude1 for Catalina and lower, OCLP for Big Sur and newer.

Installing it on a separate partition is always a fantastic idea - that way you can play around with it a little and see if it works the way you need it to, then if it does, upgrade your main partition! And if it doesn't, just remove the new partition and be done with it.
 
MultiFinder17 said:
You're good 🙂

It should be, yup! Though if you're going with Catalina, I'd use the dosdude1 patcher for Catalina instead. Dosdude1 for Catalina and lower, OCLP for Big Sur and newer.

Installing it on a separate partition is always a fantastic idea - that way you can play around with it a little and see if it works the way you need it to, then if it does, upgrade your main partition! And if it doesn't, just remove the new partition and be done with it.
Click to expand...
ok many thanks for all your help
 
  • Like
Reactions: MultiFinder17
I've checked the link and still seen Dosdude's warning about HD5xxx GPU. Better use OCLP approach. Post-install patching of OCLP have fixed the issue with HD5xxx GPU.

HD5xxx issues.png
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back