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

High Sierra / Mojave on 2GB?

mslilyelise said:
I bought an HP EliteBook once that had the firmware password protected and the last owner was no help, and I had to wipe and refresh the CMOS with some questionable hack tools to regain control of the system. I was immensely lucky others had been down that road before me.
Click to expand...
I too had a similar experience with an HP laptop that had its BIOS page protected by a password and there was no apparent way to clear the password - I removed the CMOS battery and waited for several days in the hope that the computer would forget the settings, which is usually sufficient in this scenarios: it didn't work. I tried other physical measures - no joy and I despaired because the performance was dreadful due to every power-saving option apparently being enabled within the BIOS and I had no means of changing them.

Luckily for me, a relative was on hand when I expressed frustration at the situation and they suggested that I type in "1234." I did and voila, it worked! The comedic irony that the most obvious and easiest solution was the one that I'd never considered because it seemed implausible that it would be so simple. :D
 
  • Like
Reactions: bobesch, MacFoxG4, Amethyst1 and 1 other person
TheShortTimer said:
To revive this thread, my positive experiences with High Sierra on a 2GB MacBook Air have made me curious about giving Mojave a spin using DosDude's patcher. What do you think - is it worth a test drive?
Click to expand...
I'll be honest - I'm a sucker for Dark Mode so I'd give it a try on this account alone. :) I'd be worried about it being a very tight fit with 2 GB RAM, and it's definitely slower than High Sierra on my 2011 MBP (2.3 GHz dual-core + 8 GB RAM + SSD).
 
  • Like
Reactions: TheShortTimer
Amethyst1 said:
I'll be honest - I'm a sucker for Dark Mode so I'd give it a try on this account alone. :) I'd be worried about it being a very tight fit with 2 GB RAM, and it's definitely slower than High Sierra on my 2011 MBP (2.3 GHz dual-core + 8 GB RAM + SSD).
Click to expand...

Noted - forewarned is forearmed. :) I can always use SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy Cloner to back up my High Sierra partition and roll back to it if I decide that Mojave is an upgrade too far. :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1
My dosdude1 upgrade to Mojave went without a hitch, but having said that my current 2010 MBA has 4GB RAM, and although I'm happy with it there does seem to be a little minor hesitation sometimes. Other than that no worse performance than with High Sierra ;)
I kept my Carbon Copy backup from HS until I was sure everything was running OK, then cloned the Mojave installation over the top of it.

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1 and TheShortTimer
Anti-climax time! I followed the instructions faithfully and created a 25GB partition on an external USB HDD for the installer, the patcher reported that the operation had completed successfully, so I rebooted the MacBook Air and the USB drive failed to appear as an option within rEFInd or the Apple boot manager with the Option key held down. :(

I repeated the process about 7 times, including reformatting the partition to ensure that it's using the correct "Extended (Journaled)" but to no avail, the patcher doesn't produce a bootable USB drive. The archive contains older versions of the patcher so I downloaded version 1.3.5 but the outcome was the same. The drive itself is fine because it has a cloned partition that's immediately recognised as a bootable drive.

Ah well, that's a shame - it would've been nice to see how the MacBook Air fared with Mojave but High Sierra works just fine anyway.
 
I used a 16GB USB stick, I think it was formatted to FAT with GUID, as the file system is over written anyway.
It takes ages to create the patched installer so you need to wait until it reports itself as done.
I can't find my stick, so I'll probably make another later on today and report back.

Maybe it just won't install from an external hard drive?

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: TheShortTimer
Hughmac said:
I used a 16GB USB stick, I think it was formatted to FAT with GUID, as the file system is over written anyway.
It takes ages to create the patched installer so you need to wait until it reports itself as done.
I can't find my stick, so I'll probably make another later on today and report back.

Maybe it just won't install from an external hard drive?
Click to expand...

I managed to figure it out and I was writing this update when I saw your reply. :)

Once again, Google is my friend. I found the solution to my difficulties here. DosDude had omitted a crucial step in the process of preparing the USB drive and I failed to spot it.

The picture on dosDude's site is wrong. You don't format a partition on your USB stick/SD card you format the entire 'disk' like this…
Click to expand...
stZ1S.png

Select the overall 'disk' device, not any partition within it, then click Erase & make sure the Format & Scheme are macOS Extended (Journaled) [this is HFS+] & GUID Partition Map [this is essential for it to be bootable]. This will, of course, delete any & all data already on it - again make sure you get the right one.
Click to expand...

No wonder I couldn't get the drive to boot! He really needs to edit the guide to correct this important detail. Anyhow, with the external HDD now configured correctly, I was able to crack on with attempting the installation. :)

ZUGDpJB.jpg


Just as High Sierra had upgraded my El Capitan partition, Mojave in turn upgraded the High Sierra partition - which is exactly what I was aiming for. The instructions neglect to warn you that without any notification, the installer will restart and then boot to a prohibitory screen - and this is why you'll have to reboot with Option held down and wait for the "post install" application to appear so that you can configure Mojave to run with your machine.

Time for another reboot. So far so good...

xA2srXX.jpg


It's working! Let's log in and see what happens. :)

oDdgXFr.jpg


MffqbIj.jpg


9ivy2qh.jpg


I think I'll try out the dark mode and I'm sure that @Amethyst1 would approve. :D

szFbk2N.png


85DScpu.png


IEeROsU.png


A little shakedown is in order to gauge how the MBA copes with the same tasks under Mojave compared with El Capitan and High Sierra. I'll start with some of my TV recordings.

cyPcKqp.png
WS7BVf0.png
0h2uOUB.png
3Nj6oIO.png
uGIR6bX.png

They played with exactly the same efficiency as they would have under El Capitan and High Sierra.

Safari appears to run ok too. I didn't notice any lagging or stuttering.

OjbA56V.png


On the productivity front, from what I can see, my applications open and run at exactly the same speed (or very close to that) of sessions with El Capitan and High Sierra.

xSyAabO.png


IQZ2lid.png


4wfm62a.png


I'll spend the next few weeks seeing how I get on but considering the hardware constraints, Mojave appears to be running on the MacBook Air like a champ. Some of this could be due to the tweaks and optimisations that MR members had suggested to me for El Capitan and both High Sierra and Mojave were installed upon that leaner foundation.

Hopefully this will be helpful to others who want to see how their 2GB MBA's will cope with more recent macOS releases. :)
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1 and Hughmac
Great news :)

And, I found my patched USB stick, tucked away safely in the laptop case for the MBA ;)

If you are switching between dark and light modes, you might consider downloading NightOwl - https://nightowl.kramser.xyz/ - which does the job more easily than going into prefs every time, although yesterday i found the key combo of control+command also works.

EDIT:_ that key combo just invokes NightOwl

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: bobesch, Amethyst1 and TheShortTimer
Hughmac said:
Great news :)

And, I found my patched USB stick, tucked away safely in the laptop case for the MBA ;)
Click to expand...
Some time ago a security- or system-update of Mojave (I cannot remember, what exactly was the cause) left me with a non-functional MacBookPro, that needed to be repatched to become fully functional again.
While this happened on the go and I didn't carry the USB-stick with the installer/patcher with me, I had a non-functional machine until I was back home ...
Since then I have the habit to always box off a small 12GB-partition for the installer-software at the end of any internal SSD, that runs patched Mojave (or Sierra/HighSierra).
The whole SSD gets prepared while in TDM or an external USB3-case: first erased/reformatted in HFS+/GUID (as @TheShortTimer described here #61 ) and then repartitioned with the small 12GB at the end (at 5to12 on the new disk utility's pie chart), so that it also can be removed easily, if necessary. The installation of the patched macOS-installer then goes to the 12GB partition and stays there, to be available at any time.
Both creating the patched-installer and installing macOS on the same SSD also feels a bit quicker compared to an external USB-stick and I don't have to bother carrying the installer-USB stick with me all the time ...

DiskUtility MojavePatcher.png
 
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1, TheShortTimer and Hughmac
Speaking of updates. From DosDude's site.

  • Using APFS is REQUIRED in Mojave in order to receive system updates via the normal Software Update method. If you choose to continue using macOS Extended (Journaled) as your filesystem type, you will NOT receive System Updates via System Preferences. If you are not using APFS, you can follow the 10.14.1 installation steps below.
  • After applying ANY system update via Software Update, re-applying post-install patches using your Mojave Patcher installer volume will most likely be necessary. If you install a software update and the system fails to boot afterwards, this is what needs to be done.
Click to expand...

Some of the wording is confusing, does this mean that updates are unavailable to you if you're using HFS?
 
Well I've never had a problem with system updates on either my 2010 iMac or 2010 MBA, both of which use the @dosdude1 Mojave patcher and both of which are still on HFS.
It may be that you cannot do automatic updates, which I will never allow anyway, but normal system updates you can check for every now and then through the prefs.

However we are on the final version of Mojave so there will be no 10.14.7 update to wreck things, just security and Safari updates which do not require re-patching of the installation.

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: TheShortTimer and Amethyst1
Hughmac said:
If you are switching between dark and light modes, you might consider downloading NightOwl - https://nightowl.kramser.xyz/ - which does the job more easily than going into prefs every time, although yesterday i found the key combo of control+command also works.

EDIT:_ that key combo just invokes NightOwl
Click to expand...

Thanks, as always you're a gent. :)

Hughmac said:
Well I've never had a problem with system updates on either my 2010 iMac or 2010 MBA, both of which use the @dosdude1 Mojave patcher and both of which are still on HFS.
It may be that you cannot do automatic updates, which I will never allow anyway, but normal system updates you can check for every now and then through the prefs.

However we are on the final version of Mojave so there will be no 10.14.7 update to wreck things, just security and Safari updates which do not require re-patching of the installation.
Click to expand...

The updates have installed without any issues and Big Sur has been made available to me! :D

vOV4ETw.png


This has to be an error. I wouldn't even dare click on that button...
 
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1 and Hughmac
That is the most irritating part, and you can't even turn it off :(
The best I can do to hide that notification is to make an alias of System Prefs and drag that into the dock instead of the original.

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: bobesch and TheShortTimer
DosDude even has a patcher that allows Catalina to run on a MacBook Air 3,1. o_O

I'd try it out but Mojave is the end of the macOS line for my machine because Catalina requires 4GB as the minimum RAM. These workarounds really expose Apple's shady behaviour in terms of pushing a forced obsolescence agenda upon their customers. They claim that scores of models cannot be supported by their newer software due to age, only to have enthusiasts spectacularly demonstrate the contrary.

The amount of people who've discarded or retired their machines, unawares that they actually still had mileage in this respect has to be staggering and you can imagine the e-waste impact upon our society. On the positive front, Mojave is working really well and I doubt that I'll need to rollback to High Sierra. :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: bobesch, Amethyst1, Raging Dufus and 1 other person
My 4gb 2010 macbook is staying with Mojave as well
and apologize for not contributing to this theme these past months.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Hughmac
Well I for one am not going past Mojave at all due to having too many 32bit apps, and if necessary I will use Linux Mint for most things when I start to feel insecure on 10.14.
That may not happen for quite a while though as I still use Tiger, Leopard and Snow Leopard on the internet without many qualms on various machines.
My banking is done through IOS 14 though ;)

Cheers :)

Hugh
 
  • Like
Reactions: MacFoxG4, bobesch, Amethyst1 and 2 others
TheShortTimer said:
I'd try it out but Mojave is the end of the macOS line for my machine because Catalina requires 4GB as the minimum RAM.
Click to expand...
The question is - does it really require 4 GB? Or will it actually boot and run with less? If so, you might be able to install on another box that has at least 4 GB, clone the installed OS and apply the necessary patches for the MBA. (Not that Catalina is worth the hassle IMO...)
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: TheShortTimer
Amethyst1 said:
The question is - does it really require 4 GB? Or will it actually boot and run with less? If so, you might be able to install on another box that has at least 4 GB, clone the installed OS and apply the necessary patches for the MBA. (Not that Catalina is worth the hassle IMO...)
Click to expand...

Do I detect a challenge being made? :D

From the Reddit CatalinaPatcher group...

I’ve got Catalina running on a 2010 MacBook Air with 2GB ram and it works okay. I think you’d be okay with 4GB on the iMac
Click to expand...

Interesting, very interesting. I'm tempted to CCC my Mojave installation onto an external HDD for safe keeping and give it a go for the sake of curiosity.
 
  • Wow
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1 and Hughmac
Hughmac said:
If you are switching between dark and light modes, you might consider downloading NightOwl - https://nightowl.kramser.xyz/ - which does the job more easily than going into prefs every time, although yesterday i found the key combo of control+command also works.

EDIT:_ that key combo just invokes NightOwl

Cheers :)

Hugh
Click to expand...
Great!
There's also Grey to toggly dark/light mode for each single App individually ...
TheShortTimer said:
Interesting, very interesting. I'm tempted to CCC my Mojave installation onto an external HDD for safe keeping and give it a go for the sake of curiosity.
Click to expand...
About trying Catalina: there's a continuous background face-recognition process for the foto-library (photoanalysisd), that takes a huge amount of processing power and significantly slows down Catalina, but you can shut it down manually.
(AFAIK I made a note about it in the "Early-intel, trash or treasure" thread somewhere ... )
But like @Hughmac for the sake of my 32bit Apps I'm gonna stay with Mojave as long as possible.

Edit: here's the link about photoanalysisd #125
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Amethyst1, Hughmac and TheShortTimer
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