How to rollback / revert from Tahoe to Sequoia?

[Aggedor]

I wonder if a pinned post on this topic might be useful. I've installed Tahoe on my new 15" M4 MacBook Air, and apart from Tahoe being completely hideous, I've noticed significant text blur when scrolling in the system, websites, and documents. I know this is only a 60Hz screen, but it is significantly worse than Sequoia.

I use this machine as my work computer for an entirely text-based job, so I don't think I can stand this blurriness.

 

[durhambullsfan]

Following. Tahoe broke my ability to print so I need to go back.

 

[chrfr]

You have to erase the disk and reinstall the older operating system. You can then restore the backup you made before you upgraded.

 

[Aggedor]

You have to erase the disk and reinstall the older operating system. You can then restore the backup you made before you upgraded.

The macOS Recovery that I boot into to start the process only offers Tahoe as an installation option, however.

 

[Lyons00]

With Tahoe, I lost all of my Safari bookmarks. Did migration assistant went back to the day before and they are still gone. I had some really important things in there. There was nothing in iCloud either.
Any chance anyone knows how I can get them back?

 

[colodane]

With Tahoe, I lost all of my Safari bookmarks. Did migration assistant went back to the day before and they are still gone. I had some really important things in there. There was nothing in iCloud either.
Any chance anyone knows how I can get them back?

Yikes ! 😟

 

[Lyons00]

Yikes ! 😟

Unfortunately there's nothing that Apple can be...Not good!!

 

[ebika]

Downgrading macOS versions requires wiping the drive before installing an older version, as far as I know. Trying to run the installer for an older macOS version directly won't let you install. I won't say there aren't other ways, but at least wiping the drive and installing is well-known to work.

The steps look like this:
1. BACK UP YOUR FILES!! YOU DELETE EVERYTHING FROM YOUR COMPUTER IN THE UPCOMING STEPS!! Using Time Machine is a very good way. Other third-party tools like Carbon Copy Cloner are nice too. Honestly, if you have the time and experience, you can grab files by hand too onto an external drive or cloud storage. Manual backups are tricky since there are a bunch of hidden metadata files you might want.
2. Create a bootable installer: https://support.apple.com/en-us/101578
3. Boot into that USB device: restart your Mac and hold the Option key to select the USB as the boot drive. All your files and system are still intact at this point. (This step might vary between Intel and M-series since they reworked this stuff between generations)
4. THIS IS THE POINT OF NO RETURN!!: while in the USB's installer interface, use Disk Utility to erase your startup disk (selecting the Macintosh HD volume and clicking Erase)
5. Proceed with the macOS installer to reinstall the older OS
6. Use your backups to restore files. For Time Machine backups, attempt to follow: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/restore-files-mh11422/mac

Step 6 can go in various paths, from restoring specific files at a time, to trying to do a full restore of everything. That may require using a Time Machine backup taken on the older macOS version. I'm like 60% confident you can restore a TM backup from Tahoe onto earlier versions, but YMMV. Even if you can't do a full easy restore from a Tahoe backup, you 100% can grab all the files it backed up from the drive and put them back. It just won't be as easy and depending on whether it's metadata you're trying to restore, it gets exponentially more difficult.

Personally, I find it easiest to attach the Time Machine backup drive, navigate to a timestamp folder for the backup files in Finder, and drag over specific files. This is the least assisted way of doing things, but it allows me to have the cleanest start for the reinstall. Keep the backup drive and files around, and you can always go back and recover more files that you need/forgot.

 

[Lyons00]

Thank you, that might be a bit much for me to try . I might try it another time.

 

[warnergt]

ebika is correct.
Tahoe is unstable on my Mac.
I had to restore Sequoia exactly as described.

 

[tedson]

I installed the Release Candidate and tried it for several days and hated it. I ended up doing exactly the procedure @ebika outlined. It took a few hours to download, create an Installer USB disk (you need a minimum of 32 GB) and reinstall Sequoia. Now I just need to figure out how to get Software Update to quite offering me MacOS Tahoe. Years ago there seemed to be a way to let Software Update know that you were skipping a major OS update via the defaults system but I can't figure it out now. If anyone know how to get Software Update to quit bugging me about upgrading to Tahoe, I will be eternally grateful.

 

[Macs Pain]

Jumping back to a snapshot before updating should also work, no?

 

[ITsJamie]

I tried, but no. It will not let you restore the older Time Machine backup. I am now in the process of creating a bootable Sequoia USB and go on from there.

 

[Claude-1300]

I tried, but no. It will not let you restore the older Time Machine backup. I am now in the process of creating a bootable Sequoia USB and go on from there.

Correct.
I did a TimeMachine backup of my current drive (Mac Studio M2)
I upgraded to Tahoe
Some of my software didn't work in Tahoe.
So i decided to go back to Sequoia.
Used a bootable USB stick.
Wipe the whole disk
Installed Sequoia
Entered in Recovery Mode
Used "install from a TM backup" - and indeed my last backups before upgrading showed there.
Wanted to restore the latest one.
Got a message that to do this, I needed to use Migration Assistant
Went back to Sequoia Admin user.
Launched Migration assistant
It only showed me the latest TM backup (done under Tahoe) - and greyed out.
Impossible to access....
Reinstalled Tahoe
Launched the "new" Migration Assistant
Now I can access my former backups - at least the data - including the ones from Sequoia.

I guess it has to do with the FW upgrade performed by the Tahoe installer, and with the fact that now, the disk is encrypted by default.

As a conclusion: IF YOU GO TAHOE, YOU CANNOT COME BACK !!!

 

[ITsJamie]

I can scroll through my backups and I restored a few Apps. The rest (mail accounts/ large installs) I had to do manually. This costed me a few hours, but now I'm back on Sequoia again.
Then I proceeded to https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/defer-tahoe-for-90-days.2465304/ hopefully most has been fixed by then or I have to ignore the red 1️⃣.

Restored my Macbook Air M4, but I leave Tahoe on my Mac Mini M4. The performance is significantly worse. Takes much much longer to boot, really strange as reports suggest the opposite.

 

[Claude-1300]

So... 6 hours later, the restore of the data is completed - on Tahoe.
I wasn't ready to fizzle with the different sub-files and preferences and other adding that some software place everywhere on the disk.

On the good side: everything seems to be there, and it works.
On the plus side, one programme that was broken now is working again (Nikon Camera Control Pro 2)

On the minus side, one game (Battle Supremacy) that had almost no sound anymore (only effects sounds like wind or flies - no gunshots or engine sounds) is now giving me some other additional effects (voices). But still no main sounds...

So no visible (yet) data loss - that is already a blessing !

 

[betelgeusecz]

Correct.
I did a TimeMachine backup of my current drive (Mac Studio M2)
I upgraded to Tahoe
Some of my software didn't work in Tahoe.
So i decided to go back to Sequoia.
Used a bootable USB stick.
Wipe the whole disk
Installed Sequoia
Entered in Recovery Mode
Used "install from a TM backup" - and indeed my last backups before upgrading showed there.
Wanted to restore the latest one.
Got a message that to do this, I needed to use Migration Assistant
Went back to Sequoia Admin user.
Launched Migration assistant
It only showed me the latest TM backup (done under Tahoe) - and greyed out.
Impossible to access....
Reinstalled Tahoe
Launched the "new" Migration Assistant
Now I can access my former backups - at least the data - including the ones from Sequoia.

I guess it has to do with the FW upgrade performed by the Tahoe installer, and with the fact that now, the disk is encrypted by default.

As a conclusion: IF YOU GO TAHOE, YOU CANNOT COME BACK !!!

Had the same after reinstalling Sequoia. Found this post helpful: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...-in-migration-assistant.2446842/post-33662057

Back on Sequoia 15.7 with my data restored from before Tahoe upgrade.

 

[Claude-1300]

Interesting. Thanks for sharing !

So a small Apple flag-bug that is causing headaches to many … How many times have we seen this before ？

 

[gilby101]

I guess it has to do with the FW upgrade performed by the Tahoe installer, and with the fact that now, the disk is encrypted by default.

1) You might need to use DFU mode (on an Mx Mac) to restore Firmware and Sequoia.
2) For safety you need to have kept your Sequoia TM disk untouched (e.g disconnected and hidden in a drawer) by Tahoe or its betas.

 

[Claude-1300]

I guess a full clone by Carbon Copy would have helped as well.

 

[gilby101]

The steps look like this:
1. BACK UP YOUR FILES!! YOU DELETE EVERYTHING FROM YOUR COMPUTER IN THE UPCOMING STEPS!! Using Time Machine is a very good way. Other third-party tools like Carbon Copy Cloner are nice too. Honestly, if you have the time and experience, you can grab files by hand too onto an external drive or cloud storage. Manual backups are tricky since there are a bunch of hidden metadata files you might want.
2. Create a bootable installer: https://support.apple.com/en-us/101578
3. Boot into that USB device: restart your Mac and hold the Option key to select the USB as the boot drive. All your files and system are still intact at this point. (This step might vary between Intel and M-series since they reworked this stuff between generations)
4. THIS IS THE POINT OF NO RETURN!!: while in the USB's installer interface, use Disk Utility to erase your startup disk (selecting the Macintosh HD volume and clicking Erase)
5. Proceed with the macOS installer to reinstall the older OS
6. Use your backups to restore files. For Time Machine backups, attempt to follow: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/restore-files-mh11422/mac

I would add that:
1) you may need a TM backup disk untouched by Tahoe - you can't know whether Tahoe will make it unreadable for recovery by Sequoia.
2) A bootable installer may not be sufficient. The "firmware" on Mx Macs will have been changed by Tahoe and you likely need to (and probably should anyway) restore in DFU mode.

 

[gilby101]

I guess a full clone by Carbon Copy would have helped as well.

A backup (clone or not) would be an alternative to TM, but won't help with restoring macOS.

 

[thohnb]

Hi ! It my first time to roll-back:
Sorry if it silly question:
- Does it harm my Macbook if I i roll back?
- Well , if we rollback, can we somehow block the force-update to Mac 26 again? Like "pause"

 

[Mike Boreham]

As @gilby101 mentioned above, rolling back by erasing and reinstalling Sequoia from a bootable USB will work but the internal firmware will still be Tahoe. This has never mattered as firmware has always been backward compatible, but if you ever do a Recovery reinstall in future it will install Tahoe because the firmware is Tahoe.

As @ebika implied conventional advice, and the safe option is restore a back up made when the machine was last on Sequoia, but my experience is that this is not essential. When restoring from a Tahoe backup after reinstalling you may (not always happened) be warned that the backup was made on a later OS and advised to update, but there is an option to proceed anyway.

If you do proceed you will probably find that your Photos Library is no longer compatible as it has been updated to a later OS. You can get round this by deleting the incompatible Photos Lib and downloading a fresh one from iCloud. If you are not using iCloud you may be stuck and need a Sequoia backup, but you could try opening the Photos lib with ctrl+alt keys which launches the repair process. I haven’t tested this in Tahoe but it worked in previous OSes, also I have only done it with a iCloud lib. Similar may apply with Apple Mail. You may need to delete the account and create a new one and re-download your mail.

 

[PotentPeas]

2) A bootable installer may not be sufficient. The "firmware" on Mx Macs will have been changed by Tahoe and you likely need to (and probably should anyway) restore in DFU mode.

New firmware can still boot old OS's (but not necessarily vice versa). Apple makes a point to allow you to dual-boot multiple versions of macOS without having to flop the firmware version around.