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I received MBA late 2010 with Mojave. Can I downgrade it? If so, which OS is it most efficient and fast?

rcmeqz said:
By saying reinstall el capitan, you mean download the pkg OS and create a bootable disk? Am I right?
Click to expand...
try to download the el captain from the link i posted, or another osx of your choice.
there is a great chance that a message will prevent this.
if so
you need to reinstall the original osx that came with your MacBook air.
this can be performed by pressing the option key
you will need a good wifi signal and about an hour or so.
this is a great guide: https://osxdaily.com/howto-reset-mac-to-factory-settings/
 
rcmeqz,
deltamac suggests using Yosemite which is good.
follow the osxdaily instructions and then go to the apple link for yosmite.
im finished for today, you can always ask for more help.
i will check tomorrow, good nite😀
 
I hate being pedantic, but OP already said that the recovery system won't work - probably because the Mojave system on the MBAir is not supported by the existing hardware, or it may be badly patched in the first place. That would be one of the problems with getting an older Mac with an unsupported system installed. It may not be the great bargain that the OP was hoping for, if you have to erase everything and reinstall an actual working system.
And, the original system for the OP's MBAir is Snow Leopard, which didn't have a recovery system at all. I am not sure if Apple ever released the firmware for that 2010 MBAir that gives the support for Internet Recovery, so it's likely that Internet Recovery can't work, because the hardware is too old (First available on 2011 Macs, and some 2010 Macs got firmware updates, but again, I don't know about the 2010 MBAir.
 
DeltaMac said:
The OP has a 2010, which will easily go back to the original Snow Leopard. But, as it is unlikely the OP has a bootable copy of a Snow Leopard that was not a general release version, then it would just be a simple matter of finding a copy of the installer for anything from Lion (10.7) to High Sierra (10.13). Make a USB bootable installer from that installer app, and go for it - install the system.

OP also said that the MBAir is new for them, and came with Mojave, which is not supported natively, and would be a patched system to even work. And, would also be working within the limitations of only 2 GB of RAM, not upgradeable.
OP can't even reinstall that existing Mojave system, without creating a patched installer for Mojave. Much simpler to just go to an older system. Even El Capitan is challenging to install because Apple, in their wisdom, has never updated the installer to accept current dates on the system. You have to reset the system date manually to install El Capitan. Yosemite (OS X 10.10) is a better choice, as the installer has no such issues. AND, it handles the limited RAM in a 2GB system better than El Capitan does.
Click to expand...
thanks for your response and for making things clear for me... so if I followed it correctly, I'd download the Yosemite OS from the net, and make a bootable disk. Then everything will be Okay afterwards?

BTW, during pre-installation, can I erase the entire disk or it would be risky should the setup fail I dont have any OS to go to?
 
MtLoin2020 said:
rcmeqz,
deltamac suggests using Yosemite which is good.
follow the osxdaily instructions and then go to the apple link for yosmite.
im finished for today, you can always ask for more help.
i will check tomorrow, good nite😀
Click to expand...
thanks pal, been a great help!
 
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rcmeqz said:
can I erase the entire disk or it would be risky should the setup fail
Click to expand...
It will be a leap of faith at that step.

Yosemite USB installer would not recognise Mojave APFS disk and would not proceed without erasing entire disk anyway.

Yosemite should require disk to be erase to:
- Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
- GUID partition table

Google yosemite clean install and get familiar with the steps. Youtube vids should be available too.
 
Last edited:
mwidjaya said:
It will be a leap of faith at that step.

Yosemite USB installer would not recognise Mojave APFS disk and would not proceed without erasing entire disk anyway.

Yosemite should require disk to be erase to:
- Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
- GUID partition table

Google yosemite clean install and get familiar with the steps. Youtube vids should be available too.
Click to expand...
THat's a problem since the built-in drive is a flash storage APFS can I still proceed?
 
rcmeqz said:
can I still proceed?
Click to expand...
Yes, of course.

After booting up from USB installer, you will be running Disk Utility to erase the whole disk to HFS+; previous format before APFS, aka Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

It will then be able to accept the Yosemite installation.
 
mwidjaya said:
Yes, of course.

After booting up from USB installer, you will be running Disk Utility to erase the whole disk to HFS+; previous format before APFS, aka Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

It will then be able to accept the Yosemite installation.
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Glad it will. Will try to do everything now, wish me luck guys and no matter what, thanks for your great help, I really appreciate it. :)
 
rcmeqz said:
‘Twas a success! Thank y’all!
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that is good news,  are very good like that and your MacBook air is a very goor notebook
what OSX did we decide on?
if Yosemite is outdated as afar as syncing and internet, El Capitan should install with no problem.
 
MtLoin2020 said:
that is good news,  are very good like that and your MacBook air is a very goor notebook
what OSX did we decide on?
if Yosemite is outdated as afar as syncing and internet, El Capitan should install with no problem.
Click to expand...
Tried Yosemite since it is older so I supposed it would run faster and so far I’m satisfied because I can now run multiple aps without significant lag. At the end of the day, my goal is just to make it run for Microsoft office apps and browsing. Thank you again!
 
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MtLoin2020 said:
Safari is excellent and wont track you and will sync well with ipads, etc.
we have an ipad, eh?
Click to expand...
Apparently, safari in Yosemite cannot open full version of Facebook. Is safari upgradeable?

Yes, I own an ipad. An old one though :D
 
rcmeqz said:
thanks for your response. However i'm face with two challenges:

1. Mojave is slow on this MBA. If I cannot downgrade, I'm stuck with it but I tried to reinstall OS but command+R won't work at startup it has error icon (like the ghostbuster logo without the ghost lol). How do I go about it?

2. I really want to downgrade it to where it would be fastest. Which OS is it and how do I do it?
Click to expand...

It sounds like the speed problem is with your hardware and not the Mac OS (replacing the MacOS will not fix your speed problem).

If your laptop has a legacy spinner hard drive, replacing the hard drive with an SSD hard drive will make a huge difference.

You can also max out the Ram.

Edit: Reading further, I see you have an SSD.

The 2 GB Ram is probably the bottleneck. I think that you can upgrade it to 4 GB.
 
rcmeqz said:
Apparently, safari in Yosemite cannot open full version of Facebook. Is safari upgradeable?

Yes, I own an ipad. An old one though :D
Click to expand...
Up to 14 if yosmite wont run that, i know elcapitan will with your MBA specs.
are you enjoying the macbook air so far?
 
Plutonius said:
It sounds like the speed problem is with your hardware and not the Mac OS (replacing the MacOS will not fix your speed problem).

If your laptop has a legacy spinner hard drive, replacing the hard drive with an SSD hard drive will make a huge difference.

You can also max out the Ram.

Edit: Reading further, I see you have an SSD.

The 2 GB Ram is probably the bottleneck. I think that you can upgrade it to 4 GB.
Click to expand...
they said the ram was soldered. i really wish I could upgrade the ram
 
MtLoin2020 said:
Up to 14 if yosmite wont run that, i know elcapitan will with your MBA specs.
are you enjoying the macbook air so far?
Click to expand...
well, my kid can use it for her online class via skype. I sometimes use it for internet browsing. But I guess, beyond that, this macbook is almost useless. LOL. It cannot even be that responsive to MS Excel 2016
 
Plutonius said:
I just looked and was surprised.

I didn't think that Apple had started soldering in RAM as early as 2010 :(.
Click to expand...
 started soldering RAM in 2009 for their first MacBook airs, i dont mind the ram encased, but the ssd drive is why i might purchase a MacBook Pro from 2015/17 instead of a new m1 MacBook air in the future
 
rcmeqz said:
Do you experience lag on Mojave? Seems like there's a 1-second delay for every click. Perhaps reinstalling fresh would do the trick however I cant get to recovery mode. What could I do? Also, How can I install lower OS?
Click to expand...

That thing has too little ram, so it's going to hit the SSD quite a lot. Is your SSD almost full? They don't have the seek and latency issues of a spinning hard drive, I have seen systems behave erratically when they're too close to capacity. Do you have any accessories connected to it? Driver conflicts with third party devices sometime cause lag problems. There are a lot of accessories out there that are untested with a machine released 10 years ago. Are you running chrome? If so, disable hardware acceleration.
 
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