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Is Yosemite really that bad?

leman said:
So my recommendation is to go and make your own experience instead of listening to the 0.1% of the user base that is having issues of some sort.
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This, just do this.

Backup first (you should do this routinely and before any system change of any consequence), as any change cannot be perfect in 100% of all user cases.
 
leman said:
Yes, absolutely.



The likelihood of you having issues is very low, despite what the local vocal minority might make you believe. Every OS X has had an issue, every upgrade is a potential risk and there are always things that can go wrong. At least Yosemite will not delete your files, like Snow Leopard install used to.

Personal experience with these things differ and Apple is certainly to blame for many aspects of the issues some folks are having. I believe that they have made some things too complicated, which could lead to subtle and hard to fix issues (e.g. the WiFi bug). On the other hand, I maintain a department that runs several dozens Macs and Yosemite has been the least problematic upgrade on my memory. For us, it actually fixed some occasional WiFi problems we were having on Mavericks. And despite all the 'criticism', Yosemite's is already installed on more Macs than any other OS X every was — and that only half a year after its release!

So my recommendation is to go and make your own experience instead of listening to the 0.1% of the user base that is having issues of some sort. Macs are certainly not problem-free (nothing is), but they also have not nearly as many issues as one might want you believe. And you seem to have all your Backups in the right place — worst thing that can happen is that you loose few hours and revert back to your previous working system.
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And probably half of that contributed to those so happened to have bought new Macs which are not capable of downgrading to something better than Yosemite despite these users wanted to... Case in point, iMac 5k, any Mac that has been launched since late 2014... If there has been a legit way to downgrade, Yosemite would have gotten a far lower portion of the market share.

And who in the right mind would want to compare 10.10.3 with 10.6.0...?
 
Eithanius said:
And probably half of that contributed to those so happened to have bought new Macs which are not capable of downgrading to something better than Yosemite despite these users wanted to... Case in point, iMac 5k, any Mac that has been launched since late 2014... If there has been a legit way to downgrade, Yosemite would have gotten a far lower portion of the market share.
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Baseless conjecture. If Yosemite were so horrible, it wouldn't have 60% adoption rate right now. It took Mavericks 2-3 month more to reach same figures. You can't explain it all away with new Macs only.
 
leman said:
Baseless conjecture. If Yosemite were so horrible, it wouldn't have 60% adoption rate right now. It took Mavericks 2-3 month more to reach same figures. You can't explain it all away with new Macs only.
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Do we know any figures of users who installed Yosemite, but reverted back to Mavericks or any other version of OS? Are those consumers recorded as Yosemite users in statistics?
 
Ulenspiegel said:
Do we know any figures of users who installed Yosemite, but reverted back to Mavericks or any other version of OS? Are those consumers recorded as Yosemite users in statistics?
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I'm interested to know as well... I have on my MBP, Snow Leopard, Mavericks, and Yosemite...? Which stats would I be recorded in...? Am I part of Yosemite stats even though I use Snow Leopard 95% of the time...?
 
The stats I looked at (GoSquared) are collected from the web. They reflect the proportion of users that visit relevant websites when using a particular OS. So things like downgrades are easily traceable. These stats approximate the current, synchrony distribution, they do not accumulate over time. It's certainly far from perfect statistics and it's not very robust, but it gives us a fairly good idea about what is going on.

P.S. Yosemite downgrades were clearly seen on the graph brw. Shortly after the release, there was surge of adoption which quickly followed by a sharp drop. That were people revering back 😉

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Eithanius said:
I'm interested to know as well... I have on my MBP, Snow Leopard, Mavericks, and Yosemite...? Which stats would I be recorded in...? Am I part of Yosemite stats even though I use Snow Leopard 95% of the time...?
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This depends on how they do their stats and data collection. A reasonable algorithm would report your IP as snow leopard. At the same time, I don't think that they go through the hassle of tracking details like that. For the big picture, this is irrelevant because users like you are probably do rate that it doesn't matter if they are counted wrong.
 
leman said:
The stats I looked at (GoSquared) are collected from the web. They reflect the proportion of users that visit relevant websites when using a particular OS. So things like downgrades are easily traceable. These stats approximate the current, synchrony distribution, they do not accumulate over time. It's certainly far from perfect statistics and it's not very robust, but it gives us a fairly good idea about what is going on.

P.S. Yosemite downgrades were clearly seen on the graph brw. Shortly after the release, there was surge of adoption which quickly followed by a sharp drop. That were people revering back 😉

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This depends on how they do their stats and data collection. A reasonable algorithm would report your IP as snow leopard. At the same time, I don't think that they go through the hassle of tracking details like that. For the big picture, this is irrelevant because users like you are probably do rate that it doesn't matter if they are counted wrong.
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Merci bien. 😉
I am still sceptical about the accuracy of the figures, but well.
 
SaxnFlutman said:
You're right, I was blurring clean install and new partition, because both go above and beyond what Apple recommends, which is to simply download it and install over whatever is already there. So, my point is still a valid one, if more than just installing it is the better way to go, then Apple should say so, or, they should only release a new OS when just installing it over what's there will be safe...

If I did partition my hard drive, and installed Yosemite, would that mean it would have no access to everything I already have, on the other partition? Would I be able to access those files? If they aren't accessible to Yosemite, how will I know if it works? If it works with nothing of mine in place, that doesn't really tell me much, as I'm sure it must at least work ok without anything else in play.
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The old partition would be exactly like another hard drive. In fact when you boot to the new partition you will see that the old partition would get mounted automatically on your desktop. What I was suggesting was for people to try out Yosemite as it is and see how it works. The other times I have suggested creating a separate partition was so that people could see if a problem they are having is strictly a Yosemite issue or an issue being caused by something that was installed. In both cases, nothing has been lost except a little bit of time and maybe gained some piece of mind trying to diagnose an issue.

When I first was interested in installing Yosemite I read about the issues people were having. That made me concerned. I decided that I would take the cautious approach and test drive Yosemite before I decided whether I really wanted to commit to installing as my primary OS. So I did exactly what I have been suggesting to others, install it on a separate partition.

If you are unsure then do a cautious install test drive it on a separate partition as it is. If you like it initially then try installing some of your third party software and use it. Get a sense of confidence from using it before you go whole hog on installing it. This will take more time but if you do encounter an issue you at least know that you aren't committed and can go back to your primary install without messing anything up.

As much as I like Yosemite, I do think everyone has to decide if Yosemite will work for them. For 10.11 I will probably also take the cautious approach to installing OS X again.
 
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Is it that bad? In my opinion, yes.

I used it for over 6 months, but I finally had enough a few days ago and reverted all the way back to Mountain Lion. Now I feel the same way I did when I first switched to a Mac. I'm in awe at how beautiful everything is and how it all just works.

I recommend you stay as far away from Yosemite as possible.
 
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constant wifi drops on my nMP. jerky animation when scrolling GUI (finder).. I would go back to Mavericks in a heart beat but my apps will not let.
 
Eithanius said:
And probably half of that contributed to those so happened to have bought new Macs which are not capable of downgrading to something better than Yosemite despite these users wanted to... Case in point, iMac 5k, any Mac that has been launched since late 2014... If there has been a legit way to downgrade, Yosemite would have gotten a far lower portion of the market share.

And who in the right mind would want to compare 10.10.3 with 10.6.0...?
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I would. I have a computer that runs 10.6 and it's nothing special. It's lightweight sure, but it's also lacking tons of features like continuity, handoff, icloud photo library integration, icloud drive integration, etc. that matter a ton to me. I would much rather use yosemite than 10.6 on a daily basis.
 
christarp said:
I would. I have a computer that runs 10.6 and it's nothing special. It's lightweight sure, but it's also lacking tons of features like continuity, handoff, icloud photo library integration, icloud drive integration, etc. that matter a ton to me. I would much rather use yosemite than 10.6 on a daily basis.
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Sorry I think you missed my point... I was referring to leman's statement of comparing a half year build, somewhat bug-fixed 10.10.3 vs the very initial, day-one build, bug-ridden 10.6.0, when he should be comparing 10.10.3 vs 10.6.3. I wasn't comparing the features between Snow Leopard and Yosemite...
 
Eithanius said:
Sorry I think you missed my point... I was referring to leman's statement of comparing a half year build, somewhat bug-fixed 10.10.3 vs the very initial, day-one build, bug-ridden 10.6.0, when he should be comparing 10.10.3 vs 10.6.3. I wasn't comparing the features between Snow Leopard and Yosemite...
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My apologies. That's what I get for jumping into a conversation I s'pose.
 
simonsi said:
This, just do this.

Backup first (you should do this routinely and before any system change of any consequence), as any change cannot be perfect in 100% of all user cases.
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I'm thinking of doing this on my 2012 i7 Mac Mini. I still have the standard 4GB ram installed because upgrading it has been very low on my list and really not interested in doing so. It's mostly just used as an iTunes / ATV2 server.

I do use Time Machine for backups so I could always go back and restore.
I did that in the past when trying out Mtn Lion and went back to Lion on another Mac.
 
Didn't really know where to post this so here goes.

One thing that I noticed on the two times I tested Yosemite was the stutter of a lot of animations on my 2012 rMBP. Mission Control was close to unusable on 10.10.0 for me and Finder had some stutter/lag too. One of the things I always did to test this was moving the Applications folder to the dock and open it with the Grid effect. That animation was painful to watch and, even though I didn't measure, I'm pretty sure that saying it was running at 15FPS was too much. Last time I tried Yosemite (10.10.3), I did the same and the lag was still there.

Yesterday I went to an Apple store to check out the new Macbook and decided to try this exact same thing on every Mac available on the store. Only the new Macbook had stuttering on that particular animation. The new Macbook still has the HDxxxx series integrated GPU. The ones with Iris graphics didn't have the issue. Could stuttering on Yosemite be bad drivers optimisation?
 
dastinger said:
One thing that I noticed on the two times I tested Yosemite was the stutter of a lot of animations on my 2012 rMBP. Mission Control was close to unusable on 10.10.0 for me and Finder had some stutter/lag too. One of the things I always did to test this was moving the Applications folder to the dock and open it with the Grid effect. That animation was painful to watch and, even though I didn't measure, I'm pretty sure that saying it was running at 15FPS was too much. Last time I tried Yosemite (10.10.3), I did the same and the lag was still there.
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I have a mid 2012 rMBP too. I've seen some slight stuttering with Mission Control and Finder, but nothing I would call unusable. I guess it depends on how many windows you have open. Whether you are using the built-in Intel graphics or the dedicated GeForce graphics also has a big effect, as the built-in chip has had issues smoothly running the OS since its release with Mavericks.

As for the Applications folder in Grid view, I use this as well. It seems on first launch, say after a fresh startup, there is some stuttering, but after that it feels like the icons are loaded into RAM and the animation occurs much more smoothly.

I'm very sensitive to lag/stuttering, so I've gone to System Preferences -> Accessibility -> Display and turned on "Reduce Transparency." I get smoother performance, on both the built-in and dedicated graphics chip, and I actually prefer the flatter look. I also have Dark Mode on, as I hate the all the white in the Grid views of Dock folders.

See if that helps out your issues!
 
Yes, Mission Control would get unusable with some windows opened. I haven't tested it thoroughly the last time I installed Yosemite because I almost immediately got back to Mavericks but I still saw some stuttering. Mavericks is not buttery smooth but it doesn't stutter on almost every animation like Yosemite did for me.

As for the Apps folder, I know what you're saying. In Mavericks it works like that. The first time it stutters a bit and then stops doing it. In Yosemite it happens every time for me and it happened every time on the store's Macbook. We're talking about a brand new 2015 model with nothing running. A store unit. It should be smooth.

I never tried the reduced transparency in Yosemite because I really love the way the OS looks. It's probably the thing I liked the most about it since I don't own any iOS devices. Mavericks looks old after using Yosemite for a while.

Poor graphics performance and Wifi + BT issues made me get back to Mavericks anyway so I'm sticking with it until I start seeing reports that things really got better.
 
I just updated and it's alright, but not great.

Mavericks had it's share of bugs, which seem to be largely fixed, but introduced by new ones. OS X still has issues when waking up or starting in clamshell mode attached to multiple displays. I had a few app crashes. I don't think it's as usable as Mavericks (lack of contrast and thin font), I get momentary freezes or lags when swiping between spaces.

If feels, on a whole (and in my opinion), a little slower than Mavericks on my Late 2013 15" rMBP. Not bad, but not great.
 
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