MacBookPro11,1 (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014) - upgrade from High Sierra?

[zeppo2]

Time to upgrade this.
But I'm unsure of some of these Catalina issues. It appears they might come up more with people that have replaced hardware in their macbooks? I haven't made any changes. I have A1502 (EMC 2875) 2.6Ghz Core i5.

I'll need the upgrade to start on taxes later this year.

I think I will just do a full reset/wipe of the macbook and install from thumbdrive, unless that is a bad idea.

At first glance, it seems I might install Mojave and then I can always upgrade to Catalina later.

But is Catalina actually a better choice for this macbook, assuming maybe mine won't have issues with it having not changed any hardware?

My battery condition is "Replace Soon", so maybe I should replace the battery and then upgrade?

thanks
zep

 

[KeesMacPro]

Personally I'd install Mojave , as I see no advantage of Catalina over Mojave.
Mojave still supports 32 bit apps and is known as one of the most stable and mature OS.

 

[zeppo2]

ok, thanks

 

[KeesMacPro]

YW!

BTW: if you never updated this MBP to Mojave and/ or Catalina before : there's a FirmWare update involved during the installation.
The FW updater can be picky about the hardware installed i.e. especially the OEM SSD should be installed.
But if you never changed the OEM HW setup, you'll be on the save side.

 

[LaToya Vanderbling]

Hi! Can I ask what your experience is with either Mojave or Catalina on this machine?
I am with Catalina and it is feeling very slow. Would like to know if it is normal or if my machine needs fixing.

 

[Audit13]

I'm using Catalina 10.15.6 on a mid-2014 13" with 8 GB and 128 GB SSD.

Fast, no issues for me.

 

[LaToya Vanderbling]

Thanks for this Audit13, most useful

 

[nothingtoseehere]

My battery condition is "Replace Soon", so maybe I should replace the battery and then upgrade?

I can recommend to change the battery by Apple, if your cash is ok for that (around $200/200€). You get also a new keyboard, in general. Did this recently with my MBP 13" early 2015, great results.

(Other people here, including @Audit13, changed their battery by themselves, reports sounded plausible and practical as well.)

Question is here, will Apple still do that as your machine has not been sold for more than five years. So if you would like to go this way, you should immediately ask Apple. Before the battery replacement, it indeed does not make much sense to update, but it is essential to get a good backup.

Afterwards, updating. I personally use Mojave and like it. Other people like Catalina. And other people dislike Catalina. My point here (YMMV) is that I don't mind using iTunes instead of Music/Podcasts and so on, and that with our older Macbooks, the fantastic Sidecar feature does not work (at least not as it should), so I have no need to run Catalina. When Mojave gets phased out in a year, I will change to Catalina, or Big Sur, or to the Big Sur successor (if it runs on my machine).

 

[Audit13]

You can install iTunes on a Mac running Catalina using this: https://appleinsider.com/articles/1...perture-itunes-back-to-life-in-macos-catalina

I use iTunes on my mid-2014 Pro 13" with Catalina.

 

[Fishrrman]

One more vote for Mojave.