macOS 15 Sequoia on Unsupported Macs Thread

[K two]

Full installer of macOS 15.7.8 24G817 latest beta, RC 5, now available via the Terminal command:
Code:
softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version 15.7.8
Takes a while, but leaves the full installer file in the Applications folder.
Do this, to see what's available;
Code:
softwareupdate --list-full-installers
Note; Run from GG (and I assume from Tahoe as well) this command doesn't show the 15.7.8 update

It is also available on gib 🧐

 

[basslik]

Full installer of macOS 15.7.8 24G817 latest beta, RC 5, now available via the Terminal command:
Code:
softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version 15.7.8
Takes a while, but leaves the full installer file in the Applications folder.
Do this, to see what's available;
Code:
softwareupdate --list-full-installers
Note; Run from GG (and I assume from Tahoe as well) this command doesn't show the 15.7.8 update

Can someone shed some light on my my update to 15.7.8 with OCLP 2.4.1

It automatically popped up on my 5,1. I didn't do anything in terminal, just popped up as a update to install?

Went smooth by the way.

But my other 5,1 with the same MacOS 15.7.7, did not pop up on that machine as an available update?

 

[LeVan]

Can someone shed some light on my my update to 15.7.8 with OCLP 2.4.1

It automatically popped up on my 5,1. I didn't do anything in terminal, just popped up as a update to install?

Went smooth by the way.

But my other 5,1 with the same MacOS 15.7.7, did not pop up on that machine as an available update?

The 15.7.8 24G817 update is a release Candidate (RC) and it will show up if you are enrolled in the Apple Public Beta Program (or the Developer program). It will not show up as a normal 15.7.8 update would. If you want to update, Google Apple Public Beta Program and set that up (it's easy).

 

[LuckyOldMan]

If you want to update, Google Apple Public Beta Program and set that up (it's easy).

No need if you use OCLP to download 15.7.8 RC5.

 

[basslik]

The 15.7.8 24G817 update is a release Candidate (RC) and it will show up if you are enrolled in the Apple Public Beta Program (or the Developer program). It will not show up as a normal 15.7.8 update would. If you want to update, Google Apple Public Beta Program and set that up (it's easy).

Thank you Levan, greatly appreciate the info.

 

[LeVan]

Thank you Levan, greatly appreciate the info.

You may already be aware of this site, but the Mr. Macintosh site <https://mrmacintosh.com/macos-sequoia-full-installer-database-download-directly-from-apple/> has links to all of Apples macOS releases, but normally no betas. It does have all of the Golden Gate betas.
Using the Terminal you can see what full installers at Apple are available, or download them to your Application folder, including some RCs or betas:
Code;
softwareupdate --list-full-installers <—to see what's available
softwareupdate --fetch-full-installer --full-installer-version 15.7.8 <—get Sequoia RC5 build 24G817

 

[makra]

Please tell me, if this is off topic: I'm thinking about what to do with my old machines once Sequoia won't get any updates. I've successfully installed Mint to a separate partition on my MBP 10,2. It's got a Broadcom BCM4331, which made it necessary install a firmware update. After that Wifi worked perfectly.

After Restart I saw this:

If I choose the EFI Boot on the right, I get this:

If I select the OC EFI Boot, I'll get a volume called "No Name" next to macOS.
If I select this drive, I'll get an alert:
"Could not read \EFI\: Invalid Parameter.
Error: could find boot options:
Invalid Parameter start-image() returned in valet parameter"

Obviously I haven't understood how to handle EFI Boots. Any suggestions?

 

[houser]

Please tell me, if this is off topic: I'm thinking about what to do with my old machines once Sequoia won't get any updates. >>> Any suggestions?

Preparing for life beyond Sequoia is certainly not OT here yet in my opinion as migration is gradual.
I am using Ubuntu on all our legacy Macs most of the time which works well as Dual boot with Sequoia and Windows on a few. I would assume it would be the same or similar with Mint, assuming your volume is ext4.
We are simply using

ext4_x64.efi

from here and just add it in EFI/OC/Drivers and edit the config.plist to use it.

This gives you any ext4 volumes at startup to boot from in OCLP like any other OS and you can delete grub if you like.
Maybe this helps a bit. There are deeper ways here that I have not had the need for so far but kept for a rainy day:
https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Multiboot/oc/linux.html
Good luck.

 

[LookingOut]

Please tell me, if this is off topic: I'm thinking about what to do with my old machines once Sequoia won't get any updates. I've successfully installed Mint to a separate partition on my MBP 10,2. It's got a Broadcom BCM4331, which made it necessary install a firmware update. After that Wifi worked perfectly.

After Restart I saw this:

View attachment 2646300

If I choose the EFI Boot on the right, I get this:
View attachment 2646301

If I select the OC EFI Boot, I'll get a volume called "No Name" next to macOS.
If I select this drive, I'll get an alert:
"Could not read \EFI\: Invalid Parameter.
Error: could find boot options:
Invalid Parameter start-image() returned in valet parameter"

Obviously I haven't understood how to handle EFI Boots. Any suggestions?

This may give you some insights. The rEFinf Boot Manager page.

The rEFInd Boot Manager

And a forked version more modern version

GitHub - RefindPlusRepo/RefindPlus: A Boot Manager for Mac and PC

A Boot Manager for Mac and PC. Contribute to RefindPlusRepo/RefindPlus development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

I have used these on standard a mac (non OpenCore) with a Debian Distro and MacOS.

 

[imacker2011]

Please tell me, if this is off topic: I'm thinking about what to do with my old machines once Sequoia won't get any updates. I've successfully installed Mint to a separate partition on my MBP 10,2. It's got a Broadcom BCM4331, which made it necessary install a firmware update. After that Wifi worked perfectly.

After Restart I saw this:

View attachment 2646300

If I choose the EFI Boot on the right, I get this:
View attachment 2646301

If I select the OC EFI Boot, I'll get a volume called "No Name" next to macOS.
If I select this drive, I'll get an alert:
"Could not read \EFI\: Invalid Parameter.
Error: could find boot options:
Invalid Parameter start-image() returned in valet parameter"

Obviously I haven't understood how to handle EFI Boots. Any suggestions?

I also had problems dual-booting Linux Mint and Sequoia on a MBP 2013 through OC. Anytime I booted up LM, MacOS would be stuck on the first quarter of the loading screen bar afterwards. This happened with the ext4_x64.efi driver as well as when booting grub through the EFI icon. After digging deep in the internet, I found some post in some forum [or reddit discussion] documenting the same thing, suggesting to make the EFI partition read-only etc... Nothing really worked. No problems on a MBP 2015, however.

I switched to Pop!_OS and actually never looked back. The problem entirely disappeared with this distro. There was also a problem with fractional scaling on LM at the time, which I described here. Might well be possible this disappeared by now with the advent of Wayland support.

 

[houser]

This happened with the ext4_x86.efi driver

Pretty sure ext4_x86.efi is 32 bit and you would need ext4_x64.efi for Sequoia, or am I missing something obvious?
Possible to run smaller ext4 volumes maybe?
Or is it possible or even a reason to run ext4_x86.efi on any later legacy Mac 2010-ish?
I would think not possible from Catalina and onwards as that was the OS to stop 32-bit support as I recall?

 

[imacker2011]

Pretty sure ext4_x86.efi is 32 bit and you would need ext4_x64.efi for Sequoia, or am I missing something obvious?
Possible to run smaller ext4 volumes maybe?
Or is it possible or even a reason to run ext4_x86.efi on any later legacy Mac 2010-ish?
I would think not possible from Catalina and onwards as that was the OS to stop 32-bit support as I recall?

Sure, it must have been the x64 version, you are completely right. I have corrected it in the post.

BTW, one of the contributors in the aforementioned forum discussion provided a script, which auto installs the ext4 driver on an existing OC installation. It is quite handy if you have several OCLP Macs.

 

[makra]

I also had problems dual-booting Linux Mint and Sequoia on a MBP 2013 through OC. Anytime I booted up LM, MacOS would be stuck on the first quarter of the loading screen bar afterwards. This happened with the ext4_x64.efi driver as well as when booting grub through the EFI icon. After digging deep in the internet, I found some post in some forum [or reddit discussion] documenting the same thing, suggesting to make the EFI partition read-only etc... Nothing really worked. No problems on a MBP 2015, however.

I switched to Pop!_OS and actually never looked back. The problem entirely disappeared with this distro. There was also a problem with fractional scaling on LM at the time, which I described here. Might well be possible this disappeared by now with the advent of Wayland support.

I had a very long session with Sam Altman's best friend. I ended up with giving up Mint and start from scratch with with Debian. After installation I had to reinstall OC again, but now both work well.

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

giving up Mint and start from scratch with with Debian

There is LMDE (Linux Mint Debian Edition). Which is yours? 😀

 

[makra]

ChatGPT recommended Debian Trixie because of the firmware issue I had with Wifi. So I downloaded debian-mac-13.6.0-amd64-netinst.

There is LMDE (Linux Mint Debian Edition). Which is yours? 😀

 

[makra]

I had a very long session with Sam Altman's best friend. I ended up with giving up Mint and start from scratch with with Debian. After installation I had to reinstall OC again, but now both work well.

I was too hasty to post: Same procedure (well, Debian works - that's something. But Grub destroys my OC: I need to start with the OC USB pen drive again. I activated verbose and got this. I won't bother very much now. The MBP 10,2 will live a happy afterlife. But in case someone is interested - here is what I got.

 

[houser]

I was too hasty to post: Same procedure (well, Debian works - that's something. But Grub destroys my OC: I need to start with the OC USB pen drive again. I activated verbose and got this. I won't bother very much now. The MBP 10,2 will live a happy afterlife. But in case someone is interested - here is what I got.

It is pretty well documented that it is a good idea to create a new separate partition for OCLP to have its wn space and avoid problems with multi boot and especially with Windows. This also has the benefit of making it easier to have quick access to edit the config files and you can then completely delete grub from your EFI and just use OCLP as the boot manager if you want. That is what we do anyway and have done for years.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I was too hasty to post: Same procedure (well, Debian works - that's something. But Grub destroys my OC: I need to start with the OC USB pen drive again. I activated verbose and got this. I won't bother very much now. The MBP 10,2 will live a happy afterlife. But in case someone is interested - here is what I got.

Simply avoid Grub or ReFind or other boot managers until you want to maintain a lot of different EFI partitions. You can integrate Linux into OpenCore. All this has been documented in the OpenCore (not OLCP) documentation in great detail. Read yourself a human written documentation and make up your mind and do not rely on an AI trained with all the rumors countless non experts have posted all over the internet over decades, now.

There is no such thing like a swarm intelligence. You will find only rats or even worse kids following a piper. Great story, you should have heard it in your native language.

 

[houser]

Simply avoid Grub or ReFind or other boot managers until you want to maintain a lot of different EFI partitions. You can integrate Linux into OpenCore. All this has been documented in the OpenCore (not OLCP) documentation in great detail.

Yes, just confirming we use this from the Dortania OCLP docs (no AI-slop 😉 for all our triple boot legacy Macs and simply add ext4_x64.efi for Linux. It recommends adding a separate volume for OCLP and ignoring or deleting grub. Has worked great here for years FWIW..

 

[makra]

Simply avoid Grub or ReFind or other boot managers until you want to maintain a lot of different EFI partitions. You can integrate Linux into OpenCore. All this has been documented in the OpenCore (not OLCP) documentation in great detail. Read yourself a human written documentation and make up your mind and do not rely on an AI trained with all the rumors countless non experts have posted all over the internet of decades, now.

There is no such thing like a swarm intelligence. You will find only rats or even worse kids following a piper. Great story, you should have heard it in your native language.

🙂 Thanks so much.

K two would probably say: Maybe I was just bored. It seemed pretty straightforward, but I can see, it isn't. Other than the kids in Hamelin I didn't have much to lose. I hope to be able to use some rainy days in Denmark to really understand, what I already had found here:

Dualbooting with Linux | OpenCore Multiboot

 

[LeVan]

🙂 Thanks so much.

K two would probably say: Maybe I was just bored. It seemed pretty straightforward, but I can see, it isn't. Other than the kids in Hamelin I didn't have much to lose. I hope to be able to use some rainy days in Denmark to really understand, what I already had found here:

Dualbooting with Linux | OpenCore Multiboot

Another Sequoia update OTA, 15.7.8 again. Installing now.

 

[K two]

Another Sequoia update OTA, 15.7.8 again. Installing now.

RC6!

 

[LeVan]

RC6!

build 24G822 it says. Did a backup via CCC to an SSD, had tons of changes, compared to recent RCs, could this be an actual 15.7.8 Release?

 

[basslik]

RC6!

Wow, JUST UPDATED.

Imagine this. running the latest Pro Tools 2026.4.1, and still tracking on my 2007 Digi003.

Thank you ALL!
Thank you OCLP

 

[K two]

build 24G822 it says. Did a backup via CCC to an SSD, had tons of changes, compared to recent RCs, could this be an actual 15.7.8 Release?

According to Discord it's another RC!