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macOS Sonoma Drops Support for These Macs

This is ********. The iMac 2017 shouldn’t have issues running this. They don’t make a difference between a highly specced model or an intro model. I will probably upgrade to Ventura later this year and will keep using that for years to come as the iMac is still as fast as when I got it.

They’re clearly phasing out the intel macs so I guess the 2019 models will be the next to go in one year’s time…
 
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bodonnell202 said:
Wow, the 2017 iMac was sold until October 2021, and it's been cut. That means someone who bought one of these (brand new from the Apple Store) in 2021 would only receive a couple years of software updates, followed by a couple years of security updates. Not great for a computer that sold for over $1000.
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Mine cost over 3000…
 
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trusso said:
And importantly - as I forgot to state in my first reply - Apple is still SELLING the M1 Air.

It will have to be a cold day in hell when Apple drops support for a Mac they were still selling only 12-24 months prior.
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Except it just happened... the 2017 iMac was sold (in the Apple Store) until October 2021 and it didn't make the cut for software that will be released fall 2023.
 
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Ventura was already chugging along on the 12' 2017 Macbook Intel m3 that sits on my bed, so I figured that was going to be it and most of 2017 lineup would go to wayside ala iPhone X.
 
bodonnell202 said:
Except it just happened... the 2017 iMac was sold (in the Apple Store) until October 2021 and it didn't make the cut for software that will be released fall 2023.
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I think a similar thing happened for one of the Macs sold around the PowerPC-Intel transition. An exception, I believe, that proves the rule.
 
erikkfi said:
Don't worry, the OCLP project will have Sonoma running on everything at least as far back as 2010 machines.
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Would be nice, but if Apple somehow forced T2 as a necessary piece of hardware for the OS, the road may have come to an end for OCLP too. That’ll be a tough thing to fully bypass.
 
Ok good, it seems like upgrading my iMac and MBP in 2019 and 2020 wasn’t the worst decision I ever made. Was concerned Apple would cut things off quickly because Apple Silicon, kinda like they did with PowerPC to Intel.
 
As expected!
This may be an unpopular take on, I wish macOS Sonoma goes even further and drops support for 2018 and 2019-era MacBook Air as well as 2018 Mac mini. They don’t even do well under macOS Ventura.
 
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Apple's greenwashing is such a farce. I love old Macs for tinkering and upgrading, but now you know why MacOS is only ~9% of the market share.

Screen Shot 2023-06-05 at 8.27.14 PM.png
 
b_scott said:
we're seriously on a "5 years and your mac is toast" cycle now? wtf.
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Apple seems to have people convinced that 3-5 years for a laptop/desktop and 2-3 years for a phone to go from latest new tech to too old and obsolete is perfectly reasonable in 2023.

Software is so matured at this point that changes are slow and subtle. There's no reason why macOS can't be supported longer.
 
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minik said:
As expected!
This may be an unpopular take on, I wish macOS Sonoma goes even further and drops support for 2018 and 2019-era MacBook Air as well as 2018 Mac mini. They don’t even do well under macOS Ventura.
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Or they could fix Ventura so it doesn't run so poorly on fairly new machines.
 
dysamoria said:
Of course they dropped support for the used 2017 iMac I just bought two months ago.
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I picked one up about a month ago from my neighbor. It is 21.5 4K i5 2017 model with 1 TB fusion which is perfect for my daughter for YouTube and light gaming (Minecraft, Roblox etc). I am just going to replace the spinning hdd and ssd which I already have and let this thing run for few more years. I was initially going to upgrade memory and name drive, but we no support anymore, I will just go with basic upgrades.
 
I'm guessing Sonoma (MacOS 14) will be the last OS for my 2019 iMac, which means support would end Oct 2026. That's 7 years of support (and 5 years on a current OS), so not too bad. And that at most MacOS 15 would be the last one for the 2020 iMacs, in which case those would also get 7 years. For the Intel Mac Pro, I dunno, maybe MacOS 16, which would be 2028.
 
escargot3 said:
All intel macs are slow and outdated compared to ASi. It won’t be long before they are no longer supported. PowerPC macs only got a single OS release until support for them was completely dropped with Snow Leopard. That being said my parents still use my 2012 retina MBP 15” running catalina and it’s fine enough. But it’s certainly slow and outdated compared to my ASi MBP.
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Maybe in a comparative sense to your silicon Mac it might be slow, but it’s not show for the everyday tasks I use it for:
- mail, Office, DEVONthink, obsidian, endnote, web apps, photo editing. It so feels fine.
 
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escargot3 said:
All intel macs are slow and outdated compared to ASi. It won’t be long before they are no longer supported. PowerPC macs only got a single OS release until support for them was completely dropped with Snow Leopard. That being said my parents still use my 2012 retina MBP 15” running catalina and it’s fine enough. But it’s certainly slow and outdated compared to my ASi MBP.
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Depends on the application. With the assistance of some other posters I did extensive benchmarking of my 2019 i9 iMac vs. M1 Pro and M1 Max MacBook Pro's for tasks in Mathematica (a symbolic math program), and found that the M1's averaged only about 20% faster. I.e., not much of a difference. And on certain graphical processing tasks they were actually slower. This might be because Apple has not yet developed sufficiently fast libraries to replace those supplied by Intel.
 
ApplesAreSweet&Sour said:
That fear is unwarranted.

Obviously, it will happen eventually.

But there's no precedence of any post Apple Silicon Mac getting dropped. So I wouldn't lose sleep over it just yet.

This is just another year of dropping more Intel Macs, as expected.

I'd start worrying when the MacOS version drops that drops support for the last remaining Intel Mac.

Since no new Intel chips were introduced alongside the first M1 Macs, and the newest Intel Mac is from 2019, I highly doubt Apple is going to drop support for a selection of Intel Macs while also dropping support for some M1 and M2 machines.

I'd be very surprised if M1 gets less than 6 years of full support.
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M1 should realistically get 8 years of support, and possibly as long as 10 years (yes I'm serious).

M1/M2 basically the same, right? M2 is the cornerstone of Reality Pro... and you could realistically expect that thing will get support until 2030. It's not even out until 2024!!

M1 was released in late 2020.... so if Vision Pro is supported in 2030, then M1 could carry on just as long, i.e. 10 years.
 
SBlue1 said:
You are just guessing like the rest of us.
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Not a guess, going by history.

When Apple designs their own silicon, they support it longer than Intel. iPad being the best corollary. Seven years support is typical, and this was before the Mx chips, which are more robust than the Axx chips from the iPhone/iPad lines.
 
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Siliconguy said:
Running may be a little optimistic. Working I will believe. the graphics may be weak point as much as the lack of cores. When was the last dual core Mac?
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I have ventura on a 2012 13” MBP and it runs rather well FWIW
 
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