Mid 2011 iMac: best OS?

[Loa]

Hello,

My friend's mid 2011 iMac (2.5 i5 with 16GB of ram) is still on 10.8. I know that I could install 10.13 on it, but is it optimal? Sometimes newer OSes are slower on older machines.

So, what's the best OS for such an iMac? (My friend doesn't need the new bells and whistles, nor the incredible emojis of the latest OSes.)

Thanks

Loa

 

[signuphere]

I have the same machine and can't fathom why not to install the latest and greatest OS. It's free and presumably updates security features as well. I don't use the emojis or Siri, could not care less for either, same goes for other bells and whistles, whatever they may be.

 

[rizzo41999]

I think he should be fine with the latest OS. But if you ask me, 10.6 is still the best OS. Unfortunately, it's irrelevant these days.

 

[keysofanxiety]

Chuck an SSD in there and I'd say throw on 10.13. Though with the standard stock drive, it'll run much slower than Mountain Lion does. Certainly still usable, but without doubt it'll be noticeably slower.

If it was my own machine I'd upgrade it without hesitating, even without an SSD.

However if your friend is happy with how it is at the moment, I say if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Partly because if something goes wrong, it doesn't look as they expected, or it doesn't run as well as they expected, you'll likely get the blame as the person who crippled their iMac.

 

[Fishrrman]

Try El Capitan (my preference), or "Low" Sierra.

High Sierra seems problematic for many folks at the moment.
And the APFS filing system doesn't seem worth the trouble, either.

 

[EugW]

I think he should be fine with the latest OS. But if you ask me, 10.6 is still the best OS. Unfortunately, it's irrelevant these days.

Huh? It is the best OS but it is irrelevant? That makes no sense.

It was the best OS 7 years ago, but its time has long since past. In 2017, 10.6 is almost unusable in a practical sense.

 

[Loa]

Thanks for the inputs.

He wants to upgrade it because of many compatibility issues with recent apps and with his iOS devices that are using more recent versions.

But when we updated it from 10.7 to 10.8, there was a clear and unmistakable performance drop, and he's afraid that the same thing will happen again.

He's not going to put a SSD in there, as he's only going to use it as a back-up machine (he's buying a macbook right now).

I think I'm going to suggest 10.12 and see how it goes.

 

[Fishrrman]

Any version of the OS released -after- 10.8 Mountain Lion is going to make it slower than it is now...

 

[redheeler]

MacOS Sierra runs great on my 2011 iMac, better than you'd expect for a 6-year-old Mac; but I have installed an SSD. On the original spinning hard drive, the latest MacOS will run but performance does suffer, and the same is true even for brand new Macs that don't have an SSD.

 

[JJSingapore]

Just to share my most recent experience.. (am user not pro..) -- I had the same work machine iMac mid 2011 and same question as you 3 wks ago. did few hrs of research and decided to upgrade from Sierra to High Sierra. sadly, I failed to realise some applications like Filemaker11 or FM 13 dont work with HS 10.13.... finally this week, decided to pull out the legendary grey disc (snowleopard) reinstall. C / option failed. Cmd-R erased APFS + reformat led me to infamous grey screen of death.... repeat, tried - grey disc, bootable usb, external cd drive, reset xxx yyy zzz.. all failed. Finally after 4-5hrs slowslowslow internet recovery (Mountain Lion) brought my iMac back to life again.....total time wastage 10-12hrs...

So do check if your applications work w 10.13 first before upgrade

first post here from 10.9.5 Mavericks.....

* updated to El Capitan 10.11.6 (15G21013) after Mavericks random UI lag , Mail and iMessage trouble. Butt~ery smooth now..

 

[Nevada92]

Just to share my most recent experience.. (am user not pro..) -- I had the same work machine iMac mid 2011 and same question as you 3 wks ago. did few hrs of research and decided to upgrade from Sierra to High Sierra. sadly, I failed to realise some applications like Filemaker11 or FM 13 dont work with HS 10.13.... finally this week, decided to pull out the legendary grey disc (snowleopard) reinstall. C / option failed. Cmd-R erased APFS + reformat led me to infamous grey screen of death.... repeat, tried - grey disc, bootable usb, external cd drive, reset xxx yyy zzz.. all failed. Finally after 4-5hrs slowslowslow internet recovery (Mountain Lion) brought my iMac back to life again.....total time wastage 10-12hrs...

So do check if your applications work w 10.13 first before upgrade

first post here from 10.9.5 Mavericks.....

* updated to El Capitan 10.11.6 (15G21013) after Mavericks random UI lag , Mail and iMessage trouble. Butt~ery smooth now..

Completely with you on this - stick with Sierra not High Sierra.

My gut feeling is that APFS is best left to Macs with card storage.

10.12 served me very well on the original HD but now I'm having trouble with a new SSD - It's not easy - The only version of Sierra I could find to install kept crashing the drive so I've been round the houses a few times. About to try a new drive our of the wrapper and hope that will work OK.