Other Mist - no, not the game, a macOS downloader

[eyoungren]

Anyone seen Mist?

This App Can Download Any Version of macOS

Sometimes you need to access an older version of macOS, but Apple doesn't make that easy. Mist is an app that can download macOS in multiple formats, and even create a bootable USB macOS recovery drive.

lifehacker.com

Popped up in my newsfeed and based on what I read, sounds good.

Located here: https://github.com/ninxsoft/Mist

Apparently, you can go as far back as Lion.

 

[Grumpus]

Anyone seen Mist?

I've been using it for some months, and it works well. There are a couple of things worth mentioning here though - it needs Monterey or higher to run, and when run on Apple Silicon machines it can't generate installers for any OS older than Big Sur.

 

[Wowfunhappy]

Can anyone confirm whether this is able to download usable installers of 10.9 Mavericks? It would be really nice if there was a way to get that from Apple's servers—but having been burned by similar tools, I'm skeptical.

Has anyone tried? If it works, I want to investigate how it's done...

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

I've been using it for some months, and it works well. There are a couple of things worth mentioning here though - it needs Monterey or higher to run, and when run on Apple Silicon machines it can't generate installers for any OS older than Big Sur.

Ahh jeez. I was thinking this would be a fantastic solution to pick up some remaining installers for my NAS but with these limitations, its pretty useless to me as I dont have an intel mac running newer than HighSierra and then I step directly up to AS & current macos.

 

[Grumpus]

Can anyone confirm whether this is able to download usable installers of 10.9 Mavericks?

Alas, Mavericks is AWOL even in Mist.

 

[Grumpus]

Ahh jeez. I was thinking this would be a fantastic solution to pick up some remaining installers for my NAS but with these limitations, its pretty useless to me as I dont have an intel mac running newer than HighSierra and then I step directly up to AS & current macos.

Mist can still download older installer apps on AS, it's just that it won't directly create installer USB drives for them. I haven't tried it, but I suspect you could use Mist to download an installer app and then run createinstallmedia (via Rosetta) to create a USB.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Can anyone confirm whether this is able to download usable installers of 10.9 Mavericks? It would be really nice if there was a way to get that from Apple's servers—but having been burned by similar tools, I'm skeptical.

It's baffling that everything down to Lion can be downloaded from Apple with the exception of Mavericks. Really strange decision on their part.

 

[DeltaMac]

Apple still has Mavericks on their servers. I did a test download, and still could download Mavericks today.
This is what I did: Booted to a Mac with Yosemite. Launched App Store. Opened Purchased tab.
Clicked on Mavericks to download.
You need the App Store, on an older OS X system, where it still showed the old OS X versions that you have previously purchased. Back in the day, the App Store showed your purchased apps, even if the app was free to download. So, now you know that I bought Mavericks when it was a current system.
I'm pretty sure that you would have to do a little mod to the license on the installer app (might be expired), so that it will actually install.
So, I needed to do this on a Mac that supports Mavericks, running OS X version old enough to still show the old purchased OS X download. Oh, and I also would need to have purchased it when Mavericks was available to add to the purchased tab.
When you have the Mavericks installer app, then that can be used to create a bootable USB installer.

 

[f54da]

>Can anyone confirm whether this is able to download usable installers of 10.9 Mavericks? It would be really nice if there was a way to get that from Apple's servers—but having been burned by similar tools, I'm skeptical.

Doesn't internet recovery get a mavericks image from somewhere? I feel like it should be possible to extract the URL that internet recovery downloads it from.

Maybe here - https://github.com/acidanthera/OpenCorePkg/tree/master/Utilities/macrecovery

There was another tool I think, can't dig it up at the moment

 

[AlixSPQR]

Ironic that Mist requires Monterey and that Apple serves version 12.7.4, the last version is 12.7.6. But Mist seems to be a great little tool, thanks.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Mist can still download older installer apps on AS, it's just that it won't directly create installer USB drives for them. I haven't tried it, but I suspect you could use Mist to download an installer app and then run createinstallmedia (via Rosetta) to create a USB.

Ahh I get it now. Hmm I typically use Belena Etcher to make usb installers, so could DL the dmg via my mbp and use BE to get through the finish line. Busy with firing up TG dinner at the moment but maybe this evening or tomorrow Ill grab Mist on my AS. Thanks

 

[Larsvonhier]

Myst was the game title.

 

[BotchQue]

 

[Sharewaredemon]

I've been trying to get an old work machine that can run Aperture working for over a week now. I was struggling with making getting a High Sierra installer for the last bunch of days. I settled on getting the machine running Ventura because I was getting fed up with expired certificates and Retroactived Aperture really wasn't the experience I'm looking for. Thanks to you (for posting this) I was able to do everything I needed with ease and it has made my day. Thanks so much for sharing this!!

 

[NC12]

Apple still has Mavericks on their servers. I did a test download, and still could download Mavericks today.
This is what I did: Booted to a Mac with Yosemite. Launched App Store. Opened Purchased tab.
Clicked on Mavericks to download.
You need the App Store, on an older OS X system, where it still showed the old OS X versions that you have previously purchased. Back in the day, the App Store showed your purchased apps, even if the app was free to download. So, now you know that I bought Mavericks when it was a current system.
I'm pretty sure that you would have to do a little mod to the license on the installer app (might be expired), so that it will actually install.
So, I needed to do this on a Mac that supports Mavericks, running OS X version old enough to still show the old purchased OS X download. Oh, and I also would need to have purchased it when Mavericks was available to add to the purchased tab.
When you have the Mavericks installer app, then that can be used to create a bootable USB installer.

Apple still has versions of Leopard on their servers. I recently was playing around with an old Powerbook G4 and after reinstalling the OS from the install DVD it came with, the old software update screen popped up and prompted me to download and install Mac OSX 10.5.8

 

[eyoungren]

Myst was the game title.

Yes, and quite a few people (I've seen on the internet) get that wrong and spell it as Mist.

 

[Grumpus]

Ahh I get it now. Hmm I typically use Belena Etcher to make usb installers, so could DL the dmg via my mbp and use BE to get through the finish line. Busy with firing up TG dinner at the moment but maybe this evening or tomorrow Ill grab Mist on my AS. Thanks

I'm pretty sure that Etcher wants bootable ISO files as input (not apps or disk images) so that approach might not work. On AS, Mist can create ISOs for Big Sur and newer, but not for Catalina and older.

I did some brief testing today, running Mist on a M3 MBP to download a Mojave installation app and then trying createinstallmedia, which wouldn't start at all. Some poking revealed that createinstallmedia had an expired certificate. Removing the certificate altogether allowed it to run and create an installation USB:

$ cd ~/Documents/'Install macOS Mojave 10.14.6_18G103.app/Contents/Resources'
$ codesign --remove-signature createinstallmedia
$ sudo ./createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Untitled
Password:
Ready to start.
To continue we need to erase the volume at /Volumes/Untitled.
If you wish to continue type (Y) then press return: Y
Erasing disk: 0%... 10%... 20%... 30%... 100%
Copying to disk: 0%... 10%... 20%... 30%... 40%... 50%... 60%... 70%... 80%... 90%... 100%
Making disk bootable...
Copying boot files...
Install media now available at "/Volumes/Install macOS Mojave"

For older OSes which don't have createinstallmedia, asr seems to work ok. I used Mist to download a Mountain Lion install app on the M3 MBP and then ran asr to create a USB installer:

$ cd ~/Documents/'Install OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.5_12F45.app/Contents/SharedSupport'
$ sudo asr restore --source InstallESD.dmg --target /Volumes/Untitled --erase
Password:
    Validating target...done
    Validating source...done
    Erase contents of /dev/disk4s2 (/Volumes/Untitled)? [ny]: y
    Retrieving scan information...done
    Validating sizes...done
    Restoring  ....10....20....30....40....50....60....70....80....90....100
    Verifying  ....10....20....30....40....50....60....70....80....90....100
    Restored target device is /dev/disk4s2.
    Remounting target volume...done
Restore completed successfully.

Both the Mojave and ML USBs boot just fine, but I didn't actually install anything. This wasn't an exhaustive test, so YMMV.

 

[startergo]

Apple still has Mavericks on their servers.

You can only download Mavericks from Apple if you have it in the "Purchased" (it was free) apps. I found another way to download it from the servers without logging to the Appstore, unfortunately it comes as an encrypted download and without the decryption key it is useless.

 

[eyoungren]

Is there something inherently special about Mavericks that people seem to want it for? My time with that macOS was short and I largely remember it for the SMB bug it introduced and all the problems that caused me. Once I left Mavericks, it became like OS9 for me - I have no wish to use it ever again.

 

[startergo]

Is there something inherently special about Mavericks that people seem to want it for? My time with that macOS was short and I largely remember it for the SMB bug it introduced and all the problems that caused me. Once I left Mavericks, it became like OS9 for me - I have no wish to use it ever again.

One good feature is that you can set any NVRAM variables from within the macOS without booting to recovery.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Is there something inherently special about Mavericks that people seem to want it for? My time with that macOS was short and I largely remember it for the SMB bug it introduced and all the problems that caused me. Once I left Mavericks, it became like OS9 for me - I have no wish to use it ever again.

What's the SMB bug that you experienced?

I need/use Mavericks on my Mac Pro 1,1 because it's the latest macOS release that can be coxed into running on the computer that's not affected by the USB 3.x PCIe card bug that affects Yosemite and El Capitan.

 

[eyoungren]

What's the SMB bug that you experienced?

My old job was a company with less than 20 people. So, running the server fell to me. As such, that meant I left it running 24/7 with no shutdowns over weekends.

For the computers in my own area, I did the same. Full power, no sleep, apps left open, server shares connected. I wanted and expected to walk in each day, tap the spacebar and pick up exactly where I left off.

With the Mavericks SMB bug, that became a very irritating issue. Mavericks has the first implementation of SMB2. The server was running SMB 1 and 2 and so were the PCs in the office. But because of whatever Apple did, once you connected a Mac running Mavericks to a server share, you had a 24-hour window of use. Once those 24 hours were up, using the share was not possible.

The MP would maintain a connection, but you could only open files. The system threw an error if you tried to save a file. In the case of InDesign, this meant that the moment you tried to save, the program would just quit. No dialogs, no error messages, just boom - ID closed.

I'm in the habit of saving my work constantly and consistently, but whether I lose a lot of work or a little, having the app just quit on me was highly irritating. At first I thought it was InDesign, then I saw that other apps were throwing up errors as well. So, I tried disconnecting shares and then connecting again. And the problem repeated itself. The only solution was to restart. I found out later that restarting was what actually reset that 24-hour connection clock.

So, having to restart every day kind of defeats the purpose of leaving your computer on and running, right? I had multiple shares to connect to on startup, so this was very infuriating. And some apps depended on certain shares already being connected! I tried everything on the server side with Active Directory and Computer Policy, etc. Nothing worked.

It's only when I stumbled upon someone else who had the EXACT problem I did with InDesign that I found out there was a bug. They specifically stated that their problem was an SMB bug in Mavericks. The ONLY workaround was to force SMB1, which meant connecting via CIFS:// and not SMB:// Which, of course, defeats the purpose of using SMB2 at all right?

AFAIK, Apple never fixed the issue until the next macOS launch. But there you go. The Mavericks SMB bug means you cannot be connected to a server share for more than 24 hours. You then are forced to restart in order to reset the timer.

Most people shut down before they leave work, so never had any idea. I didn't, I don't now, and I won't in the future unless directed to do so. So this bug was a real problem for me.

Google's AI. But the problem is well known, just search…

 

[TheShortTimer]

My old job was a company with less than 20 people. So, running the server fell to me. As such, that meant I left it running 24/7 with no shutdowns over weekends.

For the computers in my own area, I did the same. Full power, no sleep, apps left open, server shares connected. I wanted and expected to walk in each day, tap the spacebar and pick up exactly where I left off.

With the Mavericks SMB bug, that became a very irritating issue. Mavericks has the first implementation of SMB2. The server was running SMB 1 and 2 and so were the PCs in the office. But because of whatever Apple did, once you connected a Mac running Mavericks to a server share, you had a 24-hour window of use. Once those 24 hours were up, using the share was not possible.

The MP would maintain a connection, but you could only open files. The system threw an error if you tried to save a file. In the case of InDesign, this meant that the moment you tried to save, the program would just quit. No dialogs, no error messages, just boom - ID closed.

I'm in the habit of saving my work constantly and consistently, but whether I lose a lot of work or a little, having the app just quit on me was highly irritating. At first I thought it was InDesign, then I saw that other apps were throwing up errors as well. So, I tried disconnecting shares and then connecting again. And the problem repeated itself. The only solution was to restart. I found out later that restarting was what actually reset that 24-hour connection clock.

So, having to restart every day kind of defeats the purpose of leaving your computer on and running, right? I had multiple shares to connect to on startup, so this was very infuriating. And some apps depended on certain shares already being connected! I tried everything on the server side with Active Directory and Computer Policy, etc. Nothing worked.

It's only when I stumbled upon someone else who had the EXACT problem I did with InDesign that I found out there was a bug. They specifically stated that their problem was an SMB bug in Mavericks. The ONLY workaround was to force SMB1, which meant connecting via CIFS:// and not SMB:// Which, of course, defeats the purpose of using SMB2 at all right?

AFAIK, Apple never fixed the issue until the next macOS launch. But there you go. The Mavericks SMB bug means you cannot be connected to a server share for more than 24 hours. You then are forced to restart in order to reset the timer.

Most people shut down before they leave work, so never had any idea. I didn't, I don't now, and I won't in the future unless directed to do so. So this bug was a real problem for me.

Google's AI. But the problem is well known, just search…

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Thanks so much for this informative reply @eyoungren - I knew that I could rely on you for a response that went beyond "it's just wack!" etc.

I can't see myself ever needing to set up an SMB on the 2006 Mac Pro but what would you recommend as an alternative protocol?

 

[Amethyst1]

Mavericks has the first implementation of SMB2.

I can't see myself ever needing to set up an SMB on the 2006 Mac Pro but what would you recommend as an alternative protocol?

Does DAVE get SMB up to snuff on Mavericks?

 

[eyoungren]

Thanks so much for this informative reply @eyoungren - I knew that I could rely on you for a response that went beyond "it's just wack!" etc.

I can't see myself ever needing to set up an SMB on the 2006 Mac Pro but what would you recommend as an alternative protocol?

Just use AFP or force SMB1 by using CIFS with PCs