Monterey on MacBook Pro 2014 - is it worth it?

[Killerbob]

I have an old mid-2014 13" MacBook Pro. It is max configuration, i.e. 3GHz i7 w. 16GB RAM. It is usually connected to an Apple Thunderbolt Display.

Right now my wife is using it for Adobe Creative Suite, MS Office, internet, Music, as well as the usual small app stuff. It is of course running on macOS Big Sur.

I know I can easily install Monterey on it. Using Mr. Mcintosh's step-by-step guide, that's a no-brainer. It is however, without a doubt, some additional effort.

But, my question is, will it run all the apps on Monterey without any issues? Is there a reason Apple decided to include the 2014 MacBook Pros?

 

[rm5]

I’d say it’s worth a shot- it’s only one year out of support, so it should run just fine. Now the question is, do all of your apps work on Monterey? If they work on Big Sur, they should work on Monterey, but it’s still worth checking before you upgrade.

Just make sure to back everything up before upgrading in case something bad happens.

If you’re sure that everything will work fine and your data is backed up, go ahead and upgrade.

Good luck!

 

[bogdanw]

It is of course running on macOS Big Sur.

I see no point in installing Monterey, unless you want to annoy your wife.

 

[Killerbob]

lol - I am running Monterey on all my own Macs, and have no problems.

 

[pshufd]

My 2015 MacBook Pro 15 is running Mojave. I tried Monterey for a while and it uses more RAM and it has an annoying network issue. I run Monterey on my 2021 MacBook Pro 16 and have to reboot it once a week over the network issue. Big Sur also has the memory leak that I see on Monterey and the network issue. No problems on Mojave and High Sierra (I have a 2010 iMac and it runs High Sierra smoothly). I also have a 2014 MacBook Pro 15, currently loaned out to my son for work and he's running High Sierra I think.

 

[MajorFubar]

Eleven years in the Apple ecosystem and I've decided it's usually best to only upgrade when you have to rather than being on the bleeding-edge of OS rollouts. So I'd say stick with what works. My exception will be this year when OS13 rolls out in October, because my theory is that even 13.0 has to be better than the buggy mess I'm now forced to live with having bought a Mac Studio with Monterey installed.

 

[Killerbob]

I have always been of the other opinion; update when you can. And I am running Monterey on all the other Macs in the family - with NO problems. I even run Beta versions on my nMP.

My wife's Mac though, has been off-limits as she has been working on her thesis and couldn't loose her MacBook for even one day.

I think I will go ahead and try to update to Monterey - just wanted to hear from other mid-2014 MacBook Pro owners with Monterey installed.

 

[pshufd]

One other approach would be to just install it on an external SSD and run it from there - that is if it's at a desk all the time. I did this with the 2014 and 2015. I had to do the OCLP thing on the 2014.

 

[Killerbob]

One other approach would be to just install it on an external SSD and run it from there - that is if it's at a desk all the time. I did this with the 2014 and 2015. I had to do the OCLP thing on the 2014.

I nkow it is possible, but it is just so slow - the MacBook Pro mid-2014 only has TB2 ports, and not TB3.

 

[pshufd]

I nkow it is possible, but it is just so slow - the MacBook Pro mid-2014 only has TB2 ports, and not TB3.

I ran it off USB 3.0. My external SSDs only run at 500 Mbps so no loss in performance with USB 3.

 

[Killerbob]

Using USB3 or TB2 doesn't matter. It is still significantly slower than any internal SSD, which are running at:

512GB Samsung SM0512F - 750/720MB/s
1TB Samsung SM1024F - 1031/990MB/s

USB3/TB2 will be limited to the speed of the external drive, and even the fastest I have is only spec'ed at 400MB/s (Lacie Rugged SSD). And in testing it is actually slower.

 

[pshufd]

Using USB3 or TB2 doesn't matter. It is still significantly slower than any internal SSD, which are running at:

512GB Samsung SM0512F - 750/720MB/s
1TB Samsung SM1024F - 1031/990MB/s

USB3/TB2 will be limited to the speed of the external drive, and even the fastest I have is only spec'ed at 400MB/s (Lacie Rugged SSD). And in testing it is actually slower.

What I found on those systems is that performance between the internal and external SSDs didn't really matter.

 

[Killerbob]

I don't know about that. My nMP boots significantly faster on the internal SSD than on an externally connected SSD, even via TB2/USB3.

 

[pshufd]

I don't know about that. My nMP boots significantly faster on the internal SSD than on an externally connected SSD, even via TB2/USB3.

My approach was to leave it running for months at a time - I never rebooted. If everything is in RAM and cached, the SSD speed doesn't make much of a difference.