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OSX beyond 10.10 best suited for Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 6?

macstatic

macstatic

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Oct 21, 2005
2,057
175
Norway
Which version of OSX from 10.10 Yosemite and up to 10.14 (Mojave) allows you to run Photoshop CS4 (possibly other CS4 apps as well) and Adobe Lightroom 6?
And among those OSX versions, which one would you recommend for best stability, usefulness and enjoyment in general?

I've been happy with 10.9 (Mavericks), but need to upgrade to 10.10 or beyond because of compatibility with some new hardware.
 
El Capitan for sure. It’s basically just an improved version of Yosemite. 10.11 is pre Siri and doesn’t have all those a garbage iOS apps Apple put into Mojave. It is very light, as compared to the more recent versions of Mac OS. I am will running it on my 2015 unit. I use Lightroom 5.7 and Creative Cloud 2018 applications. CS4 should run.
 
I like to hear it's light because most OS upgrades are bloated and in turn need more powerful hardware in order to run efficiently. So among my upgrade options:

10.10 Yosemite
10.11 El Capitan
10.12 Sierra
10.13 High Sierra

... you'd choose 10.10 Yosemite for the best performance?
I should have mentioned my hardware as I see many discussions on similar matters yield completely different results according to which hardware it's installed on. My main computer is a mid-2010 Mac Pro (2.8GHz quad core) fitted with an SSD for OSX/apps and multiple spinning drives for files and backups. I upgraded its RAM to 24 GB.
It won't run 10.14 Mojave until I replace my ATI 5870 graphic card with something else, which I see no compelling reason to do.

My other computer is a mid-2012 Macbook Pro (2.5GHz i5) maxed out at 16 GB RAM and has had its HDD replaced with an SSD. I've been told it can run 10.14 Mojave and even 10.15 Catalina, but I'm not sure how wise it is to run different OS versions as that could complicate compatibility between the two.


I read that apparently CS4 works in 10.12 Sierra according to Adobe themselves, with a little tweaking the installer. I haven't heard about any higher OSX being compatible with it, which is why I'm trying to find out here.

Based upon your recommendation I've tried to install 10.11 El Capitan on another SSD in my Mac Pro (I've partitioned it so as to allow different OSX versions to be tried out), but for some reason I can't install it. I have the 10.10 installer DMG file, but Diskmaker X complains that the installer isn't available. All I can do is upgrade my 10.9.5. Mavericks (which I don't want to do, just in case things go wrong). So I installed 10.6 Snow Leopard on that empty SSD partition, then it complained about needing a minimum of 10.6.8. (the installer DVDs had 10.6.4 as far as I remember) so I checked for an OS update and had it update to 10.6.8, but back in 10.9.5. when running the El Capitan installer it just says I can't install it on the 10.6.8 drive partition. And Macs are (were?) supposed to be simple and easy to use.....
 
macstatic said:
... you'd choose 10.10 Yosemite for the best performance?
Click to expand...

No, I said El Cap (10.11). Sierra is where Siri comes in and the unnecessary bloat starts happening. I have run everything from 10.11-10.14 and El Capitan runs the best and uses the least amount of RAM on my 2015 model.
 
You mentioned that 10.11 was basically an improved version of 10.10. What are those improvements, and why did you skip 10.10?

What's the best way to install 10.11 (now that neither Diskmaker X works, nor running the installer to place 10.11 on an empty partition and neither upgrading from 10.6.8 works)?
 
Just get Mojave. The apps that are included with it are fine, and they take up very little if you're never going to use them. Don't use a depreciating OS just for CS6. Mojave is great, and the entire time I used it I never had a single problem.
 
macstatic said:
Which version of OSX from 10.10 Yosemite and up to 10.14 (Mojave) allows you to run Photoshop CS4 (possibly other CS4 apps as well) and Adobe Lightroom 6?
And among those OSX versions, which one would you recommend for best stability, usefulness and enjoyment in general?

I've been happy with 10.9 (Mavericks), but need to upgrade to 10.10 or beyond because of compatibility with some new hardware.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I can't help you, but would you please explain why you feel that CS4 is best?

I feel CS6 is the greatest ever, what makes CS4 better iyo?

Let me know, I'm interested.
 
CS4 is better for me because it's what I already have and it works for me.
I see no need to pay for an upgrade to CS6, but need to figure out which OS beyond 10.9 it will work with.

So has anyone installed (and used) CS4 on 10.11 El Capitan with success?
 
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Answering my own question (after installing various OSX versions on different test partitions/drives) I found Photoshop CS4 to work fine (seemingly that is, I haven't done any extensive testing) in both 10.11 El Capitan and 10.12 Sierra. The same for Lightroom 6.14 which appeared to work fine.

I used the CS4 installer to do a clean installation in both cases. I also found a site called Roaring apps which reports the same thing (and shows which apps work in which OSX versions).

I have yet to install Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 6 within 10.13 High Sierra (which is also installed on one of my test partitions), but I'm leaning towards going for 10.11 El Capitan to replace my 10.9 Mavericks (for iOS 13 compatibility in iTunes) as that appears to be a leaner, less bloated OS than the later ones (failing 10.9 of course, which would be my choice before any of them).

UPDATE: I've now attempted to install my CS4 apps within 10.13 High Sierra and it simply didn't work. First, an alert about needing to update my 32-bit apps, secondly the (purchased and fully valid) serial number wasn't recognized by the Adobe installer. I've never experienced that before.
The Roaring Apps website (linked above) is quite misleading as it report about CS4 working fine (seemingly) for some people in High Sierra, while for most people (according to several web searches on the matter) it's a lost cause, and many people revert back to 10.12 Sierra or older OSX versions.

So for me I'm ruling out 10.13 High Sierra for sure and of course 10.14 Mojave, and most likely 10.12 Sierra as well -then go for 10.11 El Capitan.
Any final thoughts on that choice before I format the drive and spend time re-installing my apps and transferring my files/settings etc?
 
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