Sierra vs High Sierra

[eece]

I recently downgraded from High Sierra to Sierra on my 2017 MacBook

It _feels_ a tad bit faster with disk access in some areas (suspending/resuming VMs in VMWare)

It got me thinking one should probably run the OS the machine was made for where possible (El Capitan is still getting patches!) with low-resource (relatively) computers like this

Other tips for speed with day-to-day use:
- Disable Time Machine automatic backups - I trigger them manually before i go to lunch / weekly)
- Don't use iCloud/Photos on the Mac at all - I realise this isn't for everyone but I noticed the speed impact a lot, I now transfer photos from my iPhone using AirDrop or use iCloud.com for browsing on the MacBook

 

[EugW]

I run High Sierra on my MacBook Core m3 and it feels about the same speed to me as Sierra. However:

1. I have 16 GB RAM
2. I don’t use iCloud with Photos. iCloud is a disaster for Photos archival when it comes to Live Photos. Actually I don’t use Photos much on my MacBook. It’s mostly on my iMac.
3. I don’t use Time Machine.

 

[gobikerider]

My Macbook came with MacOS Sierra, its updating to 10.12.6 as I type and I see no reason to get High Sierra until it gets to 10.13.4-5 no hurry on my end.

 

[EugW]

My Macbook came with MacOS Sierra, its updating to 10.12.6 as I type and I see no reason to get High Sierra until it gets to 10.13.4-5 no hurry on my end.

Yeah I wouldn't have necessarily recommended High Sierra at 10.13.1 or 10.13.2, but 10.3.3 seems fine. But it's fine to wait too.

 

[gobikerider]

Yeah I wouldn't have necessarily recommended High Sierra at 10.13.1 or 10.13.2, but 10.3.3 seems fine. But it's fine to wait too.

I agree entirely, probably would upgrade but I am too lazy to make the usb then format and do a clean install of High Sierra. Not to mention I need to get a USB to Digital AV adapter tomorrow. This computer is awesome though I am loving it so small perfectly usable. Complements my iPad Pro perfectly.

 

[eece]

So it turns out you can run High Sierra WITHOUT APFS (which is the slow part for my usage)

Simply start the High Sierra install with the --converttoapfs command parameter:
/Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall --converttoapfs NO

http://osxdaily.com/2017/10/17/how-skip-apfs-macos-high-sierra/

Am now running the best of both worlds, fast disk(VMware) HFS+ AND the silky GPU accelerated graphics of 10.13
[doublepost=1521395540][/doublepost]Current setup

 

[mikzn]

Running 10.13.3 on a enclosed SSD and booting on MBP mid 2015, works well no issues other than some of my software needs to be upgraded and the cost of the upgrades is holding me back from swapping the SSD's and completing the upgrade.

Working drive is running 10.12.6 and running well - I don't see any advantages or new features in HS to justify the change to HS and on the downside there is the cost of new software and the changes in the new versions - so am slowly testing and upgrading on the test drive at a leisurely pace.

Did try HS on one MBP when it came out - but reverted to Sierra after a few days - decided to buy an SSD and buy more time - at this point I might skip HS and wait for the next OS

When there are new interesting features I am an early adopter - but I don't see anything exciting about HS

 

[EugW]

So it turns out you can run High Sierra WITHOUT APFS (which is the slow part for my usage)

Simply start the High Sierra install with the --converttoapfs command parameter:
/Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall --converttoapfs NO

http://osxdaily.com/2017/10/17/how-skip-apfs-macos-high-sierra/

Am now running the best of both worlds, fast disk(VMware) HFS+ AND the silky GPU accelerated graphics of 10.13
[doublepost=1521395540][/doublepost]Current setup

Yes, you can run 10.13 without APFS. APFS is better in many ways though, although it wouldn't hurt to wait another year for APFS as it is still young.

 

[Mike Boreham]

I am really appreciating the benefits of APFS, in two main ways that are very obvious to me, apart from any under the bonnet benefits, that are less obvious.

1. APFS partitions (volumes) in the same container share the free space on the drive. In HFS+ each partition needs to have its own headroom, which tends to waste space. APFS avoids this if you create the volumes in the same container. You can still do partitioning in APFS like HFS if you have a good reason, by creating a separate container.

2. APFS snapshots mean you can restore to a previous state really quickly, independent of Time Machine. More here. The newest beta version of Carbon Copy Cloner is introducing the ability to create and restore APFS snapshots in a very easy way.

I have been using APFS on both my Macs since day one and not had any issues, though there is a bit of a learning curve in Disk Utility. All my SSDs (internal and external) are APFS and my HDDs are on HFS.

 

[EugW]

I am really appreciating the benefits of APFS, in two main ways that are very obvious to me, apart from any under the bonnet benefits, that are less obvious.

1. APFS partitions (volumes) in the same container share the free space on the drive. In HFS+ each partition needs to have its own headroom, which tends to waste space. APFS avoids this if you create the volumes in the same container. You can still do partitioning in APFS like HFS if you have a good reason, by creating a separate container.

2. APFS snapshots mean you can restore to a previous state really quickly, independent of Time Machine. More here. The newest beta version of Carbon Copy Cloner is introducing the ability to create and restore APFS snapshots in a very easy way.

I have been using APFS on both my Macs since day one and not had any issues, though there is a bit of a learning curve in Disk Utility. All my SSDs (internal and external) are APFS and my HDDs are on HFS.

The thing I like are instantaneous copies on the same drive. But the reason for that is because it's not actually copying anything. It's just creating a new pointer to the same file. (Some might view this as a negative though since if the original file gets corrupted, then both "copies" are corrupted.)

I too have been using APFS since the beginning but one concerning issue I ran into was opening a disk image opened one with the wrong name, which then of course didn't work.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/high-sierra-opening-dmg-displays-wrong-dmg-name.2073689/

I haven't noticed it lately, but then again I haven't been using multiple disk images that much recently. It's for this reason I think it may be wise for some people with mission critical work on their Macs to wait a while before using APFS.

For me it's just a matter of having a proper backup or three of everything, and I store most of my files on a NAS anyway (with dual daily backups).