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Upgrade from High Sierra?

NewsJunkie

NewsJunkie

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 22, 2022
5
0
Vancouver, WA
Is this possible? For $$?

Thanks,

MacOS High Sierra 10/13.6
2.5 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory: 10 GB 1067 MHz DDR3
 
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To piggy back off this -- upgrades to the newer OS are free. But, yeah, what mac do you have? OSX versions are hard to find but apple still does have them around, and you can always look at archive.org
 
Sorry, that is not enough information. Go to the Apple menu at the top left of the screen and choose "About this Mac". That will show the model and the year of your computer, which is what we need to know. For example, "Mac Mini (Late 2012)".
 
Boyd01 said:
Sorry, that is not enough information. Go to the Apple menu at the top left of the screen and choose "About this Mac". That will show the model and the year of your computer, which is what we need to know. For example, "Mac Mini (Late 2012)".
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"About This Mac only opens to this (screen shot). Is there another place to find the information?
 

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These old iMacs are great, I own one with 32GB RAM!!

You can update from High Sierra if you change the graphics video card, the AMD you have does not support graphics acceleration and Mojave or later will create strange colors and run very poorly.


"AMD Radeon HD 5xxx/6xxx series GPU acceleration: Currently, it is not possible to get full graphics acceleration when running Mojave on a system with a Radeon HD 5xxx or 6xxx series GPU. Mojave will be almost UNUSABLE without graphics acceleration. This includes the 15" and 17" MacBook Pro systems (MacBookPro8,2 and 8,3). If you want to enable GPU acceleration on these machines, you'll need to disable the AMD GPU (This will work on MacBook Pro 8,2 and 8,3 systems ONLY. You CANNOT disable the AMD GPU in an iMac.) Weird colors will also be produced when running Mojave with one of these video cards installed/enabled. To disable the AMD GPU on a 2011 MacBook Pro 8,2 or 8,3, follow the guide found here."

The link for older Mac OS X/MacOS versions is available here:

How to download and install macOS - Apple Support

Download and install current or previous versions of the Mac operating system on compatible Mac computers.
support.apple.com support.apple.com
 
@NewsJunkie I disagree with the above post, and would not recommend the use of the above patcher. Back in the old days it was a good option, but now there's something called OpenCore Legacy Patcher. You do not need to upgrade the video card either.

Also, the "MacBook Pro 8,2/8,3" stuff is completely irrelevant.
 
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rm5 said:
@NewsJunkie I disagree with the above post, and would not recommend the use of the above patcher. Back in the old days it was a good option, but now there's something called OpenCore Legacy Patcher. You do not need to upgrade the video card either.

Also, the "MacBook Pro 8,2/8,3" stuff is completely irrelevant.
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That's interesting. I'll have to test it on my own iMac. Everywhere I've looked including here at MR says that GPU acceleration is not supported on the stock iMac 12,1 without changing the video card. This Open Core page also states the same, that there are issues with acceleration:

 
Hmmm, I thought you can install the "Post-volume root patch" but maybe I'm mistaken. It worked fine on my 5,1 Mac Pro.
 
sdfox7 said:
That's interesting. I'll have to test it on my own iMac. Everywhere I've looked including here at MR says that GPU acceleration is not supported on the stock iMac 12,1 without changing the video card. This Open Core page also states the same, that there are issues with acceleration:

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That Wiki-like page is a bit outdated here and there, the support is much better than stated. They should revise it, but have other things to do, most notably to give support for upcoming macOS Ventura. But I agree that a metal compatible GPU is preferred.
 
When I have a chance I will connect an external SSD to my iMac and attempt to use the Open Core Legacy patcher. I don't want to hose the High Sierra I have on the internal SSD. I already have multiple OS versions of OCLP. I used it recently on a 2013 MBA I gave to a friend with Big Sur.
 
NewsJunkie said:
i bought it about five years ago and love it.
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I understand the sentiment, but with a Mac over 10 years old, your options are going to get more and more limited. Since it appears you are a non-technical user, I agree that messing with unsupported updates is not very practical. If you use your Mac for online ordering, bill paying, etc. then you will face an ever-increasing security risk on High Sierra and old web browsers.

Not what you want to hear, but I think it's time to consider upgrading to a newer computer. Another possibility might be getting a friend or relative to help install an usupported update, if they are technically able to do that. But you would need ongoing help from them in the future.
 
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Boyd01 said:
I understand the sentiment, but with a Mac over 10 years old, your options are going to get more and more limited. Since it appears you are a non-technical user, I agree that messing with unsupported updates is not very practical. If you use your Mac for online ordering, bill paying, etc. then you will face an ever-increasing security risk on High Sierra and old web browsers.

Not what you want to hear, but I think it's time to consider upgrading to a newer computer. Another possibility might be getting a friend or relative to help install an usupported update, if they are technically able to do that. But you would need ongoing help from them in the future.
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Thank you for your answer. I was going to buy one for $200 from a buddy. It’s already upgraded to 16gb Ram and 480GB (ssd). From my research before I got here, it seems as if it was easy to upgrade from High Sierra to Catalina just by going to the App Store. I guess not.
 
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iApple_man said:
Thank you for your answer. I was going to buy one for $200 from a buddy. It’s already upgraded to 16gb Ram and 480GB (ssd). From my research before I got here, it seems as if it was easy to upgrade from High Sierra to Catalina just by going to the App Store. I guess not.
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Keep in mind that Apple support is always a moving target. All Macs older than 2017 will no longer receive new operating systems including Ventura when it is released in October 2022. So, you'll probably want a machine from at least 2018 or later.

However, with the Intel to Apple Silicon transition, my opinion is that buying any Intel machine right now MAY be a waste of money if you're looking to buy a machine for long term use. With OS Ventura, Apple has dropped support for most 2013-2016 Macs as well as the 2017 MacBook Air and Mac mini. This is a pretty aggressive drop in support considering the 2013 Mac Pro and 2017 MacBook Air were both still being sold in 2019. I suspect Apple is trying to accelerate the end of Intel systems.

The transition from PowerPC to Intel occurred in 2006 and the final PowerPC operating system Leopard released in 2007. Chances are good that in 2024, the Mac operating system (OS 15) will no longer support Intel machines. Next year may be the final Intel compatible version, and you'll get three years of security updates after that.

Used Apple computers are expensive on the resale market, so please don't overpay. I recently bought a new M1 MacBook Air for testing and long-term use. At $899 with an education discount, and a FREE $150 Apple gift card thrown in, it was a no brainer to me.
 
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sdfox7 said:
However, with the Intel to Apple Silicon transition, my opinion is that buying any Intel machine right now MAY be a waste of money if you're looking to buy a machine for long term use. With OS Ventura, Apple has dropped support for most 2013-2016 Macs as well as the 2017 MacBook Air and Mac mini. This is a pretty aggressive drop in support considering the 2013 Mac Pro and 2017 MacBook Air were both still being sold in 2019. I suspect Apple is trying to accelerate the end of Intel systems.
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Also to take into account is what software you want to run on the system.

For example I have a 'long term' application upgraded over the past 22 years, which works fine on intel Macs.
The current version is unknown whether receiving any more updates, and is not AS native. It also is prone to crashing with latest M1/M2 cpus.
 
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