Whats so special about the new OS that affects TurboTax?

[iriejedi]

Saddly I'm on a 2008 Mac Pro (still a beast for my needs) - running the last of the OS upgrades it supports.... my Turbo Tax said the 2018 version will not work unless I upgrade to newest OS... what is so special that makes a relatively simple accounting/tax program need the newest OS?

Especially as 2018 taxes can be done on a post card.... for some simple income cases.... (totally think it was a real news story). I'd think OS 7.6.1 could still run it. LOL

Cheers.
Irie J

 

[organicCPU]

So you're running OS X 10.11.6 and Turbo Tax 2018 requires macOS 10.12.x for whatever reason. Is it possible to run 10.12.x in a Virtual Machine?

 

[iriejedi]

So you're running OS X 10.11.6 and Turbo Tax 2018 requires macOS 10.12.x for whatever reason. Is it possible to run 10.12.x in a Virtual Machine?

Not as technically savvy as I used to be... how would a virtual machine work in my 2008 cheese grater MP?

 

[ApfelKuchen]

There are any number of possible reasons, but one that's specific to financial software would be security. Most finance software these days includes some sort of internet functionality.

 

[Randall2018]

There are any number of possible reasons, but one that's specific to financial software would be security. Most finance software these days includes some sort of internet functionality.

That would make sense except El Capitan still receives security updates so it shouldn’t have any major security issues. Although I would anticipate that it won’t get many more security patches.

 

[ApfelKuchen]

That would make sense except El Capitan still receives security updates so it shouldn’t have any major security issues. Although I would anticipate that it won’t get many more security patches.

Bottom line is only Turbotax knows why it made this decision. There are probably multiple reasons - specific features added to the OS, for example. There can even be marketing reasons (our most secure, most up-to-date software requires the newest OS).

Regardless, I was answering the OP's question, which was, essentially, why would an OS newer than Snow Leopard be necessary for a financial program? Whether it requires El Capitan, Sierra, High Sierra, or Mojave, there's no doubt that developers of finance software and finance web sites consider nine-year-old OSes to be unacceptable security risks.

 

[HDFan]

what is so special that makes a relatively simple accounting/tax program need the newest OS?

Lots of things can change between OS releases, hardware support, bug fixes, new features, API changes, file locations, etc. As just one example, if the new TurboTax uses new APIs that didn't exist in the earlier OS, or Apple fixed an API which required code workarounds and they use the fixed API, you have to upgrade.

 

[SoCalReviews]

With the previous comments I realize this information is redundant but I'll add my two cents worth here anyway. Most software companies stop supporting major computer OS's that are no longer supported or will soon no longer be supported. There are security risks that they don't want to be responsible for and the cost of supporting outdated OS's usually doesn't benefit the software makers. The exception to this rule is often for antivirus, browsers and drivers for devices such as printers. I believe support for 10.11.x will soon be ending so the only option will be using MacOS 10.12.x or later if you want to use the latest Turbotax 2018.

 

[flowrider]

And, you really won't know until you buy, install and try the program. I really doubt if Intuit really knows at this time.

Lou

 

[SoCalReviews]

And, you really won't know until you buy, install and try the program. I really doubt if Intuit really knows at this time.

Lou

I've tried that in the past using an outdated Windows OS with Intuit products that required an updated Windows to run their latest version and let's just say that it didn't work out too well (crashes, data corruption, etc..) but as long as you have reliable backups and are willing to forgo support from Inuit I suppose you could give it a try.

You could also try running the Windows version in a VM on your Mac Pro. You would probably need to use VM software that supports MacOS 10.11.x and Windows 7 or 10. I would go with the latest Parallels for Mac, Windows 10 Pro and Turboxtax. You could convert the data for export and import the old data to Windows and that would extend the life of your Mac Pro with future versions of Turbotax that support Windows 10 Pro. It's a bit complicated and somewhat costly but way cheaper than a new Mac Pro or a new Mac.

 

[organicCPU]

Not as technically savvy as I used to be... how would a virtual machine work in my 2008 cheese grater MP?

Well, I don't know how well or if it would work at all. I'm running macOS High Sierra as a guest OS in a Virtual Box instance on a 2015 MBP with host macOS Sierra. The performance is acceptable, even better than macOS Sierra guest on macOS Sierra host. I guess it should be possible to run a higher macOS on an unsupported machine in a VM, but I never tried it. With Virtual Box, there are some tricks to tell what host machine it is. Therefore I guess, that Virtual Box could consider your MP 2008 as a 2012 iMac. Performance wise it could be problematic for daily use, but for once a year it should be acceptable. If I were you, I'd just try it out or take the pile and buy Windows to run it on a VM or native as a Boot Camp partition. I could give you a brief instruction how I set up a High Sierra VM on Sierra.

Another alternative would be to upgrade the MP 2008, maybe on a second drive: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/macos-high-sierra-10-13-unsupported-macs-thread.2048478/

 

[mk313]

Saddly I'm on a 2008 Mac Pro (still a beast for my needs) - running the last of the OS upgrades it supports.... my Turbo Tax said the 2018 version will not work unless I upgrade to newest OS... what is so special that makes a relatively simple accounting/tax program need the newest OS?

Especially as 2018 taxes can be done on a post card.... for some simple income cases.... (totally think it was a real news story). I'd think OS 7.6.1 could still run it. LOL

Cheers.
Irie J

Why not just use the online version of Turbo Tax? I use that version and I can access it on my iPhone, iPad, Mac, etc.

 

[SoCalReviews]

Why not just use the online version of Turbo Tax? I use that version and I can access it on my iPhone, iPad, Mac, etc.

Great idea and a simple solution but for security and privacy reasons many people don't like to have their cumulative personal financial application data and tax information stored online.

 

[jasnw]

If you're really wedded to TurboTax and can't, or don't want to, use the on-line version, a simple solution would be to buy a used Mac Mini or MacBook with minimum specs for running Mohave and use it for taxes. If you use it for taxes only you might be able to write it off as a deductible, but these days you need a lot of other deductibles to make that work (due to the higher standard deduction). If you're running a cheese grater Mac now you can use the same KVM setup for a Mini.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

Do you have a spare drive around?
Have you considered installing a newer version of the OS onto that drive?
If you do this, you can "switch boot" to the newer OS for running TurboTax, WITHOUT disturbing your existing setup on your "main drive".

 

[jasnw]

I was going to suggest that (I think you suggested that approach to me when this issue first came up), but I think the OP would still have the issue that his CPU box was unacceptable to Mohave.