There's hope that older Macs will be able to run macOS Ventura

AppleInsider · August 22, 2022 4:11PM

Older Macs not able to upgrade to macOS Ventura may be given a second lease on life, with a hack.

Expected to arrive this fall, macOS Ventura will provide Apple Silicon Macs with new features, while still providing services to Intel-based Macs. While a selection of Mac models cannot upgrade to macOS Ventura, there is a possibility that they could be upgraded in unofficial ways.

In a tweet posted on Monday, OpenCore Legacy Patcher project lead Mykola Grymalyuk revealed that there is hope for older Macs. After months of work, the team behind the project had managed to get macOS Ventura running on Macs with "legacy Metal GPUs."

A selection of screenshots posted by the developer show a beta of the operating system seemingly running on a 2008 Mac Pro, a 2012 Mac mini, a 2014 Mac mini, and a 2014 5K iMac.

After many months of work, we've finally gotten macOS Ventura running on legacy Metal GPUs!

This includes my early 2008 Mac Pro (Nvidia Kepler and AMD GCN 1), 2012 Mac mini, 2014 Mac mini and 2014 5k iMac! pic.twitter.com/cMQ5Qk8uoo
-- Mykola Grymalyuk (@khronokernel)
August 22, 2022

OpenCore is a bootloader that is primarily used by enthusiasts to create their own Hackintoshes, namely PCs that run macOS. OpenCore Legacy Patcher follows the same logic, but applies it to allow older and officially unsupported Macs to run newer releases of macOS.

Achieving support for macOS Ventura on older systems could be a good sign for owners of legacy Apple hardware who want to continue using the newest versions of the operating system.

However, Grymalyuk warns that there is no time estimate for when mainline support for the demonstrated features will be introduced in the mainline version of the OpenCore Legacy Patcher.

Read on AppleInsider

sbdude · August 22, 2022 4:53PM

I've got a MacBook Pro Retina Mid-2012 running 12.5.1 right now thanks to OpenCore. Pretty smooth as long as it's not using the intel graphics chip. Here's hoping for Ventura.

bobolicious · August 22, 2022 4:55PM

Does the EULA allow this ? If not should it ?

I understand Apple may not be able to justify support + parts beyond 4 + 9 years, however would it be helpful if such could be possible via the 'community' given the shortened macOS cycles since 2011...?

And please slotted RAM, storage & GPU where possible, sigh...

zimmermann · August 22, 2022 5:25PM

I’m running MacOS Catalina on my Mac Mini early 2009 thanks to The Dos Dude1. Slow but stable as hell. The little thing is 13 years old.

bakerzdosen · August 22, 2022 6:11PM

I debated putting an i7 in my 2015 27" iMac while it was open for an HDD->NVMe SSD swap, but decided against it because it was no longer supported beyond Monterey.

I'm starting to wonder if I should have just gone for it and used this - even if the jump to an i7-6700 really only gives you hyperthreading and *slightly* faster cores...

pdybman · August 22, 2022 7:21PM

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

lkrupp · August 22, 2022 8:28PM

Pdybman said:

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

cornchip · August 22, 2022 9:32PM

zimmermann said:

I’m running MacOS Catalina on my Mac Mini early 2009 thanks to The Dos Dude1. Slow but stable as hell. The little thing is 13 years old.

Yeah I’m running the DosDude Catalina patcher on my 09 4,1. Pretty sweet, but didn’t realize it was “slow”?

sbdude · August 22, 2022 10:23PM

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You must have missed my post, which is strange because it was the very first post here. New versions of macos on "vintage" or "obsolete" macs (designations which have nothing to do with software, btw) don't 'always run poorly.' I'm running monterey (12.5.1) just fine on a ten year old macbook pro retina. And, based on the devs' efforts, the only reasons monterey and big sur don't run on kepler macs are a few animations (metal 3 support), and the desire to no longer support certain bluetooth and wifi devices.

If anything, you can say my mac runs monterey just as "slowly" as it ran catalina. And it will save me $2k the next time I have to do my taxes, now that turbotax requires big sur.

sbdude · August 22, 2022 10:28PM

lkrupp said:

Pdybman said:

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

Vanity, eh? "Practicality" and "economy" seem like better adjectives to me.

My "obsolete" mac supports sidecar, continuity, and all the other "sideshow" gimmicks apple builds into the os these days. I'll take the plunge when intel is no longer supported, but there's no reason to ditch a perfectly good computer when it isn't broken. I'm sure we'll all be saying the same thing about ARM, too, when the next thing comes along and Apple forces everyone onto a new platform (again. and again. and again. and again).

saarek · August 22, 2022 11:09PM

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

I have many Mac’s, one of my favourites is the 2008 13” Aluminium MacBook and it runs Catalina beautifully. It’s amazing how capable that system is once you max the ram and add in an SSD.

A lot of my Macs dual boot into versions of Mac OS that are not officially compatible with no issue.

Apple frequently cuts support due to arbitrary reasons as opposed to genuine hardware limitations.

saarek · August 22, 2022 11:19PM

lkrupp said:

Pdybman said:

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

Some people get joy out of giving new life to older hardware. Heck, I still frequently use a PowerBook G4 and am working with others to get Snow Leopard up and running for PPC.

Many Macs are cut by Apple with no reason to do so other than Apple simply deciding that they no longer want to offer the support.

You don’t personally see the point in keeping older machines up to date, that’s fine. But I don’t get why you’re always been so vocally against others choosing to do so. I seem to remember you decided to upgrade an iMac that was no longer officially supported even though an inferior MacBook from the same release year was still supported and the dosdude patch offered 100% compatibility. That’s of course your choice, but your iMac would’ve had no issue running the newer OS.

For some, like me, it’s just the joy of keeping older computers going. For others it may well be for financial reasons, for others it could simply be that their Mac does everything it needs to and upgrading the OS buys longer life for their investment and they’re happy.

edited August 2022

bobolicious · August 22, 2022 11:29PM

lkrupp said:

Pdybman said:

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

...I can think of a number of scenarios where someone may for example have a secondary laptop that is used very infrequently but needs to run current apps, a backup machine for emergencies, print server or when repairs are required, students on a budget, the ability to boot back into Mojave to run 32 bit apps or work with older client assets - obvious risks include lack of prompt tech or repair support, however that may be fine for non-critical or secondary machines. Budget may be another by way of example I understand the 5,1 Pro could be hopped up to similar speeds or even faster GPU than the base 2019 pro for maybe 25% of the cost... The list goes on...

daalseth · August 22, 2022 11:49PM

Neat that this looks like it could happen, but I won’t be using it.

My experience is that even if a system is supported if it’s at the bottom of the envelope it won’t run worth s***. Features will be missing, and it will be noticeably slow. Two of my systems are too old to upgrade, and I’m not going to bother with this. The third could get the upgrade, but it’s at the ragged bottom edge, so I already wasn’t going to upgrade. I’ll take a well running but older OS, over a newest OS that is crippled.

But if someone wants to try it, more power to them.

chris rothgeb · August 23, 2022 1:59AM

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

Apple only stops supporting certain models because the base configuration of those models in too underpowered to run the OS well. That's not necessarily true for more capable machines with superior specs. For instance, if my 27" iMac from late 2012 had been the base configuration it would probably struggle to run Big Sur, let alone Monterey or Ventura. But since my system has a quad core i7, 32GB of RAM, and dedicated graphics with 2GB of VRAM, there's no reason why my machine shouldn't be able to run the latest OS. Many Macs with lesser specs are fully supported. With OpenCore Legacy Patcher, I'm running Monterey 12.4 and the experience is smooth and more than satisfactory for my needs. That's not to say that I'm not saving up for a new Mac, but for the time being, I can enjoy feature parity with my newer Apple devices like my iPhone and iPad.

chris rothgeb · August 23, 2022 2:05AM

lkrupp said:
Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

There's more utility here than I think you realize. I can use the latest features in Monterey like Universal Control with my iPad on my iMac from 2012. I invested in the top of the line 10 years ago which means my experience with running OpenCore is going to be better than most, but still, it extends the usable life of the machine and gives near feature parity with my newer Apple devices running iOS and iPadOS. Now I'm still saving up for a new Mac, but until I can actually afford it, I'm still very happy with how responsive my system is. Your point about support for Intel processors is valid, but that won't be for at least another few years. Don't forget that Apple still sells Macs with Intel processors in 2022.

ukrunr · August 23, 2022 3:57AM

lkrupp said:
Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

Similar to other responders here, having the flexibility to continue to use some of the latest OS features on my older MacPro has utility to me. My MacPro has a large display and I find working on documents/photos easier at times than on my MacBook Air or Mac mini. When Mac Photos can't read or interpret photos because of the older OS, that's annoying. When a document saved in a different version of pages won't open, that's annoying. Having the ability to update the MacPro and having compatibility is a definite help. Not for everyone, but no need for the put down.

Word of caution too, there are a few older applications that can only run on the older Mac OS, which can't run for me on my newer mac's, so don't lose the opportunity to dual-boot on these older boxes, you probably want to keep that flexibility too, if not now, you may in the the future.

frantisek · August 23, 2022 9:11AM

lkrupp said:

Pdybman said:

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

You are obviously unaware of the huge number of owners of the classical Mac Pro (last model mid-2012) that are able to run Monterey and Big Sur these days thanks to such enthusiasts and their workarounds!

Huge numbers? Bullshit. Running current versions of macOS on old hardware is a futile exercise in vanity. The old hardware can’t take advantage of many of the features of the current OS so you wind up with essentially the same features as the last available macOS for that old hardware. And the Intel code will be going away soon enough, leaving the hackintosh crowd and ‘Ventura on a 15 year old Mac’ in the Jurassic Epoch of the computer universe. But hey, there are still Amiga users out there, right? And Ford Model A clubs, right?

It looks like you would be angry that someone does that? Any reason? Are you reseller?

Have you considered SW compatibility/security updates. It can be good enough reason. You can not sync new iOS with old MacOS often. Of cause not all fancy features are working but some do.

My 2009 MPB with SSD works fine until I kill it with 50 tabs in Safari and it has just 6 GB RAM.

crowley · August 23, 2022 9:25AM

I don’t even understand how vanity comes into it. Silly angry man.

elijahg · August 23, 2022 10:20AM

bobolicious said:

Does the EULA allow this ? If not should it ?

I understand Apple may not be able to justify support + parts beyond 4 + 9 years, however would it be helpful if such could be possible via the 'community' given the shortened macOS cycles since 2011...?

And please slotted RAM, storage & GPU where possible, sigh...

For one no the EULA is pretty meaningless as an individual. Apple only cares if there's something like Pystar-esque going on, whereby there is violation of the terms en-masse and profit that Apple's missing out on. Secondly, it allows the software to be run on "Apple branded hardware". There is no age limitation in the EULA. And even if there was, it wouldn't mean much (see above).

This kind of artificial restriction is an attempt to push people to upgrade. Unfortunately Cook has realised artificially shortening the useful life of Macs means people upgrade to newer ones more regularly. If it was based on reasonable expectations of performance or required features of the hardware that wouldn't be so bad, but as proven by this "hack", performance on these older machines is just fine. Wholesale cutting off versions by model is stupid, since oftentimes the high-end previous generation Mac is faster than the low-end current gen. Microsoft manages to keep support for much longer than MacOS does nowadays. My old 2012 iMac happily runs the latest Windows 10 but is artificially stuck on High Sierra.

elijahg · August 23, 2022 10:24AM

JP234 said:

Mystifies me why anyone would want to do this. Running newer MacOS systems on Macs Apple classifies as "vintage" or "obsolete." They ALWAYS, and I mean always, run poorly, sometimes terribly. I worked for an Apple VAR as a service writer (what Apple calls a genius, but no way I'd make that claim), and we got many people who wanted us to restore their old OS, which Apple does not make easy for consumers. (We had the means, and we charged $129 for it.)

If you can't afford a new Mac, or iOS device, just keep the last authorized OS. If there's a feature you just must have, then bite the bullet and get a new model that can use it. Just a cautionary tale from someone who has seen what these hacks can do.

Complete bollocks. My old 2006 Mac Pro officially only supported Lion, but similar hacks to this meant I had it all the way to Yosemite, and it ran just fine. So no. They do not "ALWAYS", and I mean do not ALWAYS run poorly, nor terribly.

There's hope that older Macs will be able to run macOS Ventura

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