I have to reluctantly conclude: macOS Monterey is a horrible product, quality-wise

[eugenios]

I have been a macOS user since the first appearance of MacOS X. After the initial start, macOS became a platform that I loved not just for the experience, but for its stability and performance. I would easily have a laptop running for many months without single reboot and without problems. I am reasonably technical (having been part of a team that won an Apple Design Award once) and I know my way around the lower levels of the OS. There too I could do the things I should be able to do and 'it just worked'.

The last years, my experience has been completely otherwise and I've reached the end of the line. A few months back I decided to move my older macOS versions (one Mojave and a few macOS Catalinas) to macOS Monterey and, boy, do I wish I had never done that (in case of Mojave, I really wanted to because there were no longer security fixes).

A list of issues I encountered in various versions of Monterey:

• A 4K LG monitor that isn't recognized as 4K but as 5K. Notable: that same monitor is recognised fine on the only M1 Mac over here. Note also: I have 5 different Macs in this household, this clearly is not a hardware problem if all the Monterey x86 Macs do not recognise the monitor correctly, but the same hardware before the upgrade did, the only x86 Mac still running Big Sur does, and the M1 Mac running Monterey does.
• A monitor that directly after the 'upgrade' on a Mini was only showing black until after an SMC reset, a problem that returned a few times
• If Display user preferences are set, it might crash WindowServer making it impossible for that user to log in (log in, Window Server starts up, crashes, back to login screen). I had to go in via another user, clean out the affected user's prerefences, after which logging in was possible again (though all preferences were lost)
• Booting a system with a USB SSD attached (SanDisk) via USB ends up in a situation that the whole disk isn't seen (missing from System Info) until you physically disconnect/reconnect the drive. Two Thunderbolt drives connect fine and so does a USB RAID
• Attached wired keyboards/trackpad (all Apple) unable to wake a system from deep sleep, you need to physically disconnect/reconnect them to get them recognised
• A monitor as second monitor on an iMac. When the monitor is turned off, the main screen works but input (trackpad, keyboard) gets stuck for a half-second or so all the time.
• If you use software that allows connections from the outside and you use the Application Firewall (ALF) to protect your system, at some point using ALF meant that a certain service would stop working after a few hours because the kernel had stopped passing connections on to the software. Stopping and starting the software made it work again for a few hours. This software ran fine under Mojave and several earlier versions. It seemed that the kernel ran out of resources and that stopping and starting the software freed them. I had to stop using the firewall as a result.
• Services that are started by hand work fine, but when started via launchd are unable to reach.
• And the latest: under 12.5.1 the system suddenly freezes for all connection requests (e.g. you cannot ssh in to the system, or use ARD, etc. Nothing that requires TCP/IP it seems. Ping works, but no TCP/IP port can be reached. Most of the time, this will resolve itself after a while as if the kernel gets 'stuck' and at some point gets 'unstuck', but sometimes it doesn't and you have to hope you are logged out and can click the restart button or you have to do hard reboot. The last time an unstuck happened after an hour or so.

And this list isn't even complete. macOS Monterey 12.5.1 in my experience is as buggy and fragile as anything I have ever had to work with in decades, and that includes older Microsoft Windows. This is now especially the case with anything having to do with sockets, ports, traffic, etc., i.e. kernel level stuff.

I have my suspicions about what may be in play here:

• Apple not spending as much energy on x86 as it does on M1 (which pisses me off as I spent thousands on all these machines)
• Apple working hard on adding security (e.g. the kernel being able to merge a read-only and writable volume into one file system, very neat, and a lot that is now connected to software being signed) but not doing a very good job at writing correct code that can handle all the different situations ('happy flow code')
• The 'unstuck' behaviour of 12.5.1 really feels like Apple has put in some stopgap measure to make sure that if the system gets stuck there is some sort of low level 'reset'. Or, Apple knows this is unreliable, but has implemented some sort of garbage collection that once in a while cleans stuff up so it starts working again

Apple has always been that weird combination of 'insane level of attention to detail' in one place and 'insane level of neglect' elsewhere. But I have to conclude that now that Monterey is at version 12.5.1 it still is buggy, fragile, unreliable. It is a P.o.J. and I am very sorry that after more than 20 years of Apple use I have to give up on ever having something as robust as it was years ago. And the history of recent versions have been that they have become worse and worse in terms of reliability over the years.

I have started to investigate moving parts of my (until now 100% Apple) landscape to another OS because the level of reliability has become so low that I have lost my confidence that it will be reliable any time soon.

I agree 100%.
On top of that is the fact that functionalities working well, no issues for years, are broken the next major version of OS and from then never fixed in a stable way.

 

[BornAgainMac]

Please let us know how reliable you find other OSs. I've considered switching from Mac OS, but I'm not confident I'll find anything better.

MS-DOS

 

[seb333]

I'm reading this with MacOs Monterey and I have no p+++
ATH0
NO CARRIER

 

[RAS2MR]

It would be interesting to see if there is any correlation between an increase in software bugs and an increase in working individually from home rather than in co-located team members in the office. Is WFH a factor in the problem, or has software just gotten too complex, or are there other factors?

 

[jdb8167]

Just to point out how silly this is, here's my verbatim bug report:


And Apple's response:


Beggars belief...

Not sure how far you investigated this. I can't predict what application is going to come to the front when I close/quit the current front application. Sometimes it was the previously front application and other times it seems random though I notice that Safari and Finder seem to come front most often. With Messages, it seems to be whatever was the last front application but sometimes the previous front application decides to quit since it had no windows open. Calendar and TextEdit seem to do this.

But one thing is consistent. If Maps has no open windows, when it comes to the front, it always opens a new window. Maybe Maps was supposed to do what Calendar does and close if no windows are open and it moves back behind another application.

Anyway, your bug doesn't seem to have anything to do with Messages. Close everything but Finder and Maps. Close the Maps window. Switch back to Finder and then command-tab to Maps and Maps opens a new window. Other times you think Maps doesn't open a window is because the OS didn't actually switch to the Maps application. Again, MacOS is very inconsistent on what the next application to bring forward is after shutting down the currently open application.

I suspect the inconsistent behavior of choosing the next front application is the bug.

 

[iPhoneFan5349]

I have been a macOS user since the first appearance of MacOS X. After the initial start, macOS became a platform that I loved not just for the experience, but for its stability and performance. I would easily have a laptop running for many months without single reboot and without problems. I am reasonably technical (having been part of a team that won an Apple Design Award once) and I know my way around the lower levels of the OS. There too I could do the things I should be able to do and 'it just worked'.

The last years, my experience has been completely otherwise and I've reached the end of the line. A few months back I decided to move my older macOS versions (one Mojave and a few macOS Catalinas) to macOS Monterey and, boy, do I wish I had never done that (in case of Mojave, I really wanted to because there were no longer security fixes).

A list of issues I encountered in various versions of Monterey:

• A 4K LG monitor that isn't recognized as 4K but as 5K. Notable: that same monitor is recognised fine on the only M1 Mac over here. Note also: I have 5 different Macs in this household, this clearly is not a hardware problem if all the Monterey x86 Macs do not recognise the monitor correctly, but the same hardware before the upgrade did, the only x86 Mac still running Big Sur does, and the M1 Mac running Monterey does.
• A monitor that directly after the 'upgrade' on a Mini was only showing black until after an SMC reset, a problem that returned a few times
• If Display user preferences are set, it might crash WindowServer making it impossible for that user to log in (log in, Window Server starts up, crashes, back to login screen). I had to go in via another user, clean out the affected user's prerefences, after which logging in was possible again (though all preferences were lost)
• Booting a system with a USB SSD attached (SanDisk) via USB ends up in a situation that the whole disk isn't seen (missing from System Info) until you physically disconnect/reconnect the drive. Two Thunderbolt drives connect fine and so does a USB RAID
• Attached wired keyboards/trackpad (all Apple) unable to wake a system from deep sleep, you need to physically disconnect/reconnect them to get them recognised
• A monitor as second monitor on an iMac. When the monitor is turned off, the main screen works but input (trackpad, keyboard) gets stuck for a half-second or so all the time.
• If you use software that allows connections from the outside and you use the Application Firewall (ALF) to protect your system, at some point using ALF meant that a certain service would stop working after a few hours because the kernel had stopped passing connections on to the software. Stopping and starting the software made it work again for a few hours. This software ran fine under Mojave and several earlier versions. It seemed that the kernel ran out of resources and that stopping and starting the software freed them. I had to stop using the firewall as a result.
• Services that are started by hand work fine, but when started via launchd are unable to reach.
• And the latest: under 12.5.1 the system suddenly freezes for all connection requests (e.g. you cannot ssh in to the system, or use ARD, etc. Nothing that requires TCP/IP it seems. Ping works, but no TCP/IP port can be reached. Most of the time, this will resolve itself after a while as if the kernel gets 'stuck' and at some point gets 'unstuck', but sometimes it doesn't and you have to hope you are logged out and can click the restart button or you have to do hard reboot. The last time an unstuck happened after an hour or so.

And this list isn't even complete. macOS Monterey 12.5.1 in my experience is as buggy and fragile as anything I have ever had to work with in decades, and that includes older Microsoft Windows. This is now especially the case with anything having to do with sockets, ports, traffic, etc., i.e. kernel level stuff.

I have my suspicions about what may be in play here:

• Apple not spending as much energy on x86 as it does on M1 (which pisses me off as I spent thousands on all these machines)
• Apple working hard on adding security (e.g. the kernel being able to merge a read-only and writable volume into one file system, very neat, and a lot that is now connected to software being signed) but not doing a very good job at writing correct code that can handle all the different situations ('happy flow code')
• The 'unstuck' behaviour of 12.5.1 really feels like Apple has put in some stopgap measure to make sure that if the system gets stuck there is some sort of low level 'reset'. Or, Apple knows this is unreliable, but has implemented some sort of garbage collection that once in a while cleans stuff up so it starts working again

Apple has always been that weird combination of 'insane level of attention to detail' in one place and 'insane level of neglect' elsewhere. But I have to conclude that now that Monterey is at version 12.5.1 it still is buggy, fragile, unreliable. It is a P.o.J. and I am very sorry that after more than 20 years of Apple use I have to give up on ever having something as robust as it was years ago. And the history of recent versions have been that they have become worse and worse in terms of reliability over the years.

I have started to investigate moving parts of my (until now 100% Apple) landscape to another OS because the level of reliability has become so low that I have lost my confidence that it will be reliable any time soon.

That’s the state forward is at the new Apple. Craig needs to go, iOS is buggy as hell and it’s surpassed by Android in every way. The only thing Apple is excellent at is hardware. Great phones and great pcs but the software is just awful. And that’s just the truth. Every part of Apple’s software is terrible. I can’t even connect my phone to my car to listen to Apple Music without having any issues

 

[iPhoneFan5349]

It would be interesting to see if there is any correlation between an increase in software bugs and an increase in working individually from home rather than in co-located team members in the office. Is WFH a factor in the problem, or has software just gotten too complex, or are there other factors?

Bad management is the problem.

 

[WilliApple]

Thanks for letting me know not to update to 12.5.1 on my main partition.

Initial release (12.0.1) was rough, but 12.2 started fixing things in my experience. Kind of wish I would not have Beta Tested Monterey since I had 8 months of not satisfied with usability. (My main machine is an M1 MacBook Air).

Would say that Monterey 12.0.1 - 12.2 is still smoother than Windows 10 and 11 smooth though.

 

[falkon-engine]

I have been a macOS user since the first appearance of MacOS X. After the initial start, macOS became a platform that I loved not just for the experience, but for its stability and performance. I would easily have a laptop running for many months without single reboot and without problems. I am reasonably technical (having been part of a team that won an Apple Design Award once) and I know my way around the lower levels of the OS. There too I could do the things I should be able to do and 'it just worked'.

The last years, my experience has been completely otherwise and I've reached the end of the line. A few months back I decided to move my older macOS versions (one Mojave and a few macOS Catalinas) to macOS Monterey and, boy, do I wish I had never done that (in case of Mojave, I really wanted to because there were no longer security fixes).

A list of issues I encountered in various versions of Monterey:

• A 4K LG monitor that isn't recognized as 4K but as 5K. Notable: that same monitor is recognised fine on the only M1 Mac over here. Note also: I have 5 different Macs in this household, this clearly is not a hardware problem if all the Monterey x86 Macs do not recognise the monitor correctly, but the same hardware before the upgrade did, the only x86 Mac still running Big Sur does, and the M1 Mac running Monterey does.
• A monitor that directly after the 'upgrade' on a Mini was only showing black until after an SMC reset, a problem that returned a few times
• If Display user preferences are set, it might crash WindowServer making it impossible for that user to log in (log in, Window Server starts up, crashes, back to login screen). I had to go in via another user, clean out the affected user's prerefences, after which logging in was possible again (though all preferences were lost)
• Booting a system with a USB SSD attached (SanDisk) via USB ends up in a situation that the whole disk isn't seen (missing from System Info) until you physically disconnect/reconnect the drive. Two Thunderbolt drives connect fine and so does a USB RAID
• Attached wired keyboards/trackpad (all Apple) unable to wake a system from deep sleep, you need to physically disconnect/reconnect them to get them recognised
• A monitor as second monitor on an iMac. When the monitor is turned off, the main screen works but input (trackpad, keyboard) gets stuck for a half-second or so all the time.
• If you use software that allows connections from the outside and you use the Application Firewall (ALF) to protect your system, at some point using ALF meant that a certain service would stop working after a few hours because the kernel had stopped passing connections on to the software. Stopping and starting the software made it work again for a few hours. This software ran fine under Mojave and several earlier versions. It seemed that the kernel ran out of resources and that stopping and starting the software freed them. I had to stop using the firewall as a result.
• Services that are started by hand work fine, but when started via launchd are unable to reach.
• And the latest: under 12.5.1 the system suddenly freezes for all connection requests (e.g. you cannot ssh in to the system, or use ARD, etc. Nothing that requires TCP/IP it seems. Ping works, but no TCP/IP port can be reached. Most of the time, this will resolve itself after a while as if the kernel gets 'stuck' and at some point gets 'unstuck', but sometimes it doesn't and you have to hope you are logged out and can click the restart button or you have to do hard reboot. The last time an unstuck happened after an hour or so.

And this list isn't even complete. macOS Monterey 12.5.1 in my experience is as buggy and fragile as anything I have ever had to work with in decades, and that includes older Microsoft Windows. This is now especially the case with anything having to do with sockets, ports, traffic, etc., i.e. kernel level stuff.

I have my suspicions about what may be in play here:

• Apple not spending as much energy on x86 as it does on M1 (which pisses me off as I spent thousands on all these machines)
• Apple working hard on adding security (e.g. the kernel being able to merge a read-only and writable volume into one file system, very neat, and a lot that is now connected to software being signed) but not doing a very good job at writing correct code that can handle all the different situations ('happy flow code')
• The 'unstuck' behaviour of 12.5.1 really feels like Apple has put in some stopgap measure to make sure that if the system gets stuck there is some sort of low level 'reset'. Or, Apple knows this is unreliable, but has implemented some sort of garbage collection that once in a while cleans stuff up so it starts working again

Apple has always been that weird combination of 'insane level of attention to detail' in one place and 'insane level of neglect' elsewhere. But I have to conclude that now that Monterey is at version 12.5.1 it still is buggy, fragile, unreliable. It is a P.o.J. and I am very sorry that after more than 20 years of Apple use I have to give up on ever having something as robust as it was years ago. And the history of recent versions have been that they have become worse and worse in terms of reliability over the years.

I have started to investigate moving parts of my (until now 100% Apple) landscape to another OS because the level of reliability has become so low that I have lost my confidence that it will be reliable any time soon.

I miss the days of El Capitan and Sierra... those were good OSes, worked like a champion on x86 hardware... my experience with 12.5.1 isn't so bad, on the m1 max and on hackintosh.

12.0.1 to 12.3.1 were a disaster on the m1 max..when connected to a TB4 dock. I experienced all sorts of kernel panics where the m1 max would crash during wake from sleep while connected to various TB4 docks, including the new TS4 dock. 12.4 sort of resolved the issue, but Caldigit seemingly approached Intel, and released an updated NVM firmware of the Goshen Ridge chip, and now with that new NVM and 12.5.1, everything works well and as I expected to on 12.0.1.

Another issue that got resolved in the M1 Max firmware update of 12.4 was that on earlier firmwares (between those released in 12.0.1 and 12.3.1), the M1 Max couldn't connect to the M1 iPad via a USB4 or TB3/TB4 cable. The connection would connect/disconnect ad-infinitum. I needed to connect via a wire to the iPad to work-around another Monterey and/or iPadOS15.x bug, which is unreliable iPad sidecar performance via Wifi. Sometimes it would freeze up and lag, (even though my router supports 900 Mb/sec + on Wifi 6 clients). Connecting via a wire has excellent performance, but early firmwares of the M1 Max couldn't connect to the iPad via thunderbolt/usb4 cable, I had to find a non-thunderbolt usb-c cable to do the job.

But apple fixed the issue(s) and now my m1 max functions well, but Monterey is still a pain for many, including you, and that is a shame.

 

[Freedom1]

I have been a macOS user since the first appearance of MacOS X. After the initial start, macOS became a platform that I loved not just for the experience, but for its stability and performance. I would easily have a laptop running for many months without single reboot and without problems. I am reasonably technical (having been part of a team that won an Apple Design Award once) and I know my way around the lower levels of the OS. There too I could do the things I should be able to do and 'it just worked'.

The last years, my experience has been completely otherwise and I've reached the end of the line. A few months back I decided to move my older macOS versions (one Mojave and a few macOS Catalinas) to macOS Monterey and, boy, do I wish I had never done that (in case of Mojave, I really wanted to because there were no longer security fixes).

A list of issues I encountered in various versions of Monterey:

• A 4K LG monitor that isn't recognized as 4K but as 5K. Notable: that same monitor is recognised fine on the only M1 Mac over here. Note also: I have 5 different Macs in this household, this clearly is not a hardware problem if all the Monterey x86 Macs do not recognise the monitor correctly, but the same hardware before the upgrade did, the only x86 Mac still running Big Sur does, and the M1 Mac running Monterey does.
• A monitor that directly after the 'upgrade' on a Mini was only showing black until after an SMC reset, a problem that returned a few times
• If Display user preferences are set, it might crash WindowServer making it impossible for that user to log in (log in, Window Server starts up, crashes, back to login screen). I had to go in via another user, clean out the affected user's prerefences, after which logging in was possible again (though all preferences were lost)
• Booting a system with a USB SSD attached (SanDisk) via USB ends up in a situation that the whole disk isn't seen (missing from System Info) until you physically disconnect/reconnect the drive. Two Thunderbolt drives connect fine and so does a USB RAID
• Attached wired keyboards/trackpad (all Apple) unable to wake a system from deep sleep, you need to physically disconnect/reconnect them to get them recognised
• A monitor as second monitor on an iMac. When the monitor is turned off, the main screen works but input (trackpad, keyboard) gets stuck for a half-second or so all the time.
• If you use software that allows connections from the outside and you use the Application Firewall (ALF) to protect your system, at some point using ALF meant that a certain service would stop working after a few hours because the kernel had stopped passing connections on to the software. Stopping and starting the software made it work again for a few hours. This software ran fine under Mojave and several earlier versions. It seemed that the kernel ran out of resources and that stopping and starting the software freed them. I had to stop using the firewall as a result.
• Services that are started by hand work fine, but when started via launchd are unable to reach.
• And the latest: under 12.5.1 the system suddenly freezes for all connection requests (e.g. you cannot ssh in to the system, or use ARD, etc. Nothing that requires TCP/IP it seems. Ping works, but no TCP/IP port can be reached. Most of the time, this will resolve itself after a while as if the kernel gets 'stuck' and at some point gets 'unstuck', but sometimes it doesn't and you have to hope you are logged out and can click the restart button or you have to do hard reboot. The last time an unstuck happened after an hour or so.

And this list isn't even complete. macOS Monterey 12.5.1 in my experience is as buggy and fragile as anything I have ever had to work with in decades, and that includes older Microsoft Windows. This is now especially the case with anything having to do with sockets, ports, traffic, etc., i.e. kernel level stuff.

I have my suspicions about what may be in play here:

• Apple not spending as much energy on x86 as it does on M1 (which pisses me off as I spent thousands on all these machines)
• Apple working hard on adding security (e.g. the kernel being able to merge a read-only and writable volume into one file system, very neat, and a lot that is now connected to software being signed) but not doing a very good job at writing correct code that can handle all the different situations ('happy flow code')
• The 'unstuck' behaviour of 12.5.1 really feels like Apple has put in some stopgap measure to make sure that if the system gets stuck there is some sort of low level 'reset'. Or, Apple knows this is unreliable, but has implemented some sort of garbage collection that once in a while cleans stuff up so it starts working again

Apple has always been that weird combination of 'insane level of attention to detail' in one place and 'insane level of neglect' elsewhere. But I have to conclude that now that Monterey is at version 12.5.1 it still is buggy, fragile, unreliable. It is a P.o.J. and I am very sorry that after more than 20 years of Apple use I have to give up on ever having something as robust as it was years ago. And the history of recent versions have been that they have become worse and worse in terms of reliability over the years.

I have started to investigate moving parts of my (until now 100% Apple) landscape to another OS because the level of reliability has become so low that I have lost my confidence that it will be reliable any time soon.

I was recently thinking about Apple and the one thing that makes it successful. I surprised myself by coming to the conclusion that it is MacOS (OSX). It is really the thing that is the foundation of the company. Macs sit just above that, even if they no longer generate the biggest revenue. All of what Apple does rests on those two foundations. Apple neglects either of those to great detriment.

 

[dogstar]

I’m finally back on Windows full-time after 12 years on macOS, and my only regret is that I didn’t come back sooner. I grew up on Windows though — I’ve always used it (even had a Boot Camp install on my MacBook). The window management is just top tier.

However I do believe OS preference is swayed by each individual’s workflow, however. Your mileage may vary. For example I’m so much faster getting my work done having moved back to Windows, but someone else may have a difference experience.

The hard part is finding a laptop that doesn’t have some sort of glaring flaw, however. I’m picky when it comes to laptops though so, again, your mileage may vary. I went through multiple laptops before I found one I was happy with.

What laptop did you end up with?

 

[vddobrev]

It would be interesting to see if there is any correlation between an increase in software bugs and an increase in working individually from home rather than in co-located team members in the office. Is WFH a factor in the problem, or has software just gotten too complex, or are there other factors?

No, there isn't. WFH is not a factor. It is the short one year (unneeded) release cycle. No one asked for it, it is Apple's invention, to align with hardware release...

 

[Silverstring]

I can't understand why so many users are so eager to upgrade. I hate upgrading for the very simple reason- it breaks stuff.

To be fair...upgrading can break stuff.

That said, upgrading almost invariably brings new features, new APIs, etc.

So on the one hand, one has the chance of something breaking if they upgrade...but one also has the guarantee of new features if they upgrade. If the new features don't appeal to someone...I get it! Different strokes. Me? I'll take the bird in the hand.

I like upgrading to try new features, and to stay ahead of the curve...I know that one day older OSes will be dropped and new apps will require newer versions, so I'd rather start that process sooner rather than later. I'm also someone who *likes* change...always have. Keeps me on my toes.

All of that said, I understand your position and others like it—if I, for example, had software that was critical to my livelihood or something that would break upon upgrading...I wouldn't upgrade in that particular instance.

...but I've been using macOS over 20 years, and as far as my personal circumstances/use cases, that rarely—if ever—happens. Maybe I've just been lucky, but I'll take it!

Now, while the bleeding edge isn't for you and there isn't anything wrong with that...is it really that difficult to understand how other people's calculation of opportunity cost/loss aversion/risk tolerance differs from yours?!?

Or did you simply mean "can't understand" in the way that some people use it—as a substitute for "not what I, personally, want"? Just trying to understand.

Don't get me wrong, it's not that Apple can do no wrong in my eyes when they make changes.

For example, at the time I didn't care for the following changes:

• .Mac->Mobile Me->iCloud transition
• iPhoto->Photos
• Going from full-priced iPhones to carrier-subsidized ones
• iMovie HD 6->iMovie '08
• Final Cut Pro Studio ->Final Cut Pro X
• Removal of Dashboard/Desktop Widgets

...to name just a few.

However, the way I see it, Windows is what happens when you don't let the past die (or intentionally kill it). Legacy/tech debt that limits future flexibility. On balance, I'd much rather myself (and Apple) err on the side of change. Everyone else's mileage may vary! 🙂

 

[krell100]

Yeah I agree that Apple need to get off the yearly update merry-go-round. A two year turnaround gives more time to debug and test... and hopefully get a polished release. These yearly updates are crazy.

 

[v0lume4]

What laptop did you end up with?

The Asus Zenbook 14. This is the computer:

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Shop ASUS Zenbook 14" 2.8K OLED Laptop Intel Evo Platform 12th Gen Core i5 Processor 8GB Memory 256GB SSD Ponder Blue at Best Buy. Find low everyday prices and buy online for delivery or in-store pick-up. Price Match Guarantee.

www.bestbuy.com

I “settled” in the sense that I wanted a higher end processor, a dedicated GPU, and I wanted 16GB of RAM. This has none of that (though the integrated graphics are OK; I play older games). But I desperately needed a new laptop because I was still on a MacBook Pro from 2010. So this’ll do for now. I got the computer open box for $490, but even if I had paid full retail price ($750), I believe the device is a steal. It has absolutely no right to be this good for the price it’s at. Even has an OLED screen. Fan noise is quite non obtrusive, especially if you utilize Throttlestop. The one thing it has going against it (aside from the soldered 8GB of RAM) is the battery life. I reckon you could get 5-6 hours of real use out of it per charge. That may be a deal breaker for some, understandably. But at the price I got it at I’m willing to forgive so much. I often run it docked to a Thunderbolt dock at my desk, so when I need to run it’s already charged when I unplug it.

I bought a 1 TB SSD for $105 and threw it in there.

Let me know if you have any questions. I’d be happy to help.

 

[v0lume4]

I was recently thinking about Apple and the one thing that makes it successful. I surprised myself by coming to the conclusion that it is MacOS (OSX). It is really the thing that is the foundation of the company. Macs sit just above that, even if they no longer generate the biggest revenue. All of what Apple does rests on those two foundations. Apple neglects either of those to great detriment.

I think Mac hardware is at a pretty good place right now. I’m surprised about all the bugs I’m reading about in the latest software releases, however.

In regards to what I bolded in your post — you’d almost think that macOS wouldn’t ship without a single bug in it, because that’s the OS that everyone over at Apple HQ uses. I mean surely if the consumers are dealing with these issues, then the power users and engineers at Apple are too.

I remember the sorry state of the Mac about 5 years ago, and some even began to question whether Apple would continue forward with the Mac at all. It surprised me because I couldn’t fathom Apple switching over to Windows PC’s to design all their other products. But it really made you start to wonder if that’s what they’d do one day.

All of that to say, Apple’s an interesting company. Questionable in their decisions. Maybe they just live in a bubble over there. I don’t know.

 

[JustAnExpat]

I think Apple is putting in the minimum effort possible for the Intel version because most power users would have transitioned to M1/ M2s by now. Remember, Mac OSX Leopard was a $129 upgrade (for users who had PPC machines) so Apple had a motivation to remove all possible bugs. Monterey and Ventura are free :O

 

[Queen6]

I think Apple is putting in the minimum effort possible for the Intel version because most power users would have transitioned to M1/ M2s by now. Remember, Mac OSX Leopard was a $129 upgrade (for users who had PPC machines) so Apple had a motivation to remove all possible bugs. Monterey and Ventura are free :O

Think would be safe to say that Apple's point of focus is it's own silicon, it will also support the Intel Mac's until it no longer needs to. Personally I always look to use an OS revision one step behind and avoid any associated bugs & drama.

Apple's never been much for looking back and doubt that will ever change...

Q-6

 

[AlixSPQR]

I think Apple is putting in the minimum effort possible for the Intel version because most power users would have transitioned to M1/ M2s by now. Remember, Mac OSX Leopard was a $129 upgrade (for users who had PPC machines) so Apple had a motivation to remove all possible bugs. Monterey and Ventura are free :O

”Minimum effort” as in deliberately, albeit quietly, nudging Intel users into buying M macs, I'd say.

 

[PsykX]

I've said this before, but the thing that really frustrates me is not that the bugs exist, but that they're not getting fixed. I've reported dozens over the past two years and Apple has only responded to two of them: One of those responses was to say that the bug had been fixed (it hadn't), and one to say that it's by design (it shouldn't be*). The rest of the bug reports have apparently been completely ignored.

*I figured out a sequence of steps that makes the Maps app pop up unexpectedly. I would never expect an app to open a new window of its own accord, whether by design or not.

It's sad, but I stopped reporting bugs to them 6 years ago. It's no use. They replied with stupid answers that made me wonder if they actually read them. They made me waste my time (and theirs) at the end of the day.

 

[MajorFubar]

It's sad, but I stopped reporting bugs to them 6 years ago. It's no use. They replied with stupid answers that made me wonder if they actually read them. They made me waste my time (and theirs) at the end of the day.

I'm pretty convinced no human at Apple reads anything I've submitted in the last five years. This year I saw literally no point being part of the public beta team. Though going back ten years I used to get replies from people who even signed off with a name. Sure it was probably a pseudonym but it was a personal touch just the same, which appears to have long gone with the current profits-first Apple.

I remain convinced that Apple has insiders lurking on high-profile websites such as this. But I don't know whether they'll see threads like this one and condemn it as a being from small bunch of whiners having a moan who don't represent the majority, or whether the message will actually get through to the top. So just in case it's the latter:

APPLE: STOP LAUNCHING NEW OS'S EVERY FREAKING YEAR WHEN YOU HAVEN'T EVEN FIXED THE BUGGY CRAP FROM GENERATIONS AGO

Though gut instinct tells me the former. So wasted keypresses on my part.

 

[playtech1]

It was a surprise how poor Monterey has been in terms of bugs was considering how solid Big Sur was even though Big Sur needed to deal with the Apple Silicon transition and ushered in UI changes and features like iPad app support.

I will actually switch to Ventura on release because I figure it can't be much worse?

 

[belvdr]

It appears I'm in the minority. I mostly use typical office apps and haven't had any issues with Monterey. That may be my saving grace.

 

[singhalrishi27]

I recently switched to apple silicon from my Intel Mac and boy thats huge difference the intel binary of macOS is quite buggy after Catalina and with Monterey it's a nightmare apple is using all resources to make macOS run smoother apple silicon computer do don't even care about their existing customers...

 

[djbuddha]

So I’ve been running every MacOS on my MacBook Pros (first was a 2011 mid-spec, a 2012 maxed-out, a 2017 maxed out & now the last Intel MacBook Pro - i9 8 core, 5600m 4TB, 64 GB RAM)

On top of that I’m running a Hackintosh (i9 10980XE, 18 core, 6900XT, dual 2 TB NVME & 128 GB RAM)

There are 2 things off the top of my head that drive me nuts that happens on my newest MacBook Pro, and the Hackintosh.

• Split tunnelling not working on wired LAN connections (a Private Internet Access VPN issue that Apple needs to address something in the back end)
• The Airdrop bug. This one kills me. I edit video and sometimes my own YouTube videos and want to share them to my phone. Sounds easy right? Right click, share, Airdrop choose my phone. 10% of the time it works, the other 90% it just acts like you didn’t click on your phone and when you click again, it shoots the share sheet to the top of the display and sometimes ESC doesn’t even let you out. Workaround is open QuickTime and share from there but that’s super annoying.

Other than that, and I find myself to be a moderate power user, Monterey has been just fine for me. But that’s my experience. I will say though, I upgraded my MacBook Pro to Monterey and it’s a little sluggish, my Hackintosh always gets a fresh install when it’s a major OS release. I may do the wipe on the MacBook and see if that fixes the speed issues.

OP, Have you tried doing a fresh install? When I read your post it seems like it’s all upgrades to Monterey.