Late 2008 Mac and life without the latest OS

[Ethan H 1234]

I have a late 2008 Mac. It's obviously not supported by Sierra. It's probably conclusive proof that I need to (finally) buy a new Mac, but until I do what will be the short term impact of continuing to use El Capitan? Is it just missing out on the shiny new Sierra 'features' or will I soon start to notice apps becoming un-updatable? (eg flash player etc), or even unusable?

Amazingly, my Mac has always been comparable with the latest OS update, so this is new territory for me; I'd just like to know what it means in practice.

Thanks for any info any of you can throw my way.




(Apologies if this duplicates something already posted, I know there is a pinned thread specifically dedicated to Macs unsupported for Sierra, but much of the discussion seems to be about a patch to get round this)

 

[thekayman]

You're not saying which Mac you have. You might be able to upgrade to Sierra using the instructions in the sticky on this forum.

I have a late 08 / mid 09 MBP (5,1) and although it is not officially supported I still upgraded to Sierra. Everything works fine, very similar to El Cap in performance. Siri is the major addition to the new OS, everything else is quite minor in my opinion.

 

[Ethan H 1234]

Sorry, I have a MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008). To be honest, I'd only really consider trying scramble together upgrading to Sierra as a last resort. I was just interested in what the short (and long) term impact of sticking with El Capitan will be for the basic functionality of my Mac...?

 

[dianeoforegon]

You will still receive security updates for a couple of more years. The only downside would be you would want some software that would require Sierra to install.