macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

[nekton1]

Forced to agree—still, 11 years running the latest macos is a stupendous achievement, despite Apple's best efforts to sunset these old machines.
Correct me if wrong, but I thought Apple SPECIFICALLY said that if a Mac officially supports Mojave, it will support Catalina too. Was that just lying by the Marketing smoke and mirrors boys? If not, the MP5,1 should be supported at the final Catalina GM.

 

[0403979]

Definitely not. I have more than 300GB available space left. And I have tried to create the installer disk on three different machines and all have got the same result. Such an installer disk created with those errors appeared can successfully install Catalina but can't patch. No command lines output when typing "patch". Really don't know what the problem is.

I have never had that issue so I'm not sure. I guess you can try redownloading macOS Patcher and/or your macOS installer and try starting from scratch?

 

[MacClueless]

I have never had that issue so I'm not sure. I guess you can try redownloading macOS Patcher and/or your macOS installer and try starting from scratch?

Julian off topic question but do I need your Bluesky AND Dosdude installer? Doesn’t his install video patches too? Are yours different or better? Sorry for my ignorance.

 

[jhowarth]

Forced to agree—still, 11 years running the latest macos is a stupendous achievement, despite Apple's best efforts to sunset these old machines.
Correct me if wrong, but I thought Apple SPECIFICALLY said that if a Mac officially supports Mojave, it will support Catalina too. Was that just lying by the Marketing smoke and mirrors boys? If not, the MP5,1 should be supported at the final Catalina GM.

My understanding is that the MacPro 5,1 got dropped at the last minute because Intel announced that microcode updates for its processors would cease this year. Apple isn't going to support hardware which Intel refuses to support on that level.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210107

Note the 'These Mac models may receive security updates in macOS Mojave, High Sierra or Sierra, but are unable to support the fixes and mitigations due to a lack of microcode updates from Intel.' bit. So the best we can hope for is that Apple postpones the bulk of code pruning in macOS to the next major release. However I suspect bit and pieces of that will happen anyway.

 

[nekton1]

When Catalina GM appears and doesn't support the MP 5,1, it'll force the secondhand price down and might be the time to buy one or two for spares ;->

 

[macsba]

I suspect that Catalina will be the perpetually shrinking release on unsupported hardware as Apple slowly prunes out all of the dead code left from pre-2013 MacPro's. If we retain the same usability by the final point release prior to macOS 10.16 development, I'll be shocked.

Yeah, I'm getting the feeling my next Mac will be the iMac Pro. Don't have a bank that has the funds to support the new Mac Pro.

 

[0134168]

Yeah, I'm getting the feeling my next Mac will be the iMac Pro. Don't have a bank that has the funds to support the new Mac Pro.

I´, thinking over selling one kidney, but new Mac Pro have to be mine. What a specifications! And the good one is that
you can buy the cheapest, and updating it thorugh the years. Just like I have done with my Mac Pro 2010

 

[DanieleDN]

I'm still using an enjoyable OS on my MBP 4.1, so, I think (or, maybe, I hope) that this machine will be able to achieve this release (at the same time I think that, probably, it will be the last one) of macOS.
However, despite some bugs of Catalina Beta, I think that install that release on a computer came out with Mac OS X Leopard, making it capable to be a daily computer, still updated, is a brilliant result, so it has been a well known success.

P. S.

Despite the graphic glitches when the machine is turned off, some issues with rounded corners and the Map one, the machine is already suitable for daily tasks. In addition I must recognize that using Google Chrome there aren't issues when video are played (also in Netflix), and the machine is able to play them without any problem (of course it isn't able to reach top performances, because the GPU and the screen, especially in the MBP 4.1, are outdated, so, limited features are understandable and these limits aren't huge at all).

 

[macosdon]

I have never had that issue so I'm not sure. I guess you can try redownloading macOS Patcher and/or your macOS installer and try starting from scratch?

Hi, I downloaded again the patcher file to make the installer disk, but the same result, and this time, there is one more error appeared. By comparing these files with errors during creation from the installer disk and the original files from macOS Patcher, these error files are not complete. The file size is much smaller compared with the original one. So I checked the log file and copied the complete original files from the patcher to replace those error files located in BaseSystem.dmg in newly created installer disk. However, after installation, the patch command still can't be performed. I checked the two unix execute files ,"patch and restore" located in BaseSystem.dmg and found out the size of both files are zero. Is this because the patch.sh and restore.sh from the macOS Patcher haven't been converted to unix execute files during the creation so that the patch command can't be executed? What to do then?

 

[0403979]

Hi, I downloaded again the patcher file to make the installer disk, but the same result, and this time, there is one more error appeared. By comparing these files with errors during creation from the installer disk and the original files from macOS Patcher, these error files are not complete. The file size is much smaller compared with the original one. So I checked the log file and copied the complete original files from the patcher to replace those error files located in BaseSystem.dmg in newly created installer disk. However, after installation, the patch command still can't be performed. I checked the two unix execute files ,"patch and restore" located in BaseSystem.dmg and found out the size of both files are zero. Is this because the patch.sh and restore.sh from the macOS Patcher haven't been converted to unix execute files during the creation so that the patch command can't be executed? What to do then?

If you're copying resources manually, patch.sh and restore .sh need to be renamed. Otherwise, you'll have to type patch.sh or restore.sh in the Terminal.
[doublepost=1566717461][/doublepost]

Julian off topic question but do I need your Bluesky AND Dosdude installer? Doesn’t his install video patches too? Are yours different or better? Sorry for my ignorance.

The standard video patches in macOS Patcher and macOS Catalina Patcher don't fix the transparency issues with light mode. That's what BlueSky is for.

 

[macosdon]

If you're copying resources manually, patch.sh and restore .sh need to be renamed. Otherwise, you'll have to type patch.sh or restore.sh in the Terminal.

Thanks! I created the installer USB disk again by deleting "AMDRadeonX3000GLDriver.bundle" from the macOS Patcher and this time it went smoothly and no errors occurred. No more "no space left on the space" errors. The size of "patch and restore" is complete and it performed patch commands after installation. However, there are no WIFI and ethernet on MB 4,1, so I tried to install these kexts with KextWizard, but failed, that's because the S\L\E is not writable since Beta 5. I once installed WIFI and ethernet kext files from dosdude's patcher on MB4,1 with beta 2. and it's stable, no unexpected reboot. Could you update these WIFI and ethernet kexts files and the patch script when making next version of macOS Patcher? Many thanks!

 

[jhowarth]

Yeah, I'm getting the feeling my next Mac will be the iMac Pro. Don't have a bank that has the funds to support the new Mac Pro.

My own plan is to try to hold out until Apple ships something like a Ice Lake or Tiger Lake based MacMini where they get the processor TDP back down to 25 watts and finally have decent graphics with Gen 11 GPUs.

 

[Teg79]

Hi @dosdude1
I'm using your tool to install Catalina Beta on my Mac Pro 4.1, but after the tool finished, the Install macOS Catalina Beta program cannot start.
I can see it with cmd+tab but it has no window and overing its name in the top bar the mouse cursor become the colorful beach ballon of death, its listed in the non-responding applications with cmd+alt+esc.

I installed the original video card:
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512 MB

but I can install a Nvidia GTX 670

 

[dosdude1]

Hi @dosdude1
I'm using your tool to install Catalina Beta on my Mac Pro 4.1, but after the tool finished, the Install macOS Catalina Beta program cannot start.
I can see it with cmd+tab but it has no window and overing its name in the top bar the mouse cursor become the colorful beach ballon of death, its listed in the non-responding applications with cmd+alt+esc.

I installed the original video card:
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512 MB

but I can install a Nvidia GTX 670

What version of macOS are you running currently? If that method doesn't work, you can always use the USB drive installation method.

 

[macosdon]

Hi, @0403979,
Finally, successfully installed Catalina beta 6 on MB4,1 with much stable and workable WIFI and ethernet. The steps are the following:
1. Delete "AMDRadeonX3000GLDriver.bundle" from patch folder of your macOS Pather tool.
2. Copy WIFI and ethernet kexts files(including "corecapture.kext","CoreCaptureResponder.kext","IO80211Family.kext","AppleYukon2.kext","nvenet.kext" which can be found in dosdude's patcher tool) to MacBook 4,1 folder.
3. Modify the patch.sh to add WIFI and ethernet command lines.
4. Create the installer USB disk with above modified macOS Pather tool.
5. Install the OS and patch.
Here is my modified patch.sh file, could be used as reference. Thanks again for your genius and wonderful work to make the latest OS be able to run on this 10 years' old machine!

 

[Teg79]

What version of macOS are you running currently? If that method doesn't work, you can always use the USB drive installation method.

OS X El Capitan 10.11.6 (15G22010)
Tested also with the nvidia card and executing with sudo, the result is the same, I'll try tomorrow with the USB drive, can I keep the ATI Radeon HD 4870 512 MB video card during installation?

 

[aaronlroberts]

@dosdude1

Are there any CPU incompatibilites that I should be aware of?

My current config is a MP 4,1 > 5,1, Xeon CPU X5690 @ 3.47GHz (Single CPU, MAY upgrade to dual later by swapping out the tray). RX 580 (Sapphire) and 32GB ram... Should be fine, right?

 

[Flacko]

@dosdude1

Are there any CPU incompatibilites that I should be aware of?

My current config is a MP 4,1 > 5,1, Xeon CPU X5690 @ 3.47GHz (Single CPU, MAY upgrade to dual later by swapping out the tray). RX 580 (Sapphire) and 32GB ram... Should be fine, right?

Yes you will be ok. Presently running Catalina on my cMP 4.1>5.1 with RX580. See sig.

 

[FlorisVN]

Hi @dosdude1
I'm using your tool to install Catalina Beta on my Mac Pro 4.1, but after the tool finished, the Install macOS Catalina Beta program cannot start.
I can see it with cmd+tab but it has no window and overing its name in the top bar the mouse cursor become the colorful beach ballon of death, its listed in the non-responding applications with cmd+alt+esc.

I installed the original video card:
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512 MB

but I can install a Nvidia GTX 670

I think gtx670 wil work fine, just like gtx680.
I think should be compatible with built in kepler drivers..

 

[0403979]

Hi, @0403979,
Finally, successfully installed Catalina beta 6 on MB4,1 with much stable and workable WIFI and ethernet. The steps are the following:
1. Delete "AMDRadeonX3000GLDriver.bundle" from patch folder of your macOS Pather tool.
2. Copy WIFI and ethernet kexts files(including "corecapture.kext","CoreCaptureResponder.kext","IO80211Family.kext","AppleYukon2.kext","nvenet.kext" which can be found in dosdude's patcher tool) to MacBook 4,1 folder.
3. Modify the patch.sh to add WIFI and ethernet command lines.
4. Create the installer USB disk with above modified macOS Pather tool.
5. Install the OS and patch.
Here is my modified patch.sh file, could be used as reference. Thanks again for your genius and wonderful work to make the latest OS be able to run on this 10 years' old machine!

You must have a different AirPort card. Last I checked, my WiFi patch works on Catalina on the MB4,1.

 

[aaronlroberts]

I can't seem to get this running on my iMac 8,1 (used only as a media centre these days)... I choose "Install to this machine" or whatever the option is, and now I'm stuck with the no entry sign and no way to get around it.

I have another Mac, but before I start going around and wiping HDD's to create an installer, I'm wondering if it's possible to salvage this failed install? I couldn't find any decent instructions anywhere.

It just gets stuck saying "error loading kernel cache (0xe)" and then that's the end.

 

[Althiometer]

Is there any progress in the Software update patch?
It's bothering to download the installer app all the time.

 

[Teg79]

What version of macOS are you running currently? If that method doesn't work, you can always use the USB drive installation method.

With the USB Install I can start the installation ( I erased the drive and selected the clean install) but after the reboot the system run the setup.nsh, I can see the progress bar with the apple, but it stops with an error, Impossible to install macOS, it says to make a diagnosys

 

[dosdude1]

With the USB Install I can start the installation ( I erased the drive and selected the clean install) but after the reboot the system run the setup.nsh, I can see the progress bar with the apple, but it stops with an error, Impossible to install macOS, it says to make a diagnosys

Make sure your system date and time is set correctly.

 

[flyboys2003]

I can't seem to get this running on my iMac 8,1 (used only as a media centre these days)... I choose "Install to this machine" or whatever the option is, and now I'm stuck with the no entry sign and no way to get around it.

I have another Mac, but before I start going around and wiping HDD's to create an installer, I'm wondering if it's possible to salvage this failed install? I couldn't find any decent instructions anywhere.

It just gets stuck saying "error loading kernel cache (0xe)" and then that's the end.

Did it fully install already? If so, use your other Mac to create a USB bootable drive with the Patcher (make sure it's Patcher version 1.0.8), boot your iMac into the USB drive, run the Post-Install tool, and re-apply the patches, be sure to have force cache rebuild checked.