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macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

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The first post of this thread is a WikiPost and can be edited by anyone with the appropiate permissions. Your edits will be public.
jackluke said:
Try this: CatalinaOTAswufix

on non-APFS firmware machine after restart to continue with the "macOS Installer" (either OTA update or install to this machine) you should use this: USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2
Click to expand...

Thanks for the quick reply jackluke!

The CatalinaOTAswufix wants to update my machine to 10.5.5 beta 1 (can I update to the public release instead of the beta?), should I wait to go forward with this as it's not part of the "supported" versions yet?
Even if I update to 10.5.5 beta 1, as the patcher doesn't work (the external USB), is it still recommended to go forward with this step?

I've also tried the USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2 but every time I choose an USB (empty or the one I installed Catalina Patcher to) it says "no USB device found or the selected device is not an USB". I've rebooted my machine as well to see if it was due to the fact that an USB was already connected to the machine but still the same error.

I think the USB Loader would work, considering the MBP 5,5 isn't an APFS firmware machine, while I tried the same update on a Mac mini with APFS where I didn't run into this issue.

Appreciate the help, let me know if I should try anything else to solve this and update to the 10.5.4 or if I can give you more information.

Cheers
 
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ShiryuX said:
Thanks for the quick reply jackluke!

The CatalinaOTAswufix wants to update my machine to 10.5.5 beta 1 (can I update to the public release instead of the beta?), should I wait to go forward with this as it's not part of the "supported" versions yet?
Even if I update to 10.5.5 beta 1, as the patcher doesn't work (the external USB), is it still recommended to go forward with this step?

I've also tried the USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2 but every time I choose an USB (empty or the one I installed Catalina Patcher to) it says "no USB device found or the selected device is not an USB". I've rebooted my machine as well to see if it was due to the fact that an USB was already connected to the machine but still the same error.

I think the USB Loader would work, considering the MBP 5,5 isn't an APFS firmware machine, while I tried the same update on a Mac mini with APFS where I didn't run into this issue.

Appreciate the help, let me know if I should try anything else to solve this and update to the 10.5.4 or if I can give you more information.

Cheers
Click to expand...

To receive public releases simply from Software Update prefpane click "Details" and "Restore Defaults", wait a couple of minutes to let the Public update to show:
opt out from beta updates.png

About the USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2, if you use an empty USB drive try to change its label to USBopencore, or try first to erase the USB drive as GUID scheme and macOS Extended Journaled.

If you still can't install on USB external device, otherwise you could try this other that install it internally (it is easily removeable): OpenCoreAPFSloaderupdate.app.zip

Using opencore you can any time after power-on hold alt-option key to show the apple startup manager.
 
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hvds said:
Thank you jackluke for this change.
I confirm it works well now also for my setup. The app is now independent of previous EFI mounts.

The boot selector shows the internal and external SSDs with their EFIs (from APFS ROM patch I guess), and the USB stick's bootable installer with its OpenCore EFI.
Click to expand...
Just made an OTA end-to-end test using jackluke's CatalinaOTAswufix.app and USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2.app (latest version). Worked very well.

- made a bootable USB installer with 10.15.4 with dosdude's patcher 1.4.1, and OpenCore loader next to it with USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2
- on external SSD went back from 10.15.5b1 to 10.15.4 to have a second go with .5b1
- used CatalinaOTAswufix to find and prepare OTA for 10.15.5b1. 2nd OTA phase failed as expected due to old USB hardware of my MBP5,2 mid 2009
- reboot with OpenCore loader (which inserts legacy USB into prelinkedkernel during OTA installation) into the external SSD (labeled macOS installer at that point)
- OTA completes
- applied 1.4.1 post-install patches -> 10.15.5b1 boots fine.

BTW the OpenCore loader prepared with USBOpenCoreAPFSloader2 has an additional advantage: its boot list shows the original volume labels to easily distinguish several Catalina versions on the same bootable installer medium (photos; here only one version).
 

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olrik77 said:
@jackluke

Bonjour,

I have a problem with CatalinaOTAswufix :

View attachment 905638

Probably because I have a hidden administrator account with the home folder moved to /private/var/

Is it a way to fix that ?

Many thanks,

Serviteur,
Click to expand...

The easiest way would be to temporary unhidden your administrator account (or make another administrator account that you can remove or disable later), and re-hidden after you complete the update.

When you login to your hidden administrator account, if you copy/paste these in terminal:
Code: 
ls -l ~/
ls -d ~/*
open ~/

which path showed ?
 
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jackluke said:
The easiest way would be to temporary unhidden your administrator account (or make another administrator account that you can remove or disable later), and re-hidden after you complete the update.

When you login to your hidden administrator account, if you copy/paste these in terminal:
Code: 
ls -l ~/
ls -d ~/*
open ~/

which path showed ?

Try to copy the CatalinaOTAswufix.app in this path: /private/var/cpt/anysubfolder/
it should work also with an hidden administrator account.
Click to expand...

here is the result :

total 0
drwxr-xr-x 3 root staff 96 3 avr 18:37 CoreBrightness-backup
drwx------+ 5 cpt staff 160 13 avr 18:12 Desktop
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Documents
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Downloads
drwx------@ 57 cpt staff 1824 13 avr 18:07 Library
drwx------+ 4 cpt staff 128 9 avr 20:34 Movies
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Music
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Pictures
drwxr-xr-x+ 4 cpt staff 128 3 avr 18:35 Public
/private/var/cpt/CoreBrightness-backup /private/var/cpt/Movies
/private/var/cpt/Desktop /private/var/cpt/Music
/private/var/cpt/Documents /private/var/cpt/Pictures
/private/var/cpt/Downloads /private/var/cpt/Public

Serviteur,

/private/var/cpt/Library
 
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olrik77 said:
here is the result :

total 0
drwxr-xr-x 3 root staff 96 3 avr 18:37 CoreBrightness-backup
drwx------+ 5 cpt staff 160 13 avr 18:12 Desktop
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Documents
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Downloads
drwx------@ 57 cpt staff 1824 13 avr 18:07 Library
drwx------+ 4 cpt staff 128 9 avr 20:34 Movies
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Music
drwx------+ 3 cpt staff 96 3 avr 18:35 Pictures
drwxr-xr-x+ 4 cpt staff 128 3 avr 18:35 Public
/private/var/cpt/CoreBrightness-backup /private/var/cpt/Movies
/private/var/cpt/Desktop /private/var/cpt/Music
/private/var/cpt/Documents /private/var/cpt/Pictures
/private/var/cpt/Downloads /private/var/cpt/Public

Serviteur,

/private/var/cpt/Library
Click to expand...

Try to copy the CatalinaOTAswufix.app in this path: /private/var/cpt/anysubfolder/
(from terminal open /private/var/ )

for anysubfolder you can make any directory example catalinaotaswufix

it should work also with an hidden administrator account.
 
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Maxxyjunior said:
I fixed the problem on my macbook pro 8,1 starting the app directly from the Download Directory without any problem....
Click to expand...

Probably unrelated but starting from Catalina the Applications path for apple is /System/Applications/
while for third party apps is /Catalina Data Volume/Applications/ (or /System/Volumes/Data/Applications/)
and those might have some permissions issues for some apps.
 
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jackluke said:
Try to copy the CatalinaOTAswufix.app in this path: /private/var/cpt/anysubfolder/
(from terminal open /private/var/ )

for anysubfolder you can make any directory example catalinaotaswufix

it should work also with an hidden administrator account.
Click to expand...

It's done and it's OK !

Many thanks for your help.

Serviteur,
 
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Valerio G said:
Hi Balur,
reading the blog I found your issue with Photos App after an installation of Catalina on unsupported Mac.
Attached you can see what my Photos App is showing when I click on images thumbnails. Colours are messed up and pixelized.

Did you somehow sort out the problem with Catalina or just rolled back to Mojave?

My primary usage of the Mac is for photos, so this is definitely a showstopper for me and I might evaluate downgrade to Mojave (patched) if it works there.
Previous OS was El Capitan. I'm running on a iMac 20-inch, Early 2008. Display adapter is ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro 256 MB.

Cheers
Click to expand...
Hello Valerio,

have you meanwhile found a solution for this photo's issues? I'm having the same problem.

Kr,

Niels
 
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jackluke said:
Try to copy the CatalinaOTAswufix.app in this path: /private/var/cpt/anysubfolder/
(from terminal open /private/var/ )

for anysubfolder you can make any directory example catalinaotaswufix

it should work also with an hidden administrator account.
Click to expand...
Can you not just use relative paths? Assuming it's a Cocoa app, put the necessary files in the Resources folder, and you can access that specific path using [[NSBundle mainBundle] resourcePath]. This will return the EXACT path of the Resources directory of that app bundle, regardless of where it is stored on the user's machine.
 
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dosdude1 said:
Can you not just use relative paths? Assuming it's a Cocoa app, put the necessary files in the Resources folder, and you can access that specific path using [[NSBundle mainBundle] resourcePath]. This will return the EXACT path of the Resources directory of that app bundle, regardless of where it is stored on the user's machine.
Click to expand...

Yes, it should rely on Cocoa and Carbon, but they are essentially shell scripts, then I added for a better appearance an hybrid GUI applescript with some dialogs, icon and buttons, I thought also to use "curl" and download the scripts in a fixed path (example /private/tmp/), but I preferred to keep "offline resources", maybe if I improve them I'll follow your advise, but I am not very skilled as you in making very functional GUI apps.
 
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Ho installato catalina su MacBook Pro my 2008, ho installato zoom meeting e non vedo le cam dei partecipanti e nemmeno la mia , gli altri mi vedono bene .aiuto
 
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ghedo75 said:
Ho installato catalina su MacBook Pro my 2008, ho installato zoom meeting e non vedo le cam dei partecipanti e nemmeno la mia , gli altri mi vedono bene .aiuto
Click to expand...
English please... Did you use dosdude1 patcher 1.4.1?
Try install Catalina with it.
If zoom do not work go to post #9730, download the file TCCplus, Run it and then choose zoom. Choose microphone, exit, and then Run it again, choose zoom again and choose camera.
 
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0403979 said:
APFS ROM Patcher:
Warning: This tool could irreversibly brick your EFI chip. Please exercise caution with machines that have multiple EEPROM definitions. Relevant information can be found here and here. The APFS ROM patcher can be found here. Use the password apfs to decrypt the ZIP.
Click to expand...

Hello. I don't know when but I think that I somewhere red that APFS ROM Patcher can't be used on laptops with Nvidia chipset (MacBook and MacBook Pro from 2008 to 2010) because there is very good possibilty that mac could be bricked. Have I something misplaced or is it still case? Thanks in advance.
 
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MasterChief2 said:
Hello. I don't know when but I think that I somewhere red that APFS ROM Patcher can't be used on laptops with Nvidia chipset (MacBook and MacBook Pro from 2008 to 2010) because there is very good possibilty that mac could be bricked. Have I something misplaced or is it still case? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
I did this, it failed. Someone on the Discord did this, it worked. Just don't risk it.
 
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MasterChief2 said:
Hello. I don't know when but I think that I somewhere red that APFS ROM Patcher can't be used on laptops with Nvidia chipset (MacBook and MacBook Pro from 2008 to 2010) because there is very good possibilty that mac could be bricked. Have I something misplaced or is it still case? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
I use the APFS Rom Patcher on both my mid 2009 iMac 9,1 and my mid 2009 MacBook 5,2 successfully but I did brick my iMac 8,1 so it is risky
 
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I am using mid-2009 MBP(5,5) with 10.15.3.
I am thinking to upgrade to 10.15.4.
I want to know that the new version goes well.
 
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