macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

[pkouame]

Yes, but it will re-open the CatalinaInstaller.app and probably will re-download it again, because this is major upgrade not minor version as 10.14.6 beta 1, so it will need to re-download (probably two times) to create the "MacOS Install Data" root folder, I took about 2 hours to install from an i5 cpu on an SSD , very slow process I'd say.

After OTA from .5 I receive a full Catalina installer. I don’t think it re-downloads again. I did get a recovery hd failure after the ota.

 

[jackluke]

After OTA from .5 I receive a full Catalina installer. I don’t think it re-downloads again. I did get a recovery hd failure after the ota.

But that's why I do that on an empty external USB hdd/ssd, OTA updates sometimes are tricky even on a supported Mac. I forced power-off one time during the update-stages with apple logo, then installation resumed and continued.

Anyway I noticed the kextcache -i / is refused by the new Catalina kernel from single user mode, while even using patched kexts it still works fine from a booted Catalina Terminal with sudo kextcache -i /

Haven't yet tested the AGC and IOGraphics HS kext, honestly since .3 Mojave non-metal Frameworks are incompatible with Catalina frameworks, I think I'll wait for @ASentientBot patched IOSurface.kext to get the Framebuffer video.

 

[karesake]

I really hope that the graphicanomalies are finally getting fixed. That just looks like **** since Mojave. The whole system can work as well as it wants. It's no fun to use it

 

[webg3]

@swamprock hasn't installed yet Catalina especially to support it on MacBook4,1 I see very hard this time.

And yes I also as you got some HID stall 60s delay in booting:
busy, timeout (60s) AppleUserHIDDevice

and sometimes the trackpad is jerky but this only happens on MB7,1 while on the other DualGPUs MBP 6,2 the IOUSB* part seems much more stable due to the more recent architecture Arrandale, but I repeat I haven't yet replaced nothing, I have a fully stock Catalina, I only renamed the "com.apple.telemetry.plugin2" and added the Nvidia Tesla, IntelHD kexts to the SLE folder, and GPUs are recognized at least with their right VRAM sizes: macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

I'm only booting from safe mode till now, and yes also the Wifi seems no detected using the stock Catalina IO80211Family

as you can see using the stock Catalina IOUSB*.kext single user mode works perfectly too on Macbook7,1 .

And in some random booting seems the "HID stall" doesn't occur on MB7,1 with trackpad very responsive.

All this without patching nothing, I'll attempt some patches later.


To me the very good news is that Catalina hasn't dropped from xnu the SSE4.1 instruction as minimum cpu requirement as Sierra.


While by then it's clear that /Applications/ is only an "alias" mount point for /System/Applications/

But I still can't find/mount this kind of alias Catalina "Users" folders when booting from another HS/Mojave Volume, has someone succeeded to do that ?

EDIT: found Users and Library Settings Catalina apfs mount point

Hello my friend, can you post some screen prints? Thank you.

 

[bige12]

I got it fully booting and working on a 2011 MacBookPro8,3. Attempting to get graphics acceleration working, however, is a different story.

What about a mid 2011 MacBook Air 4,2?

 

[Flacko]

If you have a MacPro 3,1 with a GTX-680, it would be interesting to find out if the initial Catalina developer seed contains the required native metal graphic driver despite the GPU autodetection not being present yet. I'm hoping, if the support for 2012-mid machines really includes that MacPro release, the same nvidia driver support is retained. Assuming that they don't get cute and make the drivers x86_86h only.

Thinking along the same lines. Apple has not listed the mp5.1 as supported so there is a chance that the built in nVidia drivers will not be present. If this is the case then will have to hope the recent fix to the Mojave metal drivers can be applied to Catalina. Then cards like the RX560/580 can be used.

 

[pkouame]

But that's why I do that on an empty external USB hdd/ssd, OTA updates sometimes are tricky even on a supported Mac. I forced power-off one time during the update-stages with apple logo, then installation resumed and continued.

Anyway I noticed the kextcache -i / is refused by the new Catalina kernel from single user mode, while even using patches kexts it still works fine from a booted Catalina Terminal with sudo kextcache -i /

OTA on supported Mac was very smooth for me.
Definitely cleaner to a new USB external disk.
Strange about kextcache in single user mode.

 

[jackluke]

Hello my friend, can you post some screen prints? Thank you.

I already posted them, what you mean exactly ? If you are from a mobile device try to refresh webpage cache, because I posted screenpictures also for MB7,1 .

I'd say that on any 2010 "native HighSierra" supported machines, after a clean Catarina APFS installation things to replace for a minimum working system are: removing telemetry.plugin, IO80211Family.kext and AppleHDA.kext from HighSierra, all the rest will work OOB, apart Graphics that I haven't yet figured it out.

And set a nvram value for "-no_compat_check" I take it often for granted.

 

[webg3]

Is this about the graphics, still without acceleration?

 

[jackluke]

Is this about the graphics, still without acceleration?

About graphics I haven't done any real progress, just a detected GPU in system profiler, neither framebuffer with Brightness control, but @ASentientBot, @dosdude1 and maybe others I guess are trying to figure it out, at least to have framebuffer not so bad.

But unfortunately their Mojave non-metal acceleration frameworks discoveries don't work more on Catalina.

 

[ScreenSavers]

What about my good old mid 2010 17" Any hope for it?

 

[swamprock]

@swamprock hasn't installed yet Catalina especially to support it on MacBook4,1 I see very hard this time.

And yes I also as you got some HID stall 60s delay in booting:
busy, timeout (60s) AppleUserHIDDevice

and sometimes the trackpad is jerky but this only happens on MB7,1 while on the other DualGPUs MBP 6,2 the IOUSB* part seems much more stable due to the more recent architecture Arrandale, but I repeat I haven't yet replaced nothing, I have a fully stock Catalina, I only renamed the "com.apple.telemetry.plugin2" and added the Nvidia Tesla, IntelHD kexts to the SLE folder, and GPUs are recognized at least with their right VRAM sizes: macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

I'm only booting from safe mode till now, and yes also the Wifi seems no detected using the stock Catalina IO80211Family

as you can see using the stock Catalina IOUSB*.kext single user mode works perfectly too on Macbook7,1 .

And in some random booting seems the "HID stall" doesn't occur on MB7,1 with trackpad very responsive.

All this without patching nothing, I'll attempt some patches later.


To me the very good news is that Catalina hasn't dropped from xnu the SSE4.1 instruction as minimum cpu requirement as Sierra.


While by then it's clear that /Applications/ is only an "alias" mount point for /System/Applications/

But I still can't find/mount this kind of alias Catalina "Users" folders when booting from another HS/Mojave Volume, has someone succeeded to do that ?

EDIT: found Users and Library Settings Catalina apfs mount point

I haven't even tried yet. I usually wait until the real pros come up with some solutions, and keep an eye on these threads for the workarounds before I make an attempt. Luckily, I have a 2017 Macbook Pro that I can do *some* of the terminal work from, but it's a real pain without firewire.

 

[jackluke]

I haven't even tried yet. I usually wait until the real pros come up with some solutions, and keep an eye on these threads for the workarounds before I make an attempt. Luckily, I have a 2017 Macbook Pro that I can do *some* of the terminal work from, but it's a real pain without firewire.

Yes, firewire revealed very useful in some situation to troubleshoot an older machine in target disk mode, but can't you use some kind of usb type-c to firewire 400/800 adapter or maybe they removed its support from 2017 MBP firmware I don't know.

 

[flygbuss]

Is it just because it's the first beta or will 10.15 come without the landscape logo within 'about this mac'?
I think it was introduced with Sierra when naming also went from OS X to macOS..

 

[pkouame]

About graphics I haven't done any real progress, just a detected GPU in system profiler, neither framebuffer with Brightness control, but @ASentientBot, @dosdude1 and maybe others I guess are trying to figure it out, at least to have framebuffer not so bad.

But unfortunately their Mojave non-metal acceleration frameworks discoveries don't work more on Catalina.

The new Catalina CoreDisplay has even more bindings for external "virtual" displays (as suspected) The framework even has an XPC Services folder I don't remember noticing that in the late Mojave updates. So it communicates with other running processes.

I'll be taking a look at the new OpenGL throughout the week. Not surprising that we may have some graphic/acceleration issues... Have you played around with the wrangler?

 

[Starplayr]

Thinking along the same lines. Apple has not listed the mp5.1 as supported so there is a chance that the built in nVidia drivers will not be present. If this is the case then will have to hope the recent fix to the Mojave metal drivers can be applied to Catalina. Then cards like the RX560/580 can be used.

I installed Cat on a 2016 MacBook Pro and Nvidia drivers are present. They date back to 2018.

 

[pkouame]

Yes, firewire revealed very useful in some situation to troubleshoot an older machine in target disk mode, but can't you use some kind of usb type-c to firewire 400/800 adapter or maybe they removed its support from 2017 MBP firmware I don't know.

Did you download a full Catalina installer and patch InstallESD/OSInstall in the traditional way (to get to your point)?

 

[blindpcguy]

there has to be some nvidia drivres as the 2012 2013 and i think 2014 macbook pros supported nvidia so there has to be some remnant there

 

[jackluke]

The new Catalina CoreDisplay has even more bindings for external "virtual" displays (as suspected) The framework even has an XPC Services folder I don't remember noticing that in the late Mojave updates. So it communicates with other running processes.

I'll be taking a look at the new OpenGL throughout the week. Not surprising that we may have some graphic/acceleration issues... Have you played around with the wrangler?

That should be also related to the new "Sidecar" feature, not yet attempted Wrangler, I'd want not to mismatch so much my Catalina "clean" installation for now.

I noticed also during verbose boot this new "reference": /System/Library/FeatureFlags/Domain/

 

[Dubby360]

So @dosdude1 do you think the 2009 Macs will be able to get Catalina?

 

[Flacko]

I installed Cat on a 2016 MacBook Pro and Nvidia drivers are present. They date back to 2018.

Excellent news, many thanks. May be able to keep mp3.1 going for longer.

 

[TimothyR734]

Thanks for the reply. Even if I do use Mojave with it though the same question applies no? Will I be able then to sync my owned music and my photos from my Imac to the iphone running IOS 13?

I am really confused as to what it means killing itunes app off. Essentially it doesnt make sense to force everyone to use Catalina in order to sync their ios13 devices right? There has to be a way to allow older OS to still be able to sync with ios13 no?

from what I read and understand the new music app will sync to iPhone. We will have to see if Mojave will get the new music app as well

 

[pkouame]

That should be also related to the new "Sidecar" feature, not yet attempted Wrangler, I'd want not to mismatch so much my Catalina "clean" installation for now.

I noticed also during verbose boot this new "reference": /System/Library/FeatureFlags/Domain/

Are you at login with the "clean" install?

 

[jackluke]

Are you at login with the "clean" install?

Yes, but have to wait a couple of minutes to allow the kext_stall HIDDevice or busy_timeout (60s), after that delay it lands to login/desktop. Replacing IOHIDDevice.kext from previous OSX can't allocate more any usb input devices, so for now I need that delay in booting, sometimes in random booting that delay is totally absent.

 

[TimothyR734]

Yes, but have to wait a couple of minutes to allow the kext_stall HIDDevice or busy_timeout (60s), after that delay it lands to login/desktop. Replacing IOHIDDevice.kext from previous OSX can't allocate more any usb input devices, so for now I need that delay in booting, sometimes in random booting that delay is totally absent.

would the legacyinjectorkext work