macOS 15 Sequoia on Unsupported Macs Thread

[Bmld]

Hey guys! After update to the last Beta, my account became standard user. So I don't have anymore an admin in my MBP4.1. Any hints?

Hello, i had the same issue on a IMac, it is why I create always 2 admin account . So for you I found this :

I went to add some folder to my PATH and, to my surprise, my password was not working for admin privileges. I checked Users & Groups and sure enough, my account was listed as a standard user. This means I have no way of creating another user account with admin privileges or restoring admin privileges on my existing account.

I called Apple and they told me I had to reset my computer (you do not!!!).

If anyone runs into the issue, here is what you do:

1. Put machine into recovery mode, for my mac I had to hold the power button until “continue holding for startup options” appeared, but may differ by year/model
2. Click “Options” and then “Disk Utility”.
3. Select the “Data” volume on disk “Macintosh HD”, then click “Mount”
4. Close Disk Utility
5. In the top navigation bar, select “Utilities” then “Terminal”
6. In the terminal, type “cd /Volumes/Macintosh HD/var/db” and hit enter to change into the proper directort
7. In the terminal, type “rm .AppleSetupDone” and hit enter to delete the file
8. Close the terminal
9. Restart the computer

By deleting this file, the mac doesn’t know it has already performed the setup process like it did when you first used your mac, so it will go into the setup process again after the reboot.The final step of setup is to create a user account, so go through the entire process until you do that, the account will be an admin by default.

1. Once the setup is done, sign into the new account
2. Hit the keys cmd-space and search for “Users & Groups”
3. Select your old account and slide the switch for admin rights to on, it will ask for admin password, use the one you just created for this new account
4. sign out of your appleID if you signed into it for the new account during setup, then logout of the account on your max
5. sign into your old account, verify your admin rights
6. you can now delete the other account, you may have to resign in to your appleid.

I hope this helps someone at some point

 

[TOM1211]

Ah, okay. Yes, for me it's about 1-2 seconds.

I guess why this is displayed for different lengths of time could be:

• Depending on whether it's legacy metal or non-metal Macs.
• Depending on the background image - static vs. dynamic

I changed my background to a .jpg and changed the image to fit my native Mac display setting and the issue seems completely gone for me but as my other posts I’ve tried many things.

 

[StefanAM]

Hello, i had the same issue on a IMac, it is why I create always 2 admin account . So for you I found this :

I went to add some folder to my PATH and, to my surprise, my password was not working for admin privileges. I checked Users & Groups and sure enough, my account was listed as a standard user. This means I have no way of creating another user account with admin privileges or restoring admin privileges on my existing account.

I called Apple and they told me I had to reset my computer (you do not!!!).

If anyone runs into the issue, here is what you do:

1. Put machine into recovery mode, for my mac I had to hold the power button until “continue holding for startup options” appeared, but may differ by year/model
2. Click “Options” and then “Disk Utility”.
3. Select the “Data” volume on disk “Macintosh HD”, then click “Mount”
4. Close Disk Utility
5. In the top navigation bar, select “Utilities” then “Terminal”
6. In the terminal, type “cd /Volumes/Macintosh HD/var/db” and hit enter to change into the proper directort
7. In the terminal, type “rm .AppleSetupDone” and hit enter to delete the file
8. Close the terminal
9. Restart the computer

By deleting this file, the mac doesn’t know it has already performed the setup process like it did when you first used your mac, so it will go into the setup process again after the reboot.The final step of setup is to create a user account, so go through the entire process until you do that, the account will be an admin by default.

1. Once the setup is done, sign into the new account
2. Hit the keys cmd-space and search for “Users & Groups”
3. Select your old account and slide the switch for admin rights to on, it will ask for admin password, use the one you just created for this new account
4. sign out of your appleID if you signed into it for the new account during setup, then logout of the account on your max
5. sign into your old account, verify your admin rights
6. you can now delete the other account, you may have to resign in to your appleid.

I hope this helps someone at some point

Doesn't works on Sequoia. This works:

"I booted the Mac (6.1 MacPro) from an external hard drive. (Thank God I had a backup system ready)

Then I went into the terminal as an admin and edited the sudoers file on the internal hard drive:

sudo nano /etc/sudoers

And entered my user under the root entry:

root ALL=(ALL) ALL

(My user name) ALL=(ALL) ALL

After that, I saved the sudoers file and started my system normally from the internal hard drive.

Then I went into the terminal and executed this command:

sudo dscl . -append /Groups/admin GroupMembership (My user name)

There they were again, my admin rights in the right place."

https://www.reddit.com/r/OpenCoreLegacyPatcher/comments/1bdx538/no_mac_admin_account_after_installing_sonoma_with

 

[Mark1966]

I also changed my background to a *.jpg image and the grey screen problem has gone.

Why does Apple make such stupid changes that then lead to such strange mistakes.

There's nothing more to say about that.

 

[mikelets456]

My photos will not sync past December 9th....it keeps stating "syncing with iCloud", but that's it. Any resolution?

 

[Steve Gosselin]

My photos will not sync past December 9th....it keeps stating "syncing with iCloud", but that's it. Any resolution?

Try this: Repair your photo library on Mac.
I've had this issue before (without OCLP) and it solved the problem with this trick.

 

[shafez]

I changed my background to a .jpg and changed the image to fit my native Mac display setting and the issue seems completely gone for me but as my other posts I’ve tried many things.

Didn't work on my MBP 13" Late 2013 11,1, it did reduce the grey background time .

 

[TOM1211]

Didn't work on my MBP 13" Late 2013 11,1, it did reduce the grey background time .

Did you do a shutdown after changing ?

 

[shafez]

Did you do a shutdown after changing ?

Yes. Sonoma had the same problem for sometime and now fixed, lets hope it's fixed by the time we get 15.7 😀

 

[kerchenit]

Hi all! I installed the latest OCLP and Sequoia on my a1502 2015 macbook pro 13 with iris 6100 graphics and core i5 processor. The system works well except that the interface rhythmically freezes for a fraction of a second every 3-4 seconds. This is clearly visible when watching a video; the screensaver also slows down. Is there a way to fix this?

 

[mikelets456]

Try this: Repair your photo library on Mac.
I've had this issue before (without OCLP) and it solved the problem with this trick.

Thanks. However, I fixed it updating to 15.2 from 15.1….i tried updating OCLP first but that didn’t resolve the problem until I updated to 15.2

 

[houser]

Hi all! I installed the latest OCLP and Sequoia on my a1502 2015 macbook pro 13 with iris 6100 graphics and core i5 processor. The system works well except that the interface rhythmically freezes for a fraction of a second every 3-4 seconds. This is clearly visible when watching a video; the screensaver also slows down. Is there a way to fix this?

Odd. Is that a vanilla install? If not, maybe try that.

 

[kerchenit]

i just build bootable media with oclp under monterrey and install it according to instruction. What do you mean "vanilla install"?

 

[houser]

i just build bootable media with oclp under monterrey and install it according to instruction. What do you mean "vanilla install"?

Sorry for lingo. "Vanilla install" typically means basic clean install from scratch and not updated from previous version OS install.

 

[kerchenit]

Sorry for lingo. "Vanilla install" typically means basic clean install from scratch and not updated from previous version OS install.

Thank you! I did the installation on a separate partition of the hard drive, not an update. I also tried to delete the kexts for graphics, but the lags remained. Perhaps this is somehow related to the SSD or the processor. I will probably try other installation options

 

[houser]

Thank you! I did the installation on a separate partition of the hard drive, not an update. I also tried to delete the kexts for graphics, but the lags remained. Perhaps this is somehow related to the SSD or the processor. I will probably try other installation options

Ok. One more suggestion: redo the root patches. You might be able to make sure that that correct KDK is loaded and used. Depending on your model, the network might not be active as needed when you run the patches the first time, so a second pass can do the trick. Has helped here a few times and will certainly not hurt. Good luck.

 

[kerchenit]

Ok. One more suggestion: redo the root patches. You might be able to make sure that that correct KDK is loaded and used. Depending on your model, the network might not be active as needed when you run the patches the first time, so a second pass can do the trick. Has helped here a few times and will certainly not hurt. Good luck.

Wow! I just removed the camera section from boot.plist and now everything works great! My built-in camera is damaged and this was causing the graphics issue. Thanks again!

 

[houser]

Wow! I just removed the camera section from boot.plist and now everything works great! My built-in camera is damaged and this was causing the graphics issue. Thanks again!

You're welcome. I was going to write that unless the root patching fixes that, I would suspect a hardware issue with something video related. So there's that

 

[Dayo]

UPDATE: 17 Jan 25
Test Result: Failure to Boot
If this is a factor, it is not "THE" factor.

---

Can anyone with an MP31 running Sequoia test changing the "cpus=4" item in the boot args to "cpus=8"?
The OCLP adds this to overcome failures as set out here

Release 2.0.0 · dortania/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher

With the release of OpenCore Legacy Patcher 2.0.0, we're proud to announce macOS Sequoia support! And with it, 83 unsupported Mac models will be able to run Apple's latest operating system! With ...

github.com

The setting means only one CPU is used on MP31 but however, there is a chance that simply setting the "cpus" boot arg, even when set to 8 to use both cores, is what avoids the issues.

Spotted this in the kernel code:

xnu/osfmk/kern/sched_amp.c at 8d741a5de7ff4191bf97d57b9f54c2f6d4a15585 · apple-oss-distributions/xnu

Contribute to apple-oss-distributions/xnu development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

There are a bunch of ASSERTS that are skipped once the "cpus" boot arg is present, regardless of what "cpus" is set to. There is a chance that the MP31 fails these tests and that the fix works because they are avoided once that boot arg is set ... regardless of what it is set to (not checked here). If that is the case, it might as well be set to "8".

Obviously whoever is willing to test this needs to be able to get back into mac OS via another instance in case it doesn't work out. Maybe test on an instance on a USB stick that can be disconnected if it fails.

Alternatively, could try removing the cpus argument and setting "cpumask=0xFF" as the presence of cpumask also skips the ASSERTS. "0xFF" basically just enables all 8 cores as well.

cc @dhinakg

 

[theWoosh]

12,2 to Sequoia...
I currently have Ventura running on my 12,2 imac 27" mid-2011. Mostly works fine except Photos and Maps (coz of non-metal HD6770M graphics I presume). I tried to upgrade it to Sequoia with an OCLP image but couldn't get past login without freeze, so reinstalled Ventura. I now have a WX4150 card ready to go in as soon as I can but my Mac also has Atheros AR9380 wifi card and I'm wondering if this might also contribute to sequoia issues... If so I can replace with BCM94360CD (or BCM943602CDP if that will provide any supported advantage) from here: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006771637483.html
Any opinion on whether I will need to upgrade this as well to run Sequoia? Can't figure it out from the forum posts (hard to filter out-of-date stuff from current when searching).
Many thanks

 

[theWoosh]

Thanks for the heads-up - I can see that there is potential for problems with different file system versions in use. This also explains why I am getting 'Incompatible Disk' warning when working in High Sierra - it obviously can't read the Seqouia volume.
I wonder what happens when I come to trying to upgrade my existing High Sierra volume to Ventura or above? How does it update the files system to a newer version? The upgraded volume is just my test rig to see what works - the plan was to eventually upgrade the main High Sierra volume - maybe this is not so straightforward...

...Actually the only issue i have found with dual-boot High Sierra and Ventura is that spotlight file indexing and mail indexing have been screwed on High Sierra. I think this is because spotlight is trying to index the newer APFS Ventura volume and breaking...? Anyway I have now removed the newer APFS volumes from spotlights index and have set both spotlight and mail to reindex (with Onyx - High Sierra version) and hoping that eventually it will all be reindexed... (I haven't tried to upgrade Ventura yet)

 

[hvds]

MBP11,1: updated OTA from 15.3b1 to b2 (24D5040f) on external SSD. Using OCLP 2.2.0.
Smooth update, resulting system quite responsive. Thanks to the developers!

Further update to 15.3b3 (24D5055b) works as expected.

 

[houser]

Further update to 15.3b3 (24D5055b) works as expected.

Any clear advantages in an OCLP context over 15.2 you care to mention?

 

[TOM1211]

15.3 beta 2 reverting patches came to the 1.06gb update to 15.3 beta 3 all ran smoothly on mid MacBook Pro 2014 with OCLP 2.2 . I think if you haven’t installed sequoia on your unsupported Mac it might be worth a try once 15.3 hits release (after confirming it works and isn’t broken) on a separate partition first but it runs very well on my mid 2014 again for my needs could depend on what your doing.

 

[hvds]

Any clear advantages in an OCLP context over 15.2 you care to mention?

I don't see any, but my testing is quite limited. I just verify that the few things I need are still fine, which includes Photos. Ability to use the latest OS is the main advantage for me.