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rebelo

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 6, 2014
33
64
Brazil
I'm glad you cannot be killed by regret. Bought a brand new M5 Macbook Pro and for the third time I really tried to use Tahoe. Gave up. Erased everything and voilà, you cannot clean install anything but Tahoe. Thanks, Apple. Really silly, but I guess stupidity is on me for not asking first at the Apple Store. Should have sticked with a basic M4 Pro. Man, this is really, really silly.

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I'm glad you cannot be killed by regret. Bought a brand new M5 Macbook Pro and for the third time I really tried to use Tahoe. Gave up. Erased everything and voilà, you cannot clean install anything but Tahoe. Thanks, Apple. Really silly, but I guess stupidity is on me for not asking first at the Apple Store. Should have sticked with a basic M4 Pro. Man, this is really, really silly.

View attachment 2576253
This is and has been the case for many years, when new HW is released at the same time as a new OS, it only runs on the new OS... like and iPhone 17 requires iOS 26, nothing new...
 
its an interesting problem,
usually we are always hearing about the reverse problem: when a computer is so old that it can't be updated to the latest OS after several years.
it must be disappointing.
i think there is a way to get the OS before 26 on it. but that might violate the terms of the warranty.
although apple does do it this way, i have always presumed that it is due to system security and integrity reasons.
 
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rebelo, I hear ye!

i have a macbook pro released when LION was roaoring in 2012.
well the MBP was through a Univeristy graphic labs as we reieived that with MT Lion in sepetember.
beofre the launch as that is always screwein gme up since i own that now.

too bad they don tmake a oclp ofr older OS than what was shipped.
Mojave would rule on My mba 2020!
 
What would be the point to return the M5 Macbook for a M4 with Sequoia? What if you don’t like macOS 27 either? Then you have a fantastic modern device that remains stuck on an old OS.

I did actually have the same problem with Sonoma. Suffered for a year and upgraded to Sequoia day 1 and all issues were immediately fixed. But I was not going to return that Mac and buy an older one with worse specs on purpose.

There was just a Tahoe update to 26.1 so you could give Tahoe another try now.
 
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the lowest version of MacOS you can install is the version that was preinstalled. You cannot go to an earlier version
Indeed. As far as I remember, it has been the case since the days of System 6 (maybe before, but at the time of System 6, there had not been so many Mac models before 😉). With System 7, Apple introduced “enablers”, one little file specific to each model of Mac that enabled the system to use the specific hardware of the new model. If I’m not mistaken, enablers could not be used with older systems, so already at that time it was not possible to use an Apple OS older than the one shipped with the Mac (or at least when the Mac was released).
So… a somewhat regrettable situation but it’s hardly new. 😕
What I really hate nowadays is Apple stopping signing iOS, which forbids reverting to the previous OS that was installed and working before the update. 😠
 
This is and has been the case for many years, when new HW is released at the same time as a new OS, it only runs on the new OS... like and iPhone 17 requires iOS 26, nothing new...
Yup, that's how I understand it too. Older software versions are not going to be made to be compatible with newer hardware -- not generally.
 
That's the thing with buying the latest hardware while the latest software is still not up to the quality you expect. I am really considering the iPhone 17 for the hardware upgrade it has received compared to previous base models but iOS 26.x is what's stopping me. I'll be keeping the iPhone 11 Pro Max running iOS 18.x until an app stops supporting iOS 18.x or the minimum requirement of an app becomes iOS 26.x
 
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Odd to hear the distrust of MacOS 26.

I have a couple of Macs and they work just brilliantly with it installed. If anything I can barely tell it changed.

I remember days in the past where a new os would break legacy software, that was really annoying. Is that your problem?
 
Odd to hear the distrust of MacOS 26.

I have a couple of Macs and they work just brilliantly with it installed. If anything I can barely tell it changed.

I remember days in the past where a new os would break legacy software, that was really annoying. Is that your problem?
I'm still on iOS 17.x on my iPhone due to iOS 18.x breaking IMAP email support. That doesn't appear to have been fixed in iOS 26.x (or, should I say, iPadOS 26.x as that's my test system).
 
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This has always been the way, that new HW receives the latest available MacOS and is not down-gradable. I wouldn't even call it down-gradable as the new HW was never released with an older software to begin with.

An anecdote of annoyance and self-pity: end of 2022 I bought an iP Mini 13 with iOS 15 but chose to return it within a month (at the time) due to HW issues. Picking up and transferring data at an Apple Store to my new replacement in Jan 2023, I was forced to update to iOS16. Yeah that kinda annoyed me as the Mini did come out with the earlier version to begin with but ceased to be signed.

Caveat: I'm now on iOS18 which annoys me even more as it was actually my decision.
 
Odd to hear the distrust of MacOS 26.
Its not distrust, but rather preference and concern.

Its great that its working well for you, but that doesn't negate the legions of people having compatibility and performance issues. Then there's the UI, and how it gets in the way for some people, making it harder or they just don't like what how it works.

Finally, the idea of fixing something that isn't broken. If Sequoia is working well, no issues, what does Tahoe give you? The major feature of Tahoe is the Glass UI, and if that doesn't interest you, why bother.
 
How did 18 break IMAP? (Genuine curiosity — it hasn’t been any worse for me than it already was in earlier versions.)
After the initial set up it no longer retrieves e-mail. It just hangs forever and then eventually silently gives up. I can send mail but I cannot retrieve it. If I remove the account and recreate it mail is downloaded and the process repeats.
 
After the initial set up it no longer retrieves e-mail. It just hangs forever and then eventually silently gives up. I can send mail but I cannot retrieve it. If I remove the account and recreate it mail is downloaded and the process repeats.

Ah. I get that failure to download periodically but not consistently. But it’s been happening for me for at least 5 years, maybe longer.

Are you using Gmail? IIRC there’s an issue with Gmail’s non-standards-compliant IMAP implementation where if you have any drafts on the server, iOS mail and Mac Mail.app hang while downloading.
 
Ah. I get that failure to download periodically but not consistently. But it’s been happening for me for at least 5 years, maybe longer.

Are you using Gmail? IIRC there’s an issue with Gmail’s non-standards-compliant IMAP implementation where if you have any drafts on the server, iOS mail and Mac Mail.app hang while downloading.
No, this is a personal server that I have been running for decades. It works fine without TLS enabled but only the initial check upon account configuration works with TLS enabled. POP3 works fine with TLS enabled.

I use a self-signed certificate so I am investigating that angle. However I don't see any messages in the error / connection logs nor do the devices report any issues (other than the initial self-signed certificate warning when initially configuring the account).

I am also under the thought that maybe the TLS specification changed in some way that affects how TLS connections are handled and that Apple implemented the change thus leading to my issue. But initial searching hasn't revealed anything relevant.

I know I am not the only one as it has been discussed in the iOS 18 section. When I have time I am going to use a free TLS certificate to see if that eliminates the issue.
 
Odd to hear the distrust of MacOS 26.

I have a couple of Macs and they work just brilliantly with it installed. If anything I can barely tell it changed.

I remember days in the past where a new os would break legacy software, that was really annoying. Is that your problem?
Agreed. I have my major production systems updated as well. It works just fine.
 
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I am also under the thought that maybe the TLS specification changed in some way that affects how TLS connections are handled and that Apple implemented the change thus leading to my issue.


Probably already looked at this, but putting it out there for the rest of the class. TLDR: Apple TLS support has changed over the years.

 
Odd to hear the distrust of MacOS 26.

I have a couple of Macs and they work just brilliantly with it installed. If anything I can barely tell it changed.

I remember days in the past where a new os would break legacy software, that was really annoying. Is that your problem?
MacOS 26 is the first time I'm wary of updating and have held off. From the early response, MacOS 26 doesn't seem ready for primetime and was rushed out the door with myriad of stability issues. Great that it's working well for you but Safari 26 is super laggy on my M4 Pro MBP 14. I reverted Safari and am sticking to Sequoia for now.

I look forward to upgrading to the redesigned MBP 16 in a year and hopefully Apple will have worked out their OS kinks by then or else they're not getting (any more of) my money. Apple has really regressed from a software quality standpoint lately.
 
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Probably already looked at this, but putting it out there for the rest of the class. TLDR: Apple TLS support has changed over the years.

Ironically everything works fine in macOS Mail. I would expect that any changes made to iOS / iPadOS would also have been made in macOS.
 
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