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Should I upgrade to macOS High Sierra?

555gallardo

555gallardo

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 16, 2016
266
1,656
Slovakia
Hello,

unlike past years, during which I've been always the first in line to upgrade to the newest macOS, this time I decided to wait a bit and it seemed like a good option. As you may recall, there's been a lot of news about High Sierra's security problems, as well as Office 365 performance problems at launch. It's been a couple of months now since the vanilla macOS 10.13 was released and the newest version, 10.13.2, was released in December.

I expect the macOS High Sierra now to be better than at launch, but is it good enough for me to upgrade from 10.12.6 Sierra? I'm using my MacBook Air for Safari, Photoshop, Office and Google SketchUp, but I have several other apps in use as well, unavailable on App Store. And, I need to make sure that my Mac will just work. Now, I know that iOS 11 did change its filesystem and disabled 32-bit support, making older apps incompatible. Did the same thing happen to High Sierra as well? I want to upgrade and be sure that all of my apps will continue to work.

Thanks!
 
555gallardo

555gallardo

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 16, 2016
266
1,656
Slovakia
ceparker27 said:
Honestly? No. Don't do it. More kernel panics, less battery life, machine runs hotter than ever. I've generally been disappointed with High Sierra.
Click to expand...

Currently, my battery is able to run for about 5-6 hours of use, which is significantly less than 13 hours it was able to run when I first bought this Mac (Early-2014 w/8GB RAM). So unless I decide to replace my battery, HS would probably kill it, correct?

Also, in what cases of use does your Mac overheat? Thanks
 
makinao

makinao

macrumors 6502
Dec 27, 2009
296
116
I usually do major upgrades only 1) on the second update (at least 10.xx.2), and 2) during vacations or long holidays when I'm not doing important work. I went from Sierra to High Sierra (10.13.2) just before this new year. Aside from a couple of stalls during boot up, I haven't had any problems.
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
29,175
13,223
OP:

The questions you should be asking yourself:
- How is the MacBook running NOW?
- Does everything you currently use work fine?
- Are you satisfied with the speed that things run?

If you are completely satisfied with your MacBook -in its current state-, why do you feel that "you must upgrade"?
Do you really have the need to? (i.e., some software won't work unless you do it)
Or... is it something more akin to "peer pressure"? (if I don't upgrade, I won't have what everyone else has...)

Only you can provide the answers to such questions.

Personal experience:
I have an external "test drive" set up with High Sierra, but my "OS of choice" remains El Capitan.
I have no plans to move beyond El Cap in the near future (at least another 2-3 years).
I don't care one whit about "being out-of-date". Zilch. Nada.
 
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555gallardo

555gallardo

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 16, 2016
266
1,656
Slovakia
Fishrrman said:
OP:

The questions you should be asking yourself:
- How is the MacBook running NOW?
- Does everything you currently use work fine?
- Are you satisfied with the speed that things run?

If you are completely satisfied with your MacBook -in its current state-, why do you feel that "you must upgrade"?
Do you really have the need to? (i.e., some software won't work unless you do it)
Or... is it something more akin to "peer pressure"? (if I don't upgrade, I won't have what everyone else has...)

Only you can provide the answers to such questions.

Personal experience:
I have an external "test drive" set up with High Sierra, but my "OS of choice" remains El Capitan.
I have no plans to move beyond El Cap in the near future (at least another 2-3 years).
I don't care one whit about "being out-of-date". Zilch. Nada.
Click to expand...

I like my software being up-to-date, but I'm also aware that newest doesn't actually mean it's the best. Therefore I want to hear some user feedback before I definitely choose whether I upgrade or not. As for the other questions, currently my MBA is running just perfectly on Sierra.
 
J.Gallardo

J.Gallardo

macrumors 6502
Apr 4, 2017
448
157
Spain
I received my new iMac with High Sierra installed, so I had no choice. Everything is working perfectly well. Not a single problem by now (one month fiddling & installing my legacy apps).
But I wouldn't upgrade if your system just works; wait a little bit longer.
32bits apps are still supported in High Sierra.
Perhaps most annoying thing is not having new photo & video codecs used in last iOS. You can still get those files from iOS devices in old codec in order to work with them in your Mac, but I appreciate a better communication with my iPad Pro and my iPhone.
 
pat500000

pat500000

Suspended
Jun 3, 2015
8,523
7,515
555gallardo said:
Hello,

unlike past years, during which I've been always the first in line to upgrade to the newest macOS, this time I decided to wait a bit and it seemed like a good option. As you may recall, there's been a lot of news about High Sierra's security problems, as well as Office 365 performance problems at launch. It's been a couple of months now since the vanilla macOS 10.13 was released and the newest version, 10.13.2, was released in December.

I expect the macOS High Sierra now to be better than at launch, but is it good enough for me to upgrade from 10.12.6 Sierra? I'm using my MacBook Air for Safari, Photoshop, Office and Google SketchUp, but I have several other apps in use as well, unavailable on App Store. And, I need to make sure that my Mac will just work. Now, I know that iOS 11 did change its filesystem and disabled 32-bit support, making older apps incompatible. Did the same thing happen to High Sierra as well? I want to upgrade and be sure that all of my apps will continue to work.

Thanks!
Click to expand...
simple answer: no. It's not really stable as of yet.
 
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Nermal

Nermal

Moderator
Staff member
Dec 7, 2002
20,973
4,542
New Zealand
I would have to agree that it's not very stable. It seems that I need to force relaunch Finder every other day or else it'll say "the item cannot be found" when I try to click any icon. Add some of the other widely-documented problems here on MR and I'd suggest avoiding it if possible (I'm not running it on my primary machine, only my backup).
 
Martyimac

Martyimac

macrumors 68020
Aug 19, 2009
2,460
1,695
S. AZ.
I'm going to vote no unless there is something the OP must have that only HS offers. Among things that have been mentioned here on MR, I am going to add another.
HS installed my Epson 4 in 1 printer as an "Airprint" printer. Since that is what they call it on IOS I just assumed that it was one of those things showing iOS and MacOS getting closer. While the printer was always on the wifi network, after about 24-36 hours, MacOS would lose it. Go to print something and the printer que just kept "looking for the printer". My W10 machines would have no problem printing to it however. Also, Adobe Reader would show the same problem on my MAC. Sometimes just touching the power button to wake the printer was sufficient and things would print. But again, not consistently.
Epson has specific printer drivers on their website specifically for HS, I installed those drivers and so far, after 4 days, the printer is not getting lost. The Epson drivers installed a second printer in printer preferences also and I deleted the first printer that HS setup.

HS has changed things from the way they used to be and now it's trail and error to find out what  has changed.
 
Last edited:
S

sziehr

macrumors 6502a
Jun 11, 2009
775
953
I was just about to upgrade. I lost the functionality with my watch to unlock the screen. So yeah I wanted to upgrade. This is sounding like I should hold off.

The thing is even this installation has been unstable. I get random reboots from a sleep. This has been a thing since the 2016 MacBook Pro came into my life.
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
29,175
13,223
There just seem to be too many people having too many problems with High Sierra. It may go on to achieve the dubious distinction of being "the most problematic OS release" in Apple's [OS X] history.

Although I have no concrete evidence, I sense that the move to the APFS file system has something to do with this. The file system "underlies everything" -- it's there beneath the surface and has the potential to instigate all kinds of problems.

It's possible to install High Sierra WITHOUT APFS -- the installer can be "forced" to do an HFS+ install. HFS+ is a proven, reliable file system.

I've installed HS on an EXTERNAL SSD which I connect using a USB3 adapter/dongle. The drive is formatted to HFS+.
As such, HS actually seems pretty fast and as stable as any previous OS -- even though I use it "for test purposes only".

Nevertheless, I have no plans to move to it and make it my "main OS".
I'm still back at -- and very happy with -- El Capitan.
 
Last edited:
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fluamsler

fluamsler

macrumors member
Mar 5, 2016
96
32
near Basel, Switzerland
In my opinion: no.
My MacBook Pro (Retina 15" mid 2015 with 16GB RAM) freezes very often in sleep mode and reeving the vents at full speed (only solution is to force a restart by holding the power button or pressing CmdCtrlPwr. Resetting the SMC didn't help). While writing in Pages or Numbers I see beach balls every now and then. It is still too glitchy for working without worries. :(
I think I will disable automatic installation of macOS updates on my MacBook in the future and only install security updates until macOS 10.x.3 or 10.x.4
 
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joefoong79

macrumors regular
Jun 23, 2017
178
33
I think all this debate is useless. Why not OP just use the Time Machine back up before updating to HS. If, any problem then just reverse back using TM. The American spirit if you never try you"ll never know.
 
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MSastre

MSastre

macrumors 6502a
Aug 18, 2014
614
278
Fishrrman said:
There just seem to be too many people having too many problems with High Sierra. It may go on to achieve the dubious distinction of being "the most problematic OS release" in Apple's [OS X] history.

Although I have no concrete evidence, I sense that the move to the APFS file system has something to do with this. The file system "underlies everything" -- it's there beneath the surface and has the potential to instigate all kinds of problems.

It's possible to install High Sierra WITHOUT APFS -- the installer can be "forced" to do an HFS+ install. HFS+ is a proven, reliable file system.

I've installed HS on an EXTERNAL SSD which I connect using a USB3 adapter/dongle. The drive is formatted to HFS+.
As such, HS actually seems pretty fast and as stable as any previous OS -- even though I use it "for test purposes only".

Nevertheless, I have no plans to move to it and make it my "main OS".
I'm still back at -- and very happy with -- El Capitan.
Click to expand...

How do you "force" the installer do do an HFS+ install instead of APFS? Thanks in advance.
 
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