The infamous 2007 iMac on Catalina

[squarus]

Hello everybody, chiming in to say that I've done this exact upgrade on my own 20" Mid-2007 too. It works much better than I expected, anybody with a 2007 iMac should do this without a doubt.

 

[ScreenSavers]

Hello everybody, chiming in to say that I've done this exact upgrade on my own 20" Mid-2007 too. It works much better than I expected, anybody with a 2007 iMac should do this without a doubt.

Saw your post on Reddit. Great start. Now upgrade that RAM and throw in an SSD (If you haven't already) and you have a surprisingly modern machine there!

 

[Wacholderpolka]

Hi, I just upgraded my iMac 2007 and in general, Catalina works very well on this mashine.
The upgrade itself was quite easy, many steps to do, but easy.
I removed tons of dust from the cooles and the fans, so it is much more effective to cool down now.

The only problem i found is the photos app.
It shows all the thumbnails correctly but when i open one photo, it only shows rainbow colored pictures.
Seems lke the color table is completely wrong.

Is there any solution for this problem?

 

[Petri Krohn]

The only problem i found is the photos app.
It shows all the thumbnails correctly but when i open one photo, it only shows rainbow colored pictures.
Seems like the color table is completely wrong.

Is there any solution for this problem?

Yes, there is.

Download SwitchResX. (You do not need to pay for the license.)
Set the color depth from 10 bits to 8 bits.
Forget about SwitchResX. You do not need to restart it, unless you reinstall Catalina.

P.S. - Also see my posts:

• Continuity and Catalina on 2007 iMac 7,1
• BSEL mod? ...or just flash it to a 2008 iMac 8,1!

 

[Mac_Noob80]

It’s actually pretty simple! Upgrade the processor to an old T9300 Core 2 Duo (I had some laying around, quite difficult to get to of course,) put in an SSD while you’re in there, max out the RAM, and use Dosdude’s Catalina patcher. This took several tries and a bunch of messing around, but I finally realized it won’t work at all unless it’s APFS formatted. That means when I boot into the Snow Leopard partition I can’t access my Catalina files but who cares about that? Otherwise it’s very useable and the speed feels great for a Core 2 Duo!

I would love to know if this is still up and running? I was able to get an iMac mid 2007 for free and upgraded the CPU,RAM and put in a SSD but I'm having the hardest time updating it to Catalina using Dosdude's Catalina patcher. It just boot's to the screen with the circle with a line going through it and has the apple support link listed at the bottom.

 

[ScreenSavers]

I would love to know if this is still up and running? I was able to get an iMac mid 2007 for free and upgraded the CPU,RAM and put in a SSD but I'm having the hardest time updating it to Catalina using Dosdude's Catalina patcher. It just boot's to the screen with the circle with a line going through it and has the apple support link listed at the bottom.

What CPU did you upgrade to?

 

[Mac_Noob80]

What CPU did you upgrade to?

Sure did! I put in a T9300.

 

[edis]

I would love to know if this is still up and running? I was able to get an iMac mid 2007 for free and upgraded the CPU,RAM and put in a SSD but I'm having the hardest time updating it to Catalina using Dosdude's Catalina patcher. It just boot's to the screen with the circle with a line going through it and has the apple support link listed at the bottom.

Consider another media, occasionally I don't get it right upon first attempt. Next, you may want to check Mojave from Dosdude, I am typing this from my iMac 2007 on Mojave, I moved to for daily works and abuses. Don't know strictly why, but it's more fun, than M1 mini awaiting by my side, these are good beasts too, enjoyed it last Xmas.

 

[edis]

I have a late 2006 iMac too- the LCD is full of lines. I’m surprised yours isn’t... I also have a Core Duo iMac but that would be an early ‘06.

This is very typical for late 2006, and I have been involved into kicking Apple to recognize manufacture fault - got mine covered after warranty expired, doubt this could be still applicable. It took two repair cycles, to set it properly, seems like issue with contacts to LCD panel, this was exchanged. Unfortunately, 2006 is barely usable with its Snow Leopard, unless I buy upgrade to Lion from Apple for the last bit of juice. Loved my trusty 2006 iMac for many years. Non glare monitor alone is twist of proper care. Typing this on glaring iMac 2007 with Mojave, fine if nothing to reflect happens.

 

[speli]

Hey guys i did the T9500 transplant and started the patched catalina install as i did many times before with dosdude1’s patches. And it went south. It got stuck after the windowed install phase then i rebooted and it seemingly did the rest but since then it doesnt booth, its stuck on the last part of the line under the apple. If i look at the startup disk it says its 10.15.7 but i cant get it to start up. Heres a post about my issue. https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/s/3YcODuQUOa

Any ideas what could have gone wrong?