What have you done with an early Intel recently?

[TheShortTimer]

Office 2016 on my 2010 MBA regularly prompts me to update the software, except the updates require an OS upgrade and I'm quite happy with Catalina - besides, the hardware almost certainly wouldn't cope with the requirements of later releases.

I've become irritated with the banner prompting me to install unattainable updates and found this guide on how to permanently remove it.

Having located the folder containing the AutoUpdate program that phones home to Redmond, I deleted it from the computer.

After that, I reopened Word and the bothersome banner is no more.

Nice and easy. If you're also experiencing this annoyance, you can follow suit and get rid of it.

 

[eyoungren]

Reset PRAM today. We had a split second power failure on Tuesday night which left the DisplayLink monitors glitchy. Resetting PRAM took care of that fortunately.

 

[DCBassman]

Reset PRAM today. We had a split second power failure on Tuesday night which left the DisplayLink monitors glitchy. Resetting PRAM took care of that fortunately.

Talking of PRAM, whilst wallowing in the guts of the 21.5" iMac yesterday, I flipped out the PRAM battery to check its voltage. Still 2.9V, so put it back in, as I have no BR2032s anyhow.

 

[DCBassman]

Also talking of the iMac surgery yesterdday, I used the Y-splitter power cable trick to get around the old drive firmware and fans issue. Now, what is odd here is that this relies on pin 11 of the power port on the drive being grounded. If you buzz out the splitter (tried this on two different ones) pin 11 is not grounded, and it isn't on the drive. Yet once you connect the drive to the splitter, it's grounded. Not quite certain how that works...

 

[ToniCH]

Nice and easy. If you're also experiencing this annoyance, you can follow suit and get rid of it.

My wife has been complaining about this for couple of years, she uses the Office 365 and runs 2012 Mac Mini Server with Catalina. I recently googled it and found a similar solution for the 365. Now after maybe 2 months the notifications are still gone, she just couple of days ago mentioned that she has not seen any more update banners. Its really worth the few minutes to do to get rid of the annoyance 👍🏻

 

[ToniCH]

Reset PRAM today. We had a split second power failure on Tuesday night which left the DisplayLink monitors glitchy. Resetting PRAM took care of that fortunately.

Couple of days ago my 2012 MBA suddenly could no more log into any wifi-networks. Failure to connect every time but all networks are visible. Booted to Linux Mint and same thing. So, the problem spanned over 2 Os's. I was thinking hardware problem but decided to try the PRAM reset. And it worked to my surprise, now the wifi works again perfectly in both Os's.

 

[eyoungren]

Couple of days ago my 2012 MBA suddenly could no more log into any wifi-networks. Failure to connect every time but all networks are visible. Booted to Linux Mint and same thing. So, the problem spanned over 2 Os's. I was thinking hardware problem but decided to try the PRAM reset. And it worked to my surprise, now the wifi works again perfectly in both Os's.

Yeah, my problem was that both DisplayLink monitors were mirroring one of my other displays. I could change the background on them and then the moment I did something on a non different monitor it reflected as artifacts on the DL monitors.

I thought it was DisplayLink, but uninstalling DL and reinstalling it didn't change anything. Fortunately, the PRAM reset worked. I was going to try resetting USB ports if it hadn't.

 

[ToniCH]

Talking of PRAM, whilst wallowing in the guts of the 21.5" iMac yesterday, I flipped out the PRAM battery to check its voltage. Still 2.9V, so put it back in, as I have no BR2032s anyhow.

In some machines the access to the PRAM battery is so laborious I always try to replace them while I am in there if the battery age is unknown. So, I order few at the time so I always keep a small supply of BR2032s. iMacs especially can be difficult, cMPs are much easier.

 

[DCBassman]

The three styles of iMac I'll ever be going inside are all fairly easy. But I will get say four BR2032s, both for these and for a Swatch I have that takes 2032s.

 

[ToniCH]

The three styles of iMac I'll ever be going inside are all fairly easy. But I will get say four BR2032s, both for these and for a Swatch I have that takes 2032s.

I am happy you feel this is easy. I still think its laborious as the battery in 2009-2011 iMacs is on the backside of the motherboard. Lots of fragile cable connectors to unplug and replug and few screws too.

Note that BR2032s are for hot and more demanding environments like computers etc. CR2032 are for general use (watches, remotes, small appliances etc). So, check if the Swatch really needs the BR-type or does it use CR instead? CRs are easily available in pretty much every store, BRs are something you probably need to order.

 

[DCBassman]

I am happy you feel this is easy. I still think its laborious as the battery in 2009-2011 iMacs is on the backside of the motherboard. Lots of fragile cable connectors to unplug and replug and few screws too.

My error, I mis-remembered that! I'll replace it when it's dead, dead, dead, and not a minute earlier...

 

[DCBassman]

So, Early Intel Mac Fans, I might just dip a toe into Macbooks, and in particular, the Macbook Pro. Given that like everyone else on this thread, tinkering with it is a given, which model is the most easily upgradeable?

 

[ToniCH]

which model is the most easily upgradeable?

Mid 2012 MBP is your choice. 15" i7 are with 4 core processors, 13" i7 with 2 core. Would skip i5s.

Has USB3, upgradeable RAM (max 16GB), takes Sata SSD and has the DVD-drive. But, if needed you can delete the DVD and install another SSD. But IMO DVD is useful and you can always install a bigger SSD if needed. Easily replaceable batteries too.

Find one with silver screen bezel, they are the high res screens. I would skip Retinas.

To me the mid 2012 15" i7 2.7GHz is the ultimate machine. I do have one and also the 13" i7 2.9GHz but I prefer the 4-core machine. The 15" feels faster in many jobs.

Mac Release Dates 2012 - Macs By Year Introduced: EveryMac.com

Tech specs for all Apple Mac models released in 2012. Dates sold, processor type, memory info, storage details, configuration options, model numbers, and more.

everymac.com

PS. I also like the 2014 i7 MBP but one needs to buy one with max RAM (16GB) as it cannot be upgraded. Very fast Intel machines. Updating SSD is a bit more expensive as they are NVMe. Screens are always super high res Retinas but they are a bit more fragile than the non Retinas (not available in 2014). And replacement Retina-displays are not cheaply available, or new. Batteries are glued.

 

[GMShadow]

So, Early Intel Mac Fans, I might just dip a toe into Macbooks, and in particular, the Macbook Pro. Given that like everyone else on this thread, tinkering with it is a given, which model is the most easily upgradeable?

Depends on if you want "the fastest" or just want to know what's upgradable. If the fastest, take the above advice. If in general, I'll comment below.

The Unibodies are easier to crack open, though avoid the 2011 non-13" models unless you want to deal with dGPU failure. 2010s sometimes have issues with a capacitor, but it can be repaired.

Silver-bezel Pros are, depending on model, either a matte display or a hi-res matte display, and usually command a bit of a price premium as a result.

I went with an '09 17" matte display myself, as there was no 2012 17" and I wanted something effortlessly reliable, plus I can run Snow Leopard natively (it's dual booted to also run Mojave through OCLP).


Polycarbonate MacBooks can be fun - there's a lot of variance there in terms of upgrades and support. The 2010 Unibody Polycarbs are the ones you can push the furthest with upgrades, but they do lack FireWire, plus it's still a 1280x800 panel. I own one mostly because I actually used it as my sole Mac for about nine months (they were dirt cheap and still supported OS X.Current then).

 

[ToniCH]

Silver-bezel Pros are, depending on model, either a matte display or a hi-res matte display, and usually command a bit of a price premium as a result.

I have 2x 2011 15" silver bezels + 2012 15" silver bezel, they are all hi-res mattes (=antiglare). I didn't pay any premium over black bezels for them. Just waited until cheap ones appeared, took a month or two but rather spend that money into RAM and SSD. I think being more than decade old tech the current owners really do not know (or care) that they are anything special. They pretty much have zero interest to investigate their MBP when they know the price is still about the cost of tank of gasoline plus/minus something. And basic user knows very little compared to hobbyists.

BTW. the 20€ 2010 17" MBP I bought and fixed recently has the glossy display. IMO its not bad display either.

Ps. forgot to mention that the 2012 13" screen is quite low res. Not bad but compared to any high res screens there is a big difference.

 

[GMShadow]

I have 2x 2011 15" silver bezels + 2012 15" silver bezel, they are all hi-res mattes (=antiglare). I didn't pay any premium over black bezels for them. Just waited until cheap ones appeared, took a month or two but rather spend that money into RAM and SSD. I think being more than decade old tech the current owners really do not know (or care) that they are anything special. They pretty much have zero interest to investigate their MBP when they know the price is still about the cost of tank of gasoline plus/minus something. And basic user knows very little compared to hobbyists.

BTW. the 20€ 2010 17" MBP I bought and fixed recently has the glossy display. IMO its not bad display either.

Ps. forgot to mention that the 2012 13" screen is quite low res. Not bad but compared to any high res screens there is a big difference.

You can be patient, yes, but some sellers do mark them up a bit. It’s rarely hundreds or anything.

And yes, the 1280x800 panels on the bulk of the 13” line are not great. The 2010-2011 Airs are markedly better with 1440x900.

 

[0423MAC]

So, Early Intel Mac Fans, I might just dip a toe into Macbooks, and in particular, the Macbook Pro. Given that like everyone else on this thread, tinkering with it is a given, which model is the most easily upgradeable?

The 15” Mid 2012 unibody MBP with the high res display is beautiful and can be patched easily to handle Ventura well provided a fast SSD and 16GB RAM is installed. If you really want to go crazy also grab that subtle design AC Wifi upgrade…

I had a high-res glossy display which is getting increasingly difficult to find and let it go. Dumb decision…I miss it. The high-res anti glare is the best display for those models.

 

[DCBassman]

Thanks for your info on MacBooks, will look around once I've fully sorted out what I need to do with my over-abundance of desktops!
Writing this on the mid-2011 21.5" iMac, running a fully updated Ventura.

 

[eyoungren]

Tonight, for the first time ever I have been forced to save a Photoshop large document. File exceeds 2.2GB. Wow.

I guess that happens when you're working on a doc that's 21,000px by 5,000px at 150dpi.

EDIT: With the original and the backgrounds I was using, 4.4GB filecopy to the external drive.

 

[Heindijs]

I bought a Macbook Pro from late 2013 a few days ago. It's becoming easier to find 'mid-Intel' machines for little money compared to good working early Intel ones from my experience. But while it's technically not early Intel at all, it doesn't perform any better than some older higher end machines of course.

It's in remarkably good condition. No issues with the screen coating that I can see! Battery health is at 60% capacity, which is still pretty good after 10 years.

 

[ToniCH]

But while it's technically not early Intel at all

Well, the mid point in Intel era was mid 2014, so I think yours must be early. I divide the Intel era to early and late and thus to me mid 2014 MBP is the Schrödinger's Mac ie. it can be considered early and late at the same time. 🤪

But, nice MBP! I used to have an early 2013 15", i7 2.4GHz, 8GB RAM and it was a good machine. Only sold it off when I found a dirt cheap 2014 with 16GB RAM. Upgraded the 128GB SSD to 1TB NVMe and now its perfect. 😎

 

[Heindijs]

Well, the mid point in Intel era was mid 2014, so I think yours must be early. I divide the Intel era to early and late and thus to me mid 2014 MBP is the Schrödinger's Mac ie. it can be considered early and late at the same time. 🤪

I feel like the division keeps moving as the years go on

But, nice MBP! I used to have an early 2013 15", i7 2.4GHz, 8GB RAM and it was a good machine. Only sold it off when I found a dirt cheap 2014 with 16GB RAM. Upgraded the 128GB SSD to 1TB NVMe and now its perfect. 😎

I wish mine was a i7 with 16GB but the i5 is good enough and 8gb is plenty for what I now use it for.
I think I'm gonna go back to Monterey on it as Sonoma seems to be a bit too unstable still and I know for a fact that Monterey will run as well as Big Sur on these.

 

[ToniCH]

I wish mine was a i7 with 16GB but the i5 is good enough and 8gb is plenty for what I now use it for.

Yeah, of course choose the specs for your needs. I don't often need all that but I like to have all the resources available incase I do. Well, occasionally I do run virtual machines on it so it's really good to have max ram and most cpu cores possible.

 

[Heindijs]

Yeah, of course choose the specs for your needs. I don't often need all that but I like to have all the resources available incase I do. Well, occasionally I do run virtual machines on it so it's really good to have max ram and most cpu cores possible.

I do have to run VM's as well, but for that I just take my way more powerful modern Windows laptop with me. The problem is that that beast is just so damn heavy and with a 230w brick as well
So for regular office work this macbook is way better for me

 

[Heindijs]

I went 'back to school' a few weeks ago after years of just working and deciding it was time for me to study again. So today was the first time I took my 'new' 2013 Macbook with me and it was such a joy compared to my Windows laptop. I can actually use this one on my lap! And the Retina screen beats my pretty pathetic 1080p display on my normal laptop.
But I did have to install Monterey on it instead of Sonoma, for stability. It's running really well now

That's the joy of machines of this age, still great for daily use, yet incredibly cheap at 125 euros!