4 ms·

The worrying part is that in order to keep using the good MacBooks from the past, you need to keep them on the OS version that they shipped with. I have a 2012

The worrying part is that in order to keep using the good MacBooks from the past, you need to keep them on the OS version that they shipped with. I have a 2012 MacBook Air that was crazy fast, weighed four grams, and even ran windows 7. Sure, the drive was small, but it was perfect. But some time in 2015 or so I made the terrible strategic blunder of upgrading to the latest OS version. Performance immediately dropped to zero, and now when I open it up for any reason, I just spend my whole time watching it spin uselessly trying to idle along with one browser tab open. It's sad to see it so reduced. I've had the same experience with every iPad I've ever owned. Delightful, responsive machines that get auto-updated to brick status over the course of about three years. (I have every model up to air 3, and the only one still working perfectly is the old 1st gen air that I've kept on iOS 8 and spend a minute every day carefully dismissing the auto update prompt). I have one of the sacred 2015 MacBook Pros, which now can't edit videos using the new format exported from my wife's iPhone x. An OS upgrade would solve that. But the machine is too precious to risk it. I don't know what the solution is.

bitL 7y ago
Upgrade your drive with a dedicated mSATA adaptor (you can still get Samsung 1TB mSATA drives). That could boost your performance.
- kyboren 7y ago
  Actually, you can still get 2TB Samsung mSATA drives. The Samsung T5 and T3 external drives are just enclosures around mSATA parts.
jordanthoms 7y ago
I have seen that with my Late 2013 MBP (dgpu) as well - for some reason on High Sierra and Mojave the performance is significantly worse than Sierra (seems to be related to WindowServer process leaking memory). Haven't seen any issues with the latest OSX for the 2015 MBPs though, and unlike with iOS you can easily downgrade to an older OS if you do see issues.
nathana 7y ago
At least with the MacBooks, you do have the option to downgrade back to a previous version of the OS, if you find the performance of the new one not up to par. So why not go back to the version of the OS on your Air that you were once happy with? For the record, I have the same rMBP 2012 model that the person you're replying to talked about, and it still runs great. But I'm typing this reply to you on a MacBook Air from 2010, running macOS 10.12 Sierra, in Chrome. Still works surprisingly well...
graeme 7y ago
Things have reversed with the ipads. Ios 12 is faster than 11, and maybe even faster than 10. And early reports indicate that 13 is faster than 12. Well worth updating on your machines that support them. Dunno if the same focus has extended to new macos's, am not on the newest one.
tim333 7y ago
One interesting thing with the Airs is if you format the SSD or install a new one, slightly to my surprise the thing boots up and say 'OS missing would you like to download it' and it then downloads and installs the original OS the machine came with when new. At least that's what happened to me, 2014 model I think. By the way I use a 2013 with High Sierra and it's not that bad - sometimes they are slow at first while they index everything and then speed up again when done. I get more beach balls than before upgrading but some other stuff works better, especially charging the iphone which used to drive me nuts with the old os.
Balgair 7y ago
For other HNers, Apple intentionally slows down their older versions via updates. They've been fined for this in a variety of countries and courts in the last few years. From Oct 2018: https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-and-samsung-fined-for-slowing-down-phones-with-updates/ https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-and-samsung-fined-for-slowin... It's straightforward to find other sources and examples. Generally, you are correct, try to avoid updates after the first few months of purchase.
wasdfff 7y ago
For that air you need to upgrade the hardware to modern specs. My 2012 mbp shipped with 4gb ram and currently flies on mojave as if it was shipped with it, because I replaced the hdd with an ssd and gave it 16gb of ram. The processor in this computer isn’t all that far off from the one in the brand new air, 7 years later.

bitL 7y ago

Upgrade your drive with a dedicated mSATA adaptor (you can still get Samsung 1TB mSATA drives). That could boost your performance.

kyboren 7y ago
Actually, you can still get 2TB Samsung mSATA drives. The Samsung T5 and T3 external drives are just enclosures around mSATA parts.

jordanthoms 7y ago

I have seen that with my Late 2013 MBP (dgpu) as well - for some reason on High Sierra and Mojave the performance is significantly worse than Sierra (seems to be related to WindowServer process leaking memory). Haven't seen any issues with the latest OSX for the 2015 MBPs though, and unlike with iOS you can easily downgrade to an older OS if you do see issues.

nathana 7y ago

At least with the MacBooks, you do have the option to downgrade back to a previous version of the OS, if you find the performance of the new one not up to par. So why not go back to the version of the OS on your Air that you were once happy with? For the record, I have the same rMBP 2012 model that the person you're replying to talked about, and it still runs great. But I'm typing this reply to you on a MacBook Air from 2010, running macOS 10.12 Sierra, in Chrome. Still works surprisingly well...

graeme 7y ago

Things have reversed with the ipads. Ios 12 is faster than 11, and maybe even faster than 10. And early reports indicate that 13 is faster than 12. Well worth updating on your machines that support them. Dunno if the same focus has extended to new macos's, am not on the newest one.

tim333 7y ago

One interesting thing with the Airs is if you format the SSD or install a new one, slightly to my surprise the thing boots up and say 'OS missing would you like to download it' and it then downloads and installs the original OS the machine came with when new. At least that's what happened to me, 2014 model I think. By the way I use a 2013 with High Sierra and it's not that bad - sometimes they are slow at first while they index everything and then speed up again when done. I get more beach balls than before upgrading but some other stuff works better, especially charging the iphone which used to drive me nuts with the old os.

Balgair 7y ago

For other HNers, Apple intentionally slows down their older versions via updates. They've been fined for this in a variety of countries and courts in the last few years. From Oct 2018: https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-and-samsung-fined-for-slowing-down-phones-with-updates/ https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-and-samsung-fined-for-slowin... It's straightforward to find other sources and examples. Generally, you are correct, try to avoid updates after the first few months of purchase.

wasdfff 7y ago

For that air you need to upgrade the hardware to modern specs. My 2012 mbp shipped with 4gb ram and currently flies on mojave as if it was shipped with it, because I replaced the hdd with an ssd and gave it 16gb of ram. The processor in this computer isn’t all that far off from the one in the brand new air, 7 years later.