Catalina

[pacificm]

Hello,

I'm using Vienna Ensemble Pro 7.0.904 on a master and two slaves - all Macs with Mac OS Mojave 10.14.5, DP 9.52 and a slew of plugins.

My question is if it is safe to upgrade to Mac OSX Catalina now, or are there conflicts still unresolved? Is it best to wait?

Please advise.

Thanks!

[cuttime]

There's quite a few threads here about this. Upgrade at your own peril.

[mikehalloran]

and a slew of plugins.

Wait.

My iLok authorized plugs appear to work. Many others don't because their license managers are still incompatible — without that being fixed, it doesn't matter if the plugs or VIs would work otherwise.

Yes, IK, talkin' 'bout You! There are many others.

I've no idea about VEP.

Otherwise, DP 10.01 works on my MBP over Catalina. I don't care about 9.52 anymore. My work machine is an iMac Pro — lots of $$$ to be spent on non-music app upgrades before that machine is upgraded.

[HCMarkus]

Wait.

+1

[Michael Canavan]

Go to About this Mac, System Report, under Software select Applications. After the window populates, select the 64-Bit item header, clicking on it will sort your No or Yes answers. All the "No" answers are applications that will not run on Catalina.

I haven't updated to VEP 7, and VEP 6 is not 64 bit for instance.


Plus as people have mentioned there are plenty of audio and MIDI drivers that are not 64 bit yet.

[Prime Mover]

Think I'm going to either SKIP this upgrade and wait for "Snow Catalina", or at least wait for you guys to be guinea pigs for a VERY LONG TIME. I've got three machines doing professional audio (both live and studio), video, and 3D graphics, and I ain't upgrading until I KNOW all three industries are giving me big dumb thumbs up.

Honestly... I still miss Snow Leopard.

[mikehalloran]

Think I'm going to either SKIP this upgrade and wait for "Snow Catalina", or at least wait for you guys to be guinea pigs for a VERY LONG TIME. I've got three machines doing professional audio (both live and studio), video, and 3D graphics, and I ain't upgrading until I KNOW all three industries are giving me big dumb thumbs up.

Honestly... I still miss Snow Leopard.

Since the issue is all of those 32bit apps and license managers that haven’t been upgraded yet, waiting for the next OS version isn’t going to change that.

I do agree that you need to wait till your apps are ready but Catalina is good to go right now. This is no different than moving from OS 9 to OS X all those years ago.

With Mojave receiving security updates for another couple of years, High Sierra getting them for one more, and no app that absolutely requires Catalina yet, no one needs to do it now. At some point, OS 10.15 or later will be required for something such as the next Mac Pro and then the choices need to be made.

I do a lot of scanning and document editing. I most definitely do Not miss Snow leopard — the functionality that was broken in OS 10.5 wasn’t restored till 10.8.2 and then it was better.

I still wonder why Apple broke AppleWorks and never released an app that could open the Draw and Paint programs that, in one form of another, went all the way back to the original Macintosh. The main reason I still keep a G4 running is to open up album and cassette covers I created 33–10 years ago — that I make a little money doing fie conversion for others is a nice side benefit but not the reason I set up the rig in the first place. The open-source freeware, Libre Office can open the word processing and database functions in the discontinued Apple apps going back to MacWrite as well as much other abandoned-ware but can’t do the graphics apps. I’ve found a great, inexpensive substitute in Swift Publisher @ $19.95 (even prints to CD blanks!) but it doesn’t open ClarisDraw or graphics files from AppleWorks dammit.

Liking Catalina a lot but I’m just playing with it on my laptop. To many of my apps aren’t ready to put it onto my desktop. There are five that will require paid upgrades and only two of them are ready (hearing “Promses, Promises” from the developers) — that’s going to require I spend over a $grand but I’d be upgrading those anyway. Acrobat Pro @ $457 — ouch! unless I use my wife’s EDU discount or they offer a religious discount to church musicians.

[wvandyck]

Honestly... I still miss Snow Leopard.

When I was transitioning from SL, I had five clones of that system, just in case. Such was it's value to me. I'm now down to two that do get occasional use throughout the year.

But yeah, there's no reason to update to Catalina. Nothing to be gained, and much to lose until 3rd party developers catch up.

[bayswater]

I miss SL too. I have a Mini that can't go past 10.6, and it's the only Mac I have I can leave running for months without a restart. Since High Sierra, I can't even rely on the Finder to keep going long term.

I see the update to Catalina released today fixes problems reported by many on Apple communities, including one that bricks your Mac if there is not enough storage to complete the installation, rather than simply telling you this and aborting the update. It also fixed problems that make it impossible to log in to your Apple account. These are basics that should not have even made it beta testing. What's happened to QC at Apple?

A conversation with an Apple employee suggested that the focus is on enabling the capabilities of new hardware with very little concern for compatibility with older hardware. if that's the case, probably best to just stay with the OSX version that is one update past the version it came with. But even then, update when it gets close to the final .x release.

On security, we're closing in on the day our Macs will be totally unassailable, but only because we can't do anything on them. Reminds me of the cartoon where someone has their printer feeding directly into the shredder to ensure document security and save time.

[HCMarkus]

On security, we're closing in on the day our Macs will be totally unassailable, but only because we can't do anything on them. Reminds me of the cartoon where someone has their printer feeding directly into the shredder to ensure document security and save time.

[cuttime]

From Melda:
https://www.meldaproduction.com/text-tu ... to-windows

[James Steele]

From Melda:
https://www.meldaproduction.com/text-tu ... to-windows

Interesting. I got that email too. Seems like Melda's take on it is to start pushing moving over to Windows. Of course with the cost of Macs continuing to be high and that new Mac Pro out of reach for my budget, I may be heading that way. I have a laptop with Windows 10 on it and although it doesn't match the MacOS for elegance, I could survive. Especially since there is a Windows version of DP.

[Michael Canavan]

From Melda:
https://www.meldaproduction.com/text-tu ... to-windows

Interesting. I got that email too. Seems like Melda's take on it is to start pushing moving over to Windows. Of course with the cost of Macs continuing to be high and that new Mac Pro out of reach for my budget, I may be heading that way. I have a laptop with Windows 10 on it and although it doesn't match the MacOS for elegance, I could survive. Especially since there is a Windows version of DP.

Honestly, I've never owned any Melda plug ins because the developer has been anti apple forever.

He was all over KVR a couple years ago talking about how macs had worse performance because the OS was bad, Urs from U-He was trying to help him stating flatly that he wasn't doing it right etc. that it's not at all hard to get the same performance out of either OS, and this chump ignored him.


In terms of Apple computers, this years model of Macbook Pros are ridiculously powerful, even my old 2012 is still going strong. I don't get it really, in terms of processing power, input output from the latest Thunderbolt USB etc. it's all way more powerful in the mac mini than what was available 5-6 years ago. Everyone being upset about the lack of expandability in the apple product line seems to be forgetting that the new computers are using external busses as fast or faster than our old Mac pros internal busses.
He's had the same agenda for years, and it's not at all objective.

[bayswater]

In terms of Apple computers, this years model of Macbook Pros are ridiculously powerful, even my old 2012 is still going strong. I don't get it really, in terms of processing power, input output from the latest Thunderbolt USB etc. it's all way more powerful in the mac mini than what was available 5-6 years ago.

I agree with that, and I bought the new Mac mini after considering moving the windows. I didn't because, despite the claim in the Melda site, it is not cheap to move to Windows. There's a few hundred savings on hardware using direct comparisons, but that is eaten up quickly by buying the OS, virus protections, and replacements for some OS X only stuff. Then there's the downtime while all this is configured. And, if you really want windows, as Dvorak himself said, a mac can be the best computer to run Windows 10.

Nevertheless, the Melda argument would be easier to refute if we didn't have the endless merry-go-round of updates, much of which fix errors that should not have made it out of development, and do little or nothing to improve anything, devices that nag you endlessly to apply these updates, not to mention a ruthless policy of premature abandonment.

[mikehalloran]

I have some Melda — haven't used it in years; won't miss it.

I wouldn't go back to Windows if someone gave me a PC. In fact, the one I have is a work laptop that the company doesn't want back. I worked a support desk for (NDA) years supporting Windows applications in addition to the 23 years I worked in Win environments so it's not that I'm unfamiliar.

Nevertheless, the Melda argument would be easier to refute if we didn't have the endless merry-go-round of updates, much of which fix errors that should not have made it out of development, and do little or nothing to improve anything, devices that nag you endlessly to apply these updates, not to mention a ruthless policy of premature abandonment.

Reading the daily CNet reports on all the issues that users are having with Win10 and the auto-updates ... This has been going on over three years! Yea, I really want to switch to that.