Brian E.

Q: Does anyone have any positive feedback after upgrading to Mavericks?

I have a couple of computers that I bought in February 2012 (iMac, MacBook Pro) running OS 10.7.5, and I'd like to upgrade to Mavericks, but the forum shows all negative experiences with the upgrade, so I'm wondering whether I should wait to install.  Thanks all.

Take care,

Brian

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.5), 16GB RAM

Posted on Nov 5, 2013 7:58 PM

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Q: Does anyone have any positive feedback after upgrading to Mavericks?

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  • by John Galt,Helpful

    John Galt John Galt Nov 5, 2013 8:25 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 9 (50,303 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 5, 2013 8:25 PM in response to Brian E.

    Millions have upgraded with no problems at all. They have nothing to complain about, so they will not be represented on this site in great numbers. People come here to solve problems, or to help others solve theirs. Some may report their experience by posting reviews on the App Store, which speak for themselves:

     

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    FWIW all my Macs, iMacs, Macbook Pros, Macbook Airs upgraded completely seamlessly. I have used every OS X version since the first public beta over a decade ago, and this upgrade has been the most trouble-free of any, by far. In the past there may have been performance tradeoffs, but this upgrade is the first in Apple's history that actually makes older or more resource-limited Macs perform better due to improvements in memory, power, and other resource management.

     

    Back up your Mac anyway, as a precaution against the unexpected. Uninstall any and all third party "anti-virus", "cleanup", "speedup", "optimization", "security" or similarly categorized junk from your system first. By doing so you will avoid the vast majority of problems that people have encountered with Mavericks, as well as every other OS X upgrade there has ever been.

     

    Check with the companies that developed whatever important software you're using for Mavericks compatibility, and do the same for any hardware modifications you may have performed, particularly solid state drives and aftermarket memory, and you will have ruled out 99% of the potential for unexpected problems to occur. In rare cases such an extensive upgrade may accelerate incipient hardware failures that would have occurred with or without an upgrade, but that is no reason to avoid it. Mavericks is like getting a brand new Mac, for free.

     

    But it cannot be repeated often enough: back up your Mac first. You should be doing that whether you choose to upgrade or not, and it is the only practicable way to "undo" an upgrade should you want to.


  • by rgilbert,Helpful

    rgilbert rgilbert Nov 5, 2013 8:19 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 1 (85 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 8:19 PM in response to Brian E.

    Like John Galt, I have multiple Macs with Mavericks loaded with no issues. Even my 2007 iMac is running fine with only 6 GB of memory.  Follow the normal upgrade instructions before upgrading.  Also ask yourself "Do I need to upgrade?"  "What do I get by upgrading?"  Above all be prudent and do your homework before upgrading.

  • by MichelPM,

    MichelPM MichelPM Nov 5, 2013 8:39 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 6 (14,211 points)
    iPad
    Nov 5, 2013 8:39 PM in response to Brian E.

    Before upgrading, remove/completely uninstall any anti-virus apps, using the developer's instructions, that you may have on your Mac.

    Completely uninstall any and all "crapware" like MacKeeper or CleanMyMac or any other type of "crapware". like hard drive or memory "cleaning" apps.

    Make sure your Mac has more than 15 GBs or greater of free space on the hard drive.

    Make sure your Mac has more than the minimum recomended amount of RAM.

    4 GBs of RAM is considered a working minimum of RAM. It would be better to install more RAM than this to insure smooth operation of your Mac after the upgrade.

    If your Mac can take at least 6 GBs or 8 GBs of RAM, install these amounts.

    Correct and reliable Mac RAM can be purchased from online Mac RAM sources Crucial memory or OWC (macsales.com).

     

    Good Luck!

  • by Brian E.,

    Brian E. Brian E. Nov 5, 2013 9:10 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 1 (35 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 9:10 PM in response to Brian E.

    And apparently I'm not familiar with using these "communities."

    I tried to respond personally to the first three folks who replied, and it just ended up posting the replies in my thread.

     

    My apologies--I don't use these forums that often, although they can be helpful at times, and I do like being able to help folks that have issues, if I can.

    I think it's funny that the computer software & hardware industries use their customers to answer questions from other customers--I can't imagine my car mechanic or doctor using the same approach.

     

    Take care,

    Brian

  • by Brian E.,

    Brian E. Brian E. Nov 5, 2013 9:02 PM in response to John Galt
    Level 1 (35 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 9:02 PM in response to John Galt

    Thank you Michel, John, & rgilbert,

    I'm neither a technophobe nor technophile--I fall somewhere in between, so I usually wait to upgrade any software until it's been out for a bit, same goes with purchasing hardware.

    I work as a photographer, so I have to be able to get around a computer somewhat, and I've never had anything but Macs, which has been since 1992..

     

    Michel, I had 16GB of RAM installed in both my iMac & MB Pro when I bought them, so I'm sitting pretty good for RAM, and I do most of my hardware business with an Apple specialist here in Madison or OWC.

    And John, I automatically backup before any major installation, so no worries there.

     

    I have no "crapware," no anti-virus--the only software that would maybe fall under this heading would be TechToolPro, and I don't think that counts.

     

    And of course I know that in most cases folks don't say anything unless they're having a problem, but I always try to say something positive if I can with subjects like this.

    I've never had an issue with any upgrades, with the exception of the iOS 7 for iPhone, and 7.0.3 pretty much cleared most of that up.

     

    Two reasons I'm looking at doing it sooner than later: I read an article by another shooter that talked about the improvements in Mavericks for photographers, and I'd like to get familiar with it before I hit the road for a major job in two weeks.

     

    Again, I want to thank you all for your help & time--I really appreciate it.

     

    Take care,

    Brian

  • by Brian E.,

    Brian E. Brian E. Nov 5, 2013 9:02 PM in response to rgilbert
    Level 1 (35 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 9:02 PM in response to rgilbert

    Thank you Michel, John, & rgilbert,

    I'm neither a technophobe nor technophile--I fall somewhere in between, so I usually wait to upgrade any software until it's been out for a bit, same goes with purchasing hardware.

    I work as a photographer, so I have to be able to get around a computer somewhat, and I've never had anything but Macs, which has been since 1992..

     

    Michel, I had 16GB of RAM installed in both my iMac & MB Pro when I bought them, so I'm sitting pretty good for RAM, and I do most of my hardware business with an Apple specialist here in Madison or OWC.

    And John, I automatically backup before any major installation, so no worries there.

     

    I have no "crapware," no anti-virus--the only software that would maybe fall under this heading would be TechToolPro, and I don't think that counts.

     

    And of course I know that in most cases folks don't say anything unless they're having a problem, but I always try to say something positive if I can with subjects like this.

    I've never had an issue with any upgrades, with the exception of the iOS 7 for iPhone, and 7.0.3 pretty much cleared most of that up.

     

    Two reasons I'm looking at doing it sooner than later: I read an article by another shooter that talked about the improvements in Mavericks for photographers, and I'd like to get familiar with it before I hit the road for a major job in two weeks.

     

    Again, I want to thank you all for your help & time--I really appreciate it.

     

    Take care,

    Brian

  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Nov 5, 2013 10:16 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 9 (50,303 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 5, 2013 10:16 PM in response to Brian E.

    Definitely uninstall TechTool Pro and ensure all its remnants are permanently eradicated from your Mac before upgrading. It's not only 100% worthless, it is suspected to have caused problems for some. It can do nothing beneficial.

     

    An example is the following: http://www.micromat.com/support-45/knowledgebase/ttp7kb/techtool-pro-has-found-b ad-blocks-what-do-i-do

     

    Solution: erase the volume, if it happens again replace the drive. Really?

     

    TTP and similar utilities may be used to "repair" a damaged HD for the purposes of extracting whatever data remains intact, after an irretrievable data loss event has already occurred. Such "repairs" are usually temporary and are likely to recur, whether you use TTP or Apple's Disk Utility. You already have a backup strategy, therefore you don't need TTP or anything like it. Get rid of it before upgrading, and you will eliminate the potential for it to cause trouble.

  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Nov 5, 2013 10:13 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 9 (50,303 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 5, 2013 10:13 PM in response to Brian E.

    No worries - it's more important for you to receive cogent responses to your questions.

     

    Brian E. wrote:

     

    --I can't imagine my car mechanic or doctor using the same approach.

     

    Give it time.

  • by MichelPM,

    MichelPM MichelPM Nov 5, 2013 10:18 PM in response to John Galt
    Level 6 (14,211 points)
    iPad
    Nov 5, 2013 10:18 PM in response to John Galt

    John,

    I already asked this in another post! but will ask here! too!

    What is everyone's issue with TechTool Pro!!!

    I have been using this application along with Alsoft's Disk Warrior for as long as I have been using Macs.

    Almost 20 years, now.

    TechTool Pro has never, EVER presented an issue for me on any version of OS X.

    What gives????

  • by Mikes-mac,

    Mikes-mac Mikes-mac Nov 5, 2013 10:37 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 10:37 PM in response to Brian E.

    Do not install it! Kills or slows down externel HDD, WiFi is almost dad, Finder too,.... Better wait for the bug fixes....

  • by Topher Kessler,

    Topher Kessler Topher Kessler Nov 5, 2013 10:47 PM in response to MichelPM
    Level 6 (9,866 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 10:47 PM in response to MichelPM

    There is a general abhorrence to maintenance, security, and some system monitoring utilities here, with some in particular that have gained a poor reputation; however, despite this, some of the abhorrence is a bit of blind adherence to what others in the Mac communities have claimed. This isnt to say they are baseless, but often in my experiences I've found that utilities folks warn against have not had the ill effects that are claimed to follow them. Overall its just a judgement call.

     

    IMO, there is nothing wrong with TechTool Pro.

  • by Omer Bugra,

    Omer Bugra Omer Bugra Nov 5, 2013 10:49 PM in response to Brian E.
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 10:49 PM in response to Brian E.

    I installed Mavericks both to my and my wife's 13 inch MBP Mid-2012. Before we were running Mountain Lion without any problem, and now we are running Maveriks without any problem. But there is something important I should mention:

     

    While making such important upgrades, I always make clean installations. This was always the case even when I was using Windows in those dark years, before buying this Mac. Therefore I created a Mavericks boot up drive following the steps other users wrote on forums on web. I cleaned the Macintosh HDD with erasing it and then installed. I had many problems after that installation. MBP sometimes freezed, the touchpad did not respond correctly and fastly as it does right now and the partition in the Mac HDD which runs Find My Mac was gone. Therefore I created a Mountain Lion boot up drive, installed Mountain Lion with a clean install, erasing the hard drive again. Mountain Lion installation brought back the Find My Mac option. Then I downloaded and installed Mavericks as in simple upgrade mode without a clean install. Becauase the Mountain Lion installation was already clean. I did the same thing to my wife's MBP and we are happy now. Battery life, especially, is almost a solid hour longer than before.

     

    I recommend you to make a clean installation of the Mountain Lion using internet recovery or using the installer, if you already bought it. Then install Mavericks in upgrade mode..

     

    Good luck..

     

    Bugra

  • by MichelPM,

    MichelPM MichelPM Nov 5, 2013 10:50 PM in response to Mikes-mac
    Level 6 (14,211 points)
    iPad
    Nov 5, 2013 10:50 PM in response to Mikes-mac

    If your Mac has a lot of "crapware", not enough installed RAM or not enough free hard drive space, then installing OS X Mavericks is going to be problematic.

    The only external HDDs that have been affected by the installation of OS X Mavericks are those made by Western Digital.

    No other HDD manufacturers have been reported as issues with OS X Mavericks.

  • by Topher Kessler,

    Topher Kessler Topher Kessler Nov 5, 2013 10:53 PM in response to MichelPM
    Level 6 (9,866 points)
    Nov 5, 2013 10:53 PM in response to MichelPM

    There have been some by LaCie as well, but all seem to have been running the included drive manager software that is largely not needed, but clearly is being seen as required by folks in order to use the drives. Its incompatibilities with this software that has caused problems in Mavericks.

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