Q: Downgrade to yosemite from el capitan?
Hello,
Was just wondering how I could downgrade my os from el capitan to yosemite or another previous version? My macbook runs fairly slow compared with when it was running yosemite. Thing is, I don't have yosemite in my app store history as I purchased my macbook second hand. Therefore, I can't install yosemite that way. Is there any other way I could install a previous os? el capitan just isn't for me.
I've tried downloading files from 3rd party websites but they just don't work when I've tried to create a bootable USB from one.
Any help is hugely appreciated! Thanks.
MacBook Pro, OS X El Capitan (10.11.5)
Posted on Jul 11, 2016 4:39 AM
OS X El Capitan: Revert to a previous OS X version
You can get Yosemite by erasing the drive completely and reinstall OS X while booted into Internet Recovery. That will install the OS that shipped with that Mac.
However, you may run into problems restoring the email data store, and possibly iPhoto/Photos, iTunes, etc.
I don't know when each structure changed, so I'm not certain if you can just restore them from the backup.
The safe thing to do would be to export all of the data (messages, photos, and music) to an external drive. That way you could always import the raw files back into the Yosemite programs.
You would loose an tagging, keywords, photo albums, etc.
However, El Capitan is not likely the source of the slowness. It is more likely third-party "utilities" and other software.
Posted on Jul 11, 2016 4:46 AM