Ok this might be a weird question but I am planning to downgrade my Macbook Air from Big Sur to High Sierra but I am worried that if you downgrade all my stuff will be deleted including the photos which I am more worried about because since if you delete a photo form your mac it deletes it from your iPhone too. Will downgrading/hard reset your mac delete all photos from iPhone and iCloud. Thanks.
MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.7
Technically, downgrading from macOS 11 Big Sur to macOS 10.13 High Sierra will require Wiping the Entire Drive of everything including the Recovery Volume ( Not a Partition in Big Sur and above )
Then there is the compatibly of photos when using Big Sur.
The newer versions of macOS like Big Sur may have changed the photo file format to HEIC versus the older file format in High Sierra
Would suggest, while still in Big Sur, to Export ALL the photos to an external drive in a known general file format like jpg
This way when High Sierra is installed - the files would still be available to re-import back into the Older Version of the native Photo Application.
Technically, downgrading from macOS 11 Big Sur to macOS 10.13 High Sierra will require Wiping the Entire Drive of everything including the Recovery Volume ( Not a Partition in Big Sur and above )
Then there is the compatibly of photos when using Big Sur.
The newer versions of macOS like Big Sur may have changed the photo file format to HEIC versus the older file format in High Sierra
Would suggest, while still in Big Sur, to Export ALL the photos to an external drive in a known general file format like jpg
This way when High Sierra is installed - the files would still be available to re-import back into the Older Version of the native Photo Application.
Follow on.
Why the need to downgrade to an unsupported version that not longer gets Security Updates
Perhaps if the User would explain, we can help work through the existing issues before wiping the drive ?
Will Downgrading MacBook Delete Photos From My Mac and IPhone?
