I have OS 10.6.8. I need to upgrade to Safari 6 or better. How can I do so?

You need to upgrade to OS X Mountain Lion, but I would recommend jumping to Mavericks for this. It comes with Safari 7.

Please tell us which iMac you have. The first intel iMacs are limited to 10.6.8 as they lack the Core 2 Duo processor needed for 10.7 or higher. Then there are some 10.7-capable Macs that have video hardware limitations and cannot run 10.8 or higher.

The easiest way to handle this is for you to look up your model Identifier and, from that, we can tell exactly which iMac variant you have and recommend an upgrade path.

From various Apple Tech articles:

To install Mavericks (10.9), you need one of these Macs:

• iMac (Mid-2007 or later)
• MacBook (13-inch Aluminum, Late 2008), (13-inch, Early 2009 or later)
• MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid-2009 or later),
• MacBook Pro (15-inch or 17-inch, Mid/Late 2007 or later)
• MacBook Air (Late 2008 or later)
• Mac mini (Early 2009 or later)
• Mac Pro (Early 2008 or later)
• Xserve (Early 2009)

Your Mac also needs:

• OS X Mountain Lion, Lion, or Snow Leopard v10.6.8 already installed
• 2 GB or more of memory
• 8 GB or more of available space

OS X Mountain Lion (10.8) - Technical Specifications

General Requirements

• OS X v10.6.8 or later
• 2GB of memory
• 8GB of available space
• Some features require an Apple ID; terms apply.
• Some features require a compatible Internet service provider; fees may apply.

Supported Models

• iMac (Mid 2007 or newer)
• MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer)
• MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer)
• Xserve (Early 2009)
• MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer)
• Mac mini (Early 2009 or newer)
• Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer)

OS X Lion (10.7) - Technical Specifications

General requirements

• Mac computer with an Intel Core 2 Duo, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7, or Xeon processor
• 2GB of memory
• OS X v10.6.6 or later (v10.6.8 recommended)
• 7GB of available space

To find your model identifier code, please do "About this Mac" from your Apple menu and, in the resulting window, click the "More Info" button to get this screen:

For your computer the code will be in the line above I've indicated with the red arrow. If you post that code, we can tell you how far yo ucan upgrade. Please DO NOT post any serial numbers for security reasons.

I have a MacBook model 4.1 (Core Duo 2.4GHZ, 2GB, 298GB HD avail) running Snow Leopard 10.6.8.

I too would like to run Safari 6.

I'd rather not upgrade the OS, to not burden the HW.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

oops 129GB HD available

Safari is limited to version 5 in Snow Leopard. To obtain version 6, you must upgrade to at least Lion.

If you upgrade, I recommend that you partition your hard drive or add an external drive and install the upgrade there and NOT OVER Snow Leopard.

Use the dual-boot method (System Preferences:Startup Disk) to boot into the upgraded OS X and use Safari there. If/when you must use Snow Leopard, dual-boot back into Snow Leopard.

Allan

Thanks for the info.

Bob

Hi Allan,

I have MacBook Pro 5.5 and Core 2 Duo 4 GB memory is it possible to upgrade to Maverick and run Safari 7? Will it affect the speed of the computer after the upgrade?

Susan Lau

Unless you previously downloaded Mavericks, it is no longer available in the App Store. If you did download it, go to the Purchases tab.

Your computer can run El Capitan. While it will run on 4 GB RAM, more is better.

One option is to create a new partition (~30- 50 GB), install the new OS, and ‘test drive’ it. If you like/don’t like it it, you can then remove the partition. Do a backup before you do anything. By doing this, if you don’t like it you won’t have to go though the revert process.

Check to make sure your applications are compatible.

Application Compatibility

Applications Compatibility (2)

El Capitan 10.11 Compatibility information

Open Disk Utility, select your hard drive (step 1), then the Partition tab (step 2), and select the partition. Using the /// at the bottom move it up (step 3) until the size box decrease by about 50 GB. Select the newly created space and hit the + button (step 4). Name it something and select Mac OS Extended (Journaled) as the format (step 5). Then hit the Apply button(step 6). Download the installer from the App Store and when it starts, point it at the new partition. You might want to make a copy of the installer outside the Applications folder to avoid having to re-download it in the future. Once installed, go to System Preferences/Startup Disk, select the new partition and reboot. Test away.

Doesn't it seem like the tail wagging the dog, to need to upgrade the operating system in order to upgrade the browser???

Garlynn wrote:

Doesn't it seem like the tail wagging the dog, to need to upgrade the operating system in order to upgrade the browser???

Yes!

The problem inherent in your question is that Safari is an Apple software product and they make the decision when their product requires an OS upgrade to continue with application upgrades.

If you get FireFox or Chrome, you can obtain upgrades independent of the operating system to a much larger extent.

Hi

Please can you tell me what I can upgrade to? My old Macbook details are as follows: -

Model Identifier: MacBook2,1

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2.16 GHz

Number Of Processors: 1

Total Number Of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 4 MB

Memory: 4 GB

Bus Speed: 667 MHz

Boot ROM Version: MB21.00A5.B07

SMC Version (system): 1.17f0

Serial Number (system):

Hardware UUID:

Sudden Motion Sensor:

State: Enabled

Many thanks!

Also...

Available: 53.96 GB

Cheers!

Lion. Link to purchase if desired.

Lion

Hi Eric,

I'd like to update my system as well. I have the following:

Model Name: iMac

Model Identifier: iMac8,1

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2.8 GHz

Number Of Processors: 1

Total Number Of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 6 MB

Memory: 2 GB

Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz

Boot ROM Version: IM81.00C1.B00

SMC Version (system): 1.30f1

Serial Number (system):

Hardware UUID:

137.4 GB available.

Thanks in advance for your help!

When Eric responds directly to your question, keep this advice in mind.

If you are running OS X 10.5 Leopard now, you must install OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard (Install DVD available from the Apple Store for $20) and then use Software Update to get to version 10.6.8 to access the App Store to upgrade beyond this version.

I then recommend that you maintain your Snow Leopard environment by then using Disk Utility to partition your hard drive and install the upgraded version of OS X in that new partition.

You can then use the "dual-boot" method (hold down the Option key during Startup) to select which flavor of OS X you boot into and run. As you experiment with the new version, you have Snow Leopard available to you, as well.