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UPGRADE FROM 10.4.11

HI, I have a 10.4.11 iMac 2 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo with 2GB and I wanted to upgrade it to a newer software. The truth is this computer was not used but I've started using it again and I want to upgrade it. I think I bought it in 2008/2009, not so sure.

So if you know if I can upgrade it, please tell me how.

Thanks.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.4.11)

Posted on May 3, 2016 11:08 AM

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Posted on May 3, 2016 11:14 AM

1. Clickhere, install the DVD, and run Software Update.

2. After #1, if desired, open the Mac App Store and try downloading El Capitan. If you get told that it's incompatible with your computer, go to the online Apple Store and order a download code for Lion 10.7.

Mac OS X 10.7 and newer don't support PowerPC software such as Microsoft Office 2004. If you upgrade the OS, back up the computer first, and if you upgrade past 10.6.8, the computer should have more than 2GB of RAM.

(142014)

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Question marked as Best reply

May 3, 2016 11:14 AM in response to valentinaneri

1. Clickhere, install the DVD, and run Software Update.

2. After #1, if desired, open the Mac App Store and try downloading El Capitan. If you get told that it's incompatible with your computer, go to the online Apple Store and order a download code for Lion 10.7.

Mac OS X 10.7 and newer don't support PowerPC software such as Microsoft Office 2004. If you upgrade the OS, back up the computer first, and if you upgrade past 10.6.8, the computer should have more than 2GB of RAM.

(142014)

May 3, 2016 11:26 AM in response to valentinaneri

To expand on Niel's post, you can check which applications are Power PC by clicking:

 > About This Mac > System Information > Software > Applications (May say something different. It's been a while since I've seen 10.4 🙂)


This will show a list of your applications and tell you if they are Intel or Power PC. Intel will work on Lion 10.7 but Power PC won't, or is not supported. Aside from Microsoft Office, older Adobe and Quicken products are among the top applications that no longer work. Quicken was an especially big problem when Lion came out because there was no way to revert Quicken files back to a usable format once Lion was installed.

May 4, 2016 8:33 AM in response to valentinaneri

If you upgrade, you would probably benefit by adding RAM. Suggest 4 GB minimum and more is better. The 2 places I’ve seen recommended most to buy reliable RAM are below. I have purchased RAM several times from Other World Computing and have always been very satisfied with the product and service. They have on-line instructions on how to replace the RAM. OWC has also tested RAM above what Apple states is the maximum. I now have 6GB installed on a early 2008 iMac supposedly limited to 4 GB and noticed an improvement.


Crucial


Other World Computing

May 8, 2016 8:13 AM in response to Pmintz25

Pmintz25 wrote:


This will show a list of your applications and tell you if they are Intel or Power PC. Intel will work on Lion 10.7 but Power PC won't, or is not supported. Aside from Microsoft Office, older Adobe and Quicken products are among the top applications that no longer work. Quicken was an especially big problem when Lion came out because there was no way to revert Quicken files back to a usable format once Lion was installed.

Your comments are gratuitous and largely incorrect.


Quicken 2007 "for Lion" v16.2.3, available from quicken.com Chat support for $15, works in Snow Leopard, Lion, Mt. Lion, Mavericks, Yosemite and El Capitan.

May 9, 2016 12:58 PM in response to MlchaelLAX

This was not the case for a good while after Lion was released. Not sure when v16.2.3 was released but I assure you it was a good while after Lion was released.


Also it requires the customer to pay $15 for software they already own, to access files they already own, without any added features. If the OP didn't know about Quicken's lack of compatibility, they would have been very upset to find their files unusable after installing Lion. At least now they are warned and know there is a fix.


My statements are not incorrect at all: "...when Lion came out, there was no way to revert Quicken files back to a usable format..." Is that false? Lion came out in 2011, and there was no way at that time to revert the files; they were unusable since Quicken was unusable. Power PC applications no longer work or are not supported since Apple removed support for Rosetta. The apps may continue to work, but there is no guarantee.


Thank you for informing us of a solution to the Quicken problem. I was unaware that option existed.

May 9, 2016 2:47 PM in response to Pmintz25

I appreciate that you are attempting to provide the OP with helpful information, but in this specific instance, your information is largely incorrect and misleading.


I suspect you are relating anecdotal information that you have heard or read, but that you do not have direct experience in the matter of using Quicken 2007. This comment appears to corroborate my conclusion, since this "solution" has been available for over 4 years:


Pmintz25 wrote:


Thank you for informing us of a solution to the Quicken problem. I was unaware that option existed...

On the other hand, I was a Quicken user for over a decade and stumbled into the "Lion - lack of Rosetta" problem directly when my iMac G5 died for the last time in August, 2011, and I purchased the Lion 2011 Mac Mini without doing my usual "due diligence" about the effects of Lion.


Pmintz25 wrote:


This was not the case for a good while after Lion was released. Not sure when v16.2.3 was released but I assure you it was a good while after Lion was released.

...


My statements are not incorrect at all: "...when Lion came out, there was no way to revert Quicken files back to a usable format..." Is that false? Lion came out in 2011, and there was no way at that time to revert the files; they were unusable since Quicken was unusable. Power PC applications no longer work or are not supported since Apple removed support for Rosetta. The apps may continue to work, but there is no guarantee.


Here is the exact history:


1) Lion was released by Apple on July 20, 2011; it was not a free upgrade, requiring the user to purchase it through the App Store in a Snow Leopard Mac, upgraded to at least OS X 10.6.6 through 10.6.8.


2) Although many distributors of PowerPC software anticipated the release of Lion with an "Intel" version ready to go, many other publishers, including Intuit, did not meet this date. Some publishers, the most notable of which was Adobe, which had purchased Freehand, never upgraded this program to this day. Since an alternative program that will open and edit Freehand products is still not available, users with large libraries of Freehand image files, continue to face the problem of using these files to this day.


3) "Early adopters" of Lion discovered, largely to their horror, that PowerPC applications would not work. Apple did a poor job of educating their user base of this problem. Since Rosetta was so miraculously transparent, most users had no idea that they were even running PowerPC apps.


4) To their credit, this forum and most others focusing on Mac problems and solutions, offered these OS X upgraders two solutions:


(a) Restore Snow Leopard and continue to use their PowerPC apps; or

(b) partition their internal hard drive or add an external hard drive and install Lion there and use the "dual-boot" method (System Preferences:Startup Disk or Option-Restart) to determine which flavor of OS X (Snow Leopard or Lion) they could boot into and run.


5) Then there was the matter of those purchasing "new" Macs that could only run Lion. This category breaks into two groups:


a) Those purchasers of new Macs such as myself who owned another Mac capable of running Snow Leopard: We split the usage between our two or more computers. I would run Quicken 2007 on my 2009 MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard while file sharing from my 2011 Mac Mini running Lion (and iCloud), until I found a more permanent solution.


b) Those purchasers of new Macs that did not have access to another Mac that could run Snow Leopard. These users broke into two groups:


i) Purchasers of the 2011 Mac Mini could use the research of newfoundglory on this forum to install a running version of Snow Leopard either as its primary OS or in another partition or on an external drive. This is one of the solutions I ultimate adopted as well.



ii) Purchasers of other 2011 Macs could use the research I assembled in late September 2011 on this forum (and ultimately moved to MacRumers to keep the first post current) to install Snow Leopard into Parallels and continue to run their PowerPC apps concurrently with Lion. This was the solution I adopted to stop having to use my 2009 MacBook Pro for PowerPC apps and the one I continue to recommend users of such orphaned PowerPC software as Freehand MX.


c) Intuit released "Quicken 2007 for Lion" (version 16.2.0) in February, 2012 for $15 with all subsequent upgrades for free to the current 16.2.3.


6) So the actual number of Quicken users who did not have any solution to their problem (purchasing a new Mac and not wanting to pay money for Parallels) was minimal by the time this Intel version of Quicken 2007 was released.


Let me address your other concerns:


Pmintz25 wrote:


Also it requires the customer to pay $15 for software they already own, to access files they already own, without any added features. If the OP didn't know about Quicken's lack of compatibility, they would have been very upset to find their files unusable after installing Lion. At least now they are warned and know there is a fix.


With all due respect, this is a debate that is outside the scope of this thread. That being said, you ignore the most important "added feature:" to be able to run Quicken 2007 in Lion on an Intel Mac! Most other upgrades of PowerPC software to Intel versions similarly cost an upgrade fee, in most cases much larger than $15!


Quicken 2007 for PPC and Quicken 2007 for Intel use the same exact structure for their data files. So there is complete interchangeability of using data files from one version to the other. There was never a case that users would ever "find their files [to be] unusable after installing Lion."


I believe you are confusing this to the common problem that all PowerPC users discover when they upgrade from Snow Leopard to this day on El Capitan, which is that the PowerPC apps themselves are not usable and they must obtain upgrades to the software to access their files (for example, Microsoft Office 2008 or 2011 as an upgrade for the PowerPC versions Office 2004 or Office X, which were hardly free).


The "warnings" you are suggesting is exactly what Niel, Eric and others do quite frequently on this forum, when someone requests information about upgrading from Snow Leopard.


Pmintz25 wrote:


Thank you for informing us of a solution to the Quicken problem. I was unaware that option existed.


I am glad to help educate you in an area that I have some expertise. That, after all, is what this forum is all about!

UPGRADE FROM 10.4.11

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