maverick vs yosemite vs sierra for Mid 2012 macbook pro 13

Hi Babowa. I have a 2012 MBP and want to try Sierra. (I'm still on Yosemite.) (8GB ssd)

I thought your advice to set up a system on a partition as a test drive was a great idea. But I have NO CLUE as to how to make that happen. Can you give me a hint as to where to look for instructions.

Great idea.... I'm just a bit much of a rookie to execute.

Thanks.

In order to do that, you will need to either create a partition on your internal drive or get an external hard drive. If it's external, make sure you format it Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and GUID Partition Scheme so it's bootable (you do that in Disk Utility in Applications > Utilities.

After you create your partition, you can either download Sierra and simply direct the installer to install it on that drive (rather than your regular hard drive) or, if you want an exact copy of your system to install the upgrade on, then you can use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to clone your current system to the new partition or external drive. Once you have the clone done, boot into it and download/install the upgrade. That way, you'll have exactly what you'd have on your regular drive. You can boot into it and try it and you can boot back into your regular system any time.

You can find instructions for creating clones on the CCC website - it is really quite easy to do. It also seems easier to format an external drive rather than creating a partition on the internal drive - remember that you do not need any software or drivers on that drive. So, simply erase and format - you can find instructions in the Help section (menu bar) in Disk Utility.

Mikey,

Just wanted to ask you how the upgrade to Sierra from Yosemite went. I have the EXACT same question and was hoping you'd let me know your experience.

SO..would you upgrade a 2012 machine to Sierra?

Grateful for your (experienced) advice!

Brad

I have a mid 2012 13 inch 2.5GHz Intel Core i5 macbook pro but I have swapped out my 5400rpm hard drive for a 240GB ssd and 8GB of ram and seem to have no problems running Yosemite. I did upgrade from mavericks tho as it's growing more and more out of date each day and haven't seen any slow downs in Yosemite but if you do go to upgrade to Yosemite or Sierra, make sure you get a SSD first, otherwise programs take forever to load in Yosemite and Sierra. Hope this answer helps you choose the right OS

I have a mid 2012 "13 MacBook Pro I use to run Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, InDesign, Photomatix Pro and some other fairly demanding applications. It originally came with the 2.9 Ghz Core i7, 8 GB of RAM and a 750 GB spinning hard drive.

I immediately upgraded it to 16 GB of Ram and a 512 GB SSD and the difference in performance was dramatic. If you intend to do any serious image or video editing, I strongly recommend first replacing the hard drive with an SSD (it's easy to do) and if you can swing it, go ahead and put in an additional 8 GB of Ram (your system maxes out at 16 GB).

i also use a 27" Dell monitor (connected via the display port) and calibrated it to ensure best color results when using Photoshop and Lightroom. My system, set up this way, does a great job and when I'm traveling, I just disconnect the monitor (which also acts as a USB hub for two external hard drives) and I'm ready to go. Good luck.

Jim,

I also have the mid-2012 13 in MBP, although mine is still running the standard specs (2.9 i7, 8GB DDR3, 750GB SATA). I'm curious about a few things:

1) What brand(s) of SSD and Ram did you go with?

2) Did you do the installation yourself, and if so, did you use some guide online to which you can refer me?

3) Are you running Sierra on this set-up, or an older OS?

Thanks in advance!

I upgraded my 2012 MBP with an SSD and RAM from one of the two most recommended vendors: OWC

https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/memory/Apple_MacBook_MacBook_Pro/Upgrade?_ga=2.2 66221839.1212890240.1502815254-1594205364.1502815254

I used an upgrade SSD kit which includes an external enclosure: install the new SSD in that, plug it into the Mac, format it properly and then clone your entire system to it. When finished, swap the the drives and you can just boot up. Very simple.

They also have excellent install videos:

https://eshop.macsales.com/installvideos/

Installation of both was quite effortless.

And yes, I am running Sierra.

The install videos make it easy and a mid 2012 MBP is the last model where you can do this. Their kit comes with tiny screwdrivers and directions in addition to the videos. For cloning, you can use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper. Both make exact bootable copies of your system - I've been using CCC for bootable backup clones for years.

No it would not. Bootable clones on either a hard drive or a separate partition are stand-alone bootable exact copies of your system which means you can boot from them independently (and actually work on them if you are booted from it which you cannot do with TM). Time Machine in and of itself is not bootable - it needs the recovery partition to boot from. When you are starting with a new/blank hard drive, it is much easier to format and put a clone copy on it as it will be ready to go. If you want to start without that, you will need to format the drive first, preferably before you install it as it will be easier. Trying to use recovery on a non-formatted drive may or may not work and you would need to get there in order to use Disk Utility to format the drive. You can then opt to restore from TM, but it will need to download the OS during the process.

Hi Mikey,

I had all this OS on my Macbook Air.

Maverick is much speedy then Yosemite and Sierra, which is slowest among these 3 OS (but better then El Captain). I restored to Maverick to safe a lot of time. Sierra is much slower at my iMac with 24GB RAM, needless to say it often hag up on MB Air, especially when working with browsers with multi tabs, it even hang up my iMac on browsing. On Maverick my MBA starts at once, while you need to wait for Sierra for couple of minutes, even without starting extra programs. It reminds me old Windows.

But.... but, most of apps recently ask minimum 10.10 (Yosemite) or even 10.11 - olders versions of Mac OS continue to loose number of apps and luck upgrade support, I think because Apple policy.

Sierra has some extended battery life, but due to slow work and slowing processor you finish less jobs, then on Maverick. During my day I save more then hour when work on Maverick, but make your own choice.

Hey Steve! We miss you!

Sierra is much slower at my iMac with 24GB RAM

Well, you obviously have some issues with your device, possibly incompatible third party apps and/or some sort of AV or "cleaning" app.

I am running El Capitan on a 2012 MBP with 16 GB RAM and Sierra on a 2015 MBA with 8 GB RAM and they are both snappy and fast. Boot time is about 10 - 20 seconds; applications open within 2 - 3.

I use a 2012 Mac, it has had every version of OSX on it, from Mountain Lion to Sierra (MacOs). It has remained as fast as it always was with every version of the OS.

MacBook Pro 2012

1TB SSD (OWC)

16GB RAM (OWC)

I have a mid-2010 MBP that has had every one of those OS's installed, but I can hardly remember anything relating to performance comparison. From Mavericks on, I can't remember ever thinking any one of them was particularly slow compared to the previous.

I am on a second battery, so I don't know if the shorter battery life is a function of the OS or of the aftermarket battery. I also have some charging issues which I don't know if it is the charger or the battery, so my experience in that area is likely suspect.

If you use other Apple Devices, the subsequent OS's integrate with those devices much better. I think your 2012 MBP can take advantage of many of those features.

As to your choices, if you have not downloaded any of the interim OS's, you are out of luck. The only thing you can get from the App Store is Sierra.

It's a non-issue since the only OS X to which you can upgrade is Sierra. These forums are not for benchmarking. You can find that information by judicious Google searches. As for various models, you can find what you wish to know by downloading specs and user manuals at support.apple.com/manuals or support.apple.com/specs.

I don't believe you wish to minimize battery life as you stated.

About Batteries in Modern Apple Laptops

1. Battery University
2. Apple - Batteries - Notebooks
3. Apple - Batteries
4. Extending the Life of Your Laptop Battery
5. MacBook and MacBook Pro- Mac reduces processor speed when battery is removed while operating from an A-C adaptor
6. Apple Portables- Calibrating your computer's battery for best performance
7. Mac notebooks- Determining battery cycle count

As long as you have 8 GB RAM, you should be fine with either of the versions. Depending on what you want to use it for - editing/rendering video/graphics/images takes more power than perusing the internet and writing emails - you could increase the RAM and replace the slower 5400 rpm hard drive with an SSD. Other than that, I'd suggest you install Sierra on either a partition on the hard drive or an external drive as a "test drive" - you can see how you like it. If you don't, simply erase it as you'll still have your regular system. And, FYI, Yosemite is no longer available - it disappeared with El Capitan was introduced (which is now no longer available either since the introduction of Sierra).

I have a 2012 MBP and it was/is running Mavericks, Yosemite, El Capitan, and now Sierra with 8 GB RAM and an SSD. However, I do not do my video and graphics work on it as that is done on my iMac.