Why isn't my digidesign Mbox 2 not working with Sierra os update?

There are two main approaches for downgrading your version of OS X but one of them definitely depends on your having a Time Machine backup made prior to upgrading.

Method 1 - The Time Machine method

• Boot from the Recovery partition as per About macOS Recovery - Apple Support
• Select the first option i.e. Restore from Time Machine Backup
• Tell Time Machine to restore your Mac from a date/time that predates installing Sierra as per OS X Yosemite: Recover your entire system this is likely to take a very long time, another article describing this approach is here http://www.imore.com/how-downgrade-macos-sierra-back-os-x-el-capitan

Warning! When you restore your Mac in the above way it is almost certainly going to delete all the changes and new stuff you have done since that backup, you therefore might want to separately backup important stuff first. (Not via Time Machine.)

Method 2 - The Migration method

• Make sure you backup your current Sierra drive first this could be done via Time Machine or by cloning the entire drive to a second drive
• Then boot from the Recovery partition as per About macOS Recovery - Apple Support
• Now Select the fourth option i.e. Disk Utility
• Use Disk Utility to erase the Sierra boot drive
• Quit Disk Utility now select Reinstall OS X, this will typically reinstall the version your Mac originally came with however if you want to play safe and ensure a specific version is installed then you need to make a USB install disk containing Mountain Lion, see below for more details
• Once you have reinstalled a previous version of OS X you can then use Migration Assistant to 'migrate' stuff from the Sierra backup which would either be a Time Machine backup or 'other startup disk' - Move your content to a new Mac - Apple Support

Addendum - making a USB boot disk

• You will need a USB drive of at least 8GB capacity
• You will need the original Mountain Lion installer app from the Mac App store, if you previously 'purchased' i.e. downloaded this then it should still be in your previous purchases list
• Then you will need to use the DiskMakerX tool from here http://diskmakerx.com/ you will need to use version 3.0.4 not the current/latest version
• Once you have created the USB install disk using DiskMakerX carry on following the steps in Method 2.

Hello CarriPumps,

Thanks for posting on the Apple Support Communities. I see that your Mbox 2 and the Pro Tools software will not work after updating to macOS Sierra. I know it is important to be able to use Pro Tools and the Mbox 2 with your Mac. I will be happy to provide some direction.

You mention that you were told to downgrade your software. This might be what you need. According to the developer website of Pro Tools, version 10 supports OS X up to OS X 10.7.4. This sounds like what you had before you updated. I found this information here: Pro Tools 10 System Requirements

If you want to revert back to OS X 10.7.4, you can follow the steps on the following article. Though a Time Machine back up from before you upgraded to macOS Sierra is required.

macOS Sierra: Revert to a previous macOS version

Hope this helps.

Have a great day!

As per my previous reply here Re: Mac Oparating system, Protools and other program compatibility which answered a very similar question, ProTools 10 is only compatible with older versions of OS X. See this official Avid webpage for a list of what version of ProTools is compatible with what version os OS X - http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/Compatibility/Pro-Tools-Operating-Syste m-Compatibility-Chart

As per that Avid webpage you would need to be running ProTools 12.6 or higher in order to be compatible with Sierra. Whilst this webpage only mentions Sierra 10.12.1 I think you can safely assume that Sierra 10.12.2 and 10.12.3 should also work with ProTools 12.6 or higher.

Unfortunately it looks like according to this webpage http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/download/Mbox-2-Drivers that the Mbox 2 is not supported in Yosemite, El Capitan or Sierra. See also http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/Compatibility/Mbox-2-Mac-OS-X-10-11-Win dows-10

Even if hypothetically you managed to get drivers for the Mbox2 working ProTools 12 does not support it as support for the Mbox2 ended with ProTools 11.

Note: This is not Apple's fault, IT products are always being replaced and made obsolete you should also note that the MBox2 is not compatible with Windows 10 either.

Therefore whilst you could upgrade to ProTools 12.6 or newer to resolve your software problem you are also going to need to buy a new replacement audio interface. Or as indicated by darren.s you would have to revert to an older version of OS X. You could setup two Mac boot drives so that you could switch between the old version and Sierra.

Note: New Macs typically cannot run older versions of OS X so if you replace your Mac this will no longer be an option.

CarriPumps wrote:

Thanks John! So to clarify, my 2011 iMac is considered a "newer Mac" which means I would not be able to downgrade to a different Os system? Is that what you're saying?

Actually a 2011 iMac is now six years old and therefore not considered a new Mac. I don't have your Macs full specs but I believe it is capable of running Snow Leopard 10.6.6 and as you have currently versions all the way up to Sierra 10.12.3.

So you can obviously downgrade back to the version you were on prior to Sierra and in theory if you have the installers all the way back to Snow Leopard.

A new Mac as an example would be the 2016 MacBook Pro which can only run Sierra and cannot be downgraded to older versions because it never existed prior to Sierra being released.