EEVblog2 - Dumpster Diving - 27" Apple iMac WOW!

[tooki]

The only real limitation is that it doesn’t support the newest OS any more, and I’ve been too lazy to hack it, as many have done.

I am also still on 10.11.6 and Parallels with W7 x64 - since everything I need is running fine, I do not see a reason why I should update to Sierra or High Sierra at the moment. In the current setup I have a bunch of extra kernel modules etc. and I am not willing to deal with the new issues to be faced in 10.12 / .13 right now

There are quite a few nice features in newer OS versions. (Especially in terms of integration with iOS. Not to mention that some applications are now being built only for newer OSes, and that security updates aren’t really forthcoming any more, other than super severe ones.)

Also, I hate building a mountain of technical debt. Jumping 3 OS versions is going be to much more problematic than one at a time.

[kripton2035]

10.12 is quite OK, but 10.13 if bug full ... dont know if it will work "normaly" one day ?


note: I'm working on a 10.11.6

[tooki]

10.12 is quite OK, but 10.13 if bug full ... dont know if it will work "normaly" one day ?

I've got 10.13 running on my MacBook Air and it works great. Hasn't been buggy for me whatsoever.

[kripton2035]

try to run a ftp server on it (without buying commercial app)
try to scan from an "old" multifunction network scanner to it
try to install a (samsung) ssd drive on récent imac and try to format it (you can't even see the hardware)
lets talk about the security failures of the root account that has since been corrected but ?
lets talk about the admin password that is mandatory now, and what happens when you migrate an old system that does not have a password ?
lets talk about filevault that crypt the entire volume and external volumes without the user knowing it ?
lets talk about installing it in a mixed network environment ?
lets talk about launching own apple technicians utility apps that does not detect a 10.13 to check for a bad video card ?
lets talk about connecting some hdmi projectors to a 10.13 iMac that cuts the display in half (and work perfectly on the same hardware and 10.12) ?

but yes it can run on many machines without problem as many peoples use it .
Just there are really many problems with it that weren't here before.

[Cerebus]

I'll forget the rest of your rant because it's clear that you've just got a peculiar chip on your shoulder about Apple.

But I will address one particular point:

try to run a ftp server on it (without buying commercial app)

Why on earth do you think that a platform that has as its backbone a variety of Unix would lack non-commercial software? That's an insane belief. There's even a choice of several flavours of pre-packaged open software repositories: homebrew, MacPorts and Fink. In homebrew there's a choice of 4 ftp servers:  proftpd, pure-ftpd, tnftpd, and vsftpd. Installing one of those would require the arduous and complicated task of typing: brew install packagename, which will download, install and configure the package in less time than it takes to go and get a glass of water.

Here, I'll try it:

-prompt-redacted$ time brew install proftpd
Updating Homebrew...
==> Downloading https://homebrew.bintray.com/bottles/proftpd-1.3.6.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz
==> Downloading from https://akamai.bintray.com/4a/4ac3a9a6ab8a21e05d82fefae042d7b94e920d5f3d172485202364b489d9d629?__gd
######################################################################## 100.0%
==> Pouring proftpd-1.3.6.el_capitan.bottle.tar.gz
==> Caveats
To have launchd start proftpd now and restart at login:
  brew services start proftpd
Or, if you don't want/need a background service you can just run:
  proftpd
==> Summary
  /usr/local/Cellar/proftpd/1.3.6: 102 files, 3.1MB

real   0m20.943s
user   0m3.445s
sys   0m1.946s

Yup, less time than it's take to walk to the kitchen and back. How about removing it (as I don't really want it):

-prompt-redacted$ time brew remove proftpd
Uninstalling /usr/local/Cellar/proftpd/1.3.6... (102 files, 3.1MB)

real   0m2.441s
user   0m1.164s
sys   0m0.422s

So an ftp server downloaded, installed, and uninstalled in under half a minute. Note that i didn't even need to go to a browser window and search for one, I just typed:

-prompt-redacted$ brew search ftpd
==> Searching local taps...
proftpd                       pure-ftpd                     tnftpd                        vsftpd
==> Searching taps on GitHub...
==> Searching blacklisted, migrated and deleted formulae...

So yeah, massive hurdles to cross to run an ftp server, especially a non-commercial one, not!

[Brumby]

Do we call you kriptonite, now?

[kripton2035]

@Cerebus : thanks for this trick, but it seems to work reliably only since january ... will try it by my customer.
by the way, I'm not a Unix guy, didnt think using that. (and it wouldnt have work at the time I needed it...)
I don't have any particular rant about apple , only lots of things that worked in previous systems, that do not work now in 10.13

[Cerebus]

@Cerebus : thanks for this trick, but it seems to work reliably only since january ... will try it by my customer.
by the way, I'm not a Unix guy, didnt think using that. (and it wouldnt have work at the time I needed it...)
I don't have any particular rant about apple , only lots of things that worked in previous systems, that do not work now in 10.13

Obviously, you'll have to download and install the homebrew tools, but those ought to take care of sorting out any permissions and configuration necessary to make it all work.

[Bassman59]

try to run a ftp server on it (without buying commercial app)

I'll admit that I was annoyed when I found out that a machine upgraded to High Sierra no longer had an ftp server. The thing is, ftp is so insecure that it has been replaced by newer, better protocols. Unfortunately, I have something that uses ftp to copy data to a remote server, and that server was one of my Macs. But as Cerebus notes, it's simple enough to install the ftp server software from homebrew, which is what i did.

try to scan from an "old" multifunction network scanner to it

Blame the manufacturer of that scanner for not keeping drivers updated, not Apple.

lets talk about the security failures of the root account that has since been corrected but ?

Yes, that was a particularly dumb error, but once it was reported, it was immediately fixed.

lets talk about the admin password that is mandatory now, and what happens when you migrate an old system that does not have a password ?

macOS is Unix; admin (root) passwords have been required since the first version of OS X.

[quote[lets talk about filevault that crypt the entire volume and external volumes without the user knowing it ?[/quote]

That's disabled by default, it does not get turned on without user intervention and admin access, and the System Preferences page for it is very explicit about the need for the user to remember a login password to use the disk. (As of High Sierra, it also gives you the option of generating a recovery key so you can decrypt the disk.)

lets talk about installing it in a mixed network environment ?

Sure, let's, as the MacBook Pro I am typing this on right now is on a network running a Windows Domain server, and I can access Windows shares on the network with my domain login. And I can access the Mac's disk from the Windows 7 machine on my desk just using my Mac user login.

lets talk about launching own apple technicians utility apps that does not detect a 10.13 to check for a bad video card ?

I've never had a bad video card, so I cannot comment.

lets talk about connecting some hdmi projectors to a 10.13 iMac that cuts the display in half (and work perfectly on the same hardware and 10.12) ?

My wife regularly connects her MacBook Pro running 10.13 to all sorts of projectors, over HDMI and DVI, and has not mentioned that problem. Perhaps you have to spend 30 seconds in the Displays System Preference after connecting the projector to ensure everything is set up?

Oh, and by the way, my wife tells me that at every conference she attends, there is always someone with a Windows laptop who simply can't get their machines to talk to projector. It's always a problem.

Any more?

[Bassman59]

10.12 is quite OK, but 10.13 if bug full ... dont know if it will work "normaly" one day ?

I run 10.13 on a 2017 Macbook Pro and a 2012 Mac mini. My wife runs it on her 2015 MacBook Pro. It also runs on an old Core 2 Duo Mac mini in our TV room. No problems, especially now that they're on 10.13.3. Maybe if you had specific bugs to report, maybe we can tell you whether we ran into them, and if so, what we did to solve them.

[Bassman59]

cough...if we're going to sort of 'go there'... if Mac shiny hardware and spinning beachballs of death OS are so-o-o great, then why do serious high performance Mac OS users go Hackintosh?   

Some users build Hackintoshes because Apple hasn't been bothered to refresh the Mac Pro line in five years. Instead, they come out with an iMac Pro, forgetting that professional users would prefer the tower form factor. (I'd like to see a new mini, too!).

But Hackintoshes are always a crapshoot, and if you value stability, it's the wrong way to go.

and a Time Machine (think 'System Restore'-ish type of program) save of Before and After this is done,
and then disable the Time Machine auto function, so it doesn't eventually auto delete all that precautionary work as old images

Seriously: Time Machine is the killer macOS feature. It has saved my bacon several times. Why Microsoft hasn't put a feature like that into Windows is baffling.

If there is a concern that you might need to go back to the machine's fresh state, it might be worth doing a Time Machine backup of the new install onto an external hard disk, and then putting that hard disk on the shelf for later. But then use another disk (either local or on a NAS) and let Time Machine do its thing. It works. It really does.

Did the hard disk in your machine die? Install a new one, and when you boot into the recovery mode, tell it to restore from Time Machine backup. When the restore is complete, it'll be just as it was at the time of that last backup.

Got a new machine? When setting up, you'll be asked if you want to restore from another machine's Time Machine backup.

Deleted a file or an email? Go into Time Machine, get it back.

FWIW if he ever decides to jump Windows ship in say... 150 15 years time... better off to give Linux a shot first rather than get Mackered   

By then, owning a Mac may be 'Subscription Based',

the 'subscriber' fitted with an i-Collar  (electronic tracking collar) on their neck, in case they do a runner on the lifetime payments   

Now you're just being ridiculous.

[tooki]

and a Time Machine (think 'System Restore'-ish type of program) save of Before and After this is done,
and then disable the Time Machine auto function, so it doesn't eventually auto delete all that precautionary work as old images

Seriously: Time Machine is the killer macOS feature. It has saved my bacon several times. Why Microsoft hasn't put a feature like that into Windows is baffling.

If there is a concern that you might need to go back to the machine's fresh state, it might be worth doing a Time Machine backup of the new install onto an external hard disk, and then putting that hard disk on the shelf for later. But then use another disk (either local or on a NAS) and let Time Machine do its thing. It works. It really does.

Did the hard disk in your machine die? Install a new one, and when you boot into the recovery mode, tell it to restore from Time Machine backup. When the restore is complete, it'll be just as it was at the time of that last backup.

Got a new machine? When setting up, you'll be asked if you want to restore from another machine's Time Machine backup.

Deleted a file or an email? Go into Time Machine, get it back.

Seriously, I couldn’t agree more. It boggles my mind that there are still Mac users who’ve never bothered to set up Time Machine — and it’s equally mind-boggling that Apple doesn’t advertise Time Machine as a killer app. The time it saves, in being able to restore to a new disk or new machine, is unbelievable compared to the difficulty and/or imperfection of restoring Windows systems.