macOS Big Sur Update Bricking Some Older MacBook Pro Models

[Serban55]

After I reading this and some comment this conversation, I am holding off my Big Sur updates...

Bricking someone’s machine are more intolerable because mostly those computer are out of warranty. Is Big Sur going to continue Catalina habit bricking Macs ?

Apple is supporting your big sur bricked mac for free...if it cannot be fixed i will not be surprised if APple not giving you a free new mac..it happened before , out of warranty

 

[Maconplasma]

Three points:

It's irrelevant how old the machine is - the question is whether the upgrade is fit for purpose? It would appear for some it is not. At a time when some will already be struggling due to COVID this will be a real blow.

Also Apple tell us (with nags and red dots) that we should all upgrade immediately!

Your post is rather unsympathetic, this is a heap of pain for those not entitled enough to buy the latest and greatest.

Anyone with a near 7 & 8 year old Macs that instantly install the latest OS are taking their own risk, so offering sympathy is silly. This is not a psychotherapy thread. There is no real reason anyone with Macs that old need to install Big Sur on release day. I have a 2019 16" MBP and I am confident Big Sur will install without issue but I am not upgrading for at least a month. And yes the age of a computer does matter. Failing components such as hard drives don't rear their ugly heads until a big install like an OS happens. Furthermore it's common that many with old computers don't bother to ever clean up their system so with a new OS upgrade they may run into problems.

 

[Flying Grayson]

No problems on my mid-2014 13” MacBook Pro. Fingers crossed at least. Really enjoying Big Sur - seems like a very welcome update.

 

[joiwomcow]

Never, ever upgrade to a .0 or .1 MacOS release.
Ideally, upgrade just before the new release comes out, after Apple has had a year to debug. Desktop operating systems are mature software. There's never any urgent or compelling reason to upgrade them immediately.
I'm still on Mojave. For Apple software, it's been reasonably stable and reliable. It's no server-grade Linux, but it's good enough.

 

[Serban55]

Nowadays Windows OS is a muuuuch more stable and professional Operating System than MacOS. Yes it is.

MacOS is dead friends

that is just hate ......for people like us who use both operating systems, maybe even 3 like linux, we know the real thing...windows10 is old, of course is more stable when you dont add new stuff..Apple chose to add infrastructure and make it available for both arhitecture arm and x86
I saw how windows 10 arm is working on devices...or how well windows RT was made, now arm win10 and so many...Microsoft focus on services more than real OS. Microsoft like samsung cannot bring new good OS, they are done, and they know it
So again, Big Sur is a new release, while windows 10 is an old grampa that in a decade will be left behind
End of debate, at least for me.

PS: again, until today Apple didnt had full control for hardware , at least for mac platform. A new era starts from today.I hope you learned something.

 

[Malus120]

Mid 2014 MacBook Pro 15.4".
I erased the SSD and did a clean install. The booting sequence looked weird and restarting the machine doesn't work like suggested here:


The OS is not as responsive as Catalina was. Safari often seems frozen and doesn't take clicks or other UI input anymore, having to refresh a website. Chrome shows normal behaviour.

Last but not least... HUGE privacy concerns are popping up!
Apparently trustd and other Apple services and apps will now BYPASS firewall tools like little snitch and even VPNs. This is outrageous and I can confirm it. I had updated to little snitch 5 and it no longer can block any OS services from calling home. This was brought to my attention in this article:

Potential Mac privacy concerns surface after server outages - 9to5Mac

Apple's servers had issues on macOS Big Sur launch day that impacted a variety of services revealing potential Mac privacy and security concerns.

9to5mac.com

outrageous!

Wow, I'll wait for more people to way in before final judgement but... Yikes, this is actually probably the bigger story in the long term.
I certainly can't say I was in favor of a lot of what they were trying to do to deprecate kexts in Big Sur but this is actually really scary.
It might not matter all THAT much for those of us lucky to live in places that protect civil liberties, but to people living in autocracies (China for example) this is potentially truly terrible news. Those governments WILL force Apple to hand over this data if they want to continue doing business in those places and Apple... well something tells me they don't want to give up some of the biggest markets in the world...
I'm really curious what Apple has to say for themselves here. They've made themselves out to be the champions of privacy over the last few years. How does this in any way square with that...

 

[Maconplasma]

This is completely unacceptable, particularly during a pandemic when its not safe (or at the very least far from ideal) for many people to to go out and people are relying on these machines for their livelihood more than ever.

And what does the pandemic have to do with people wanting to install Big Sur on machines that are 7 & 8 years old on release day? I doubt if anyone with Macs this old needed Big Sur on day one, especially if it's a mission critical machine. Don't use the pandemic as some reason why people with very old Macs should be installing it right away. It's completely irrelevant. Stick to the topic please.

 

[Spock]

My mid 2014 installed and runs fine, thankfully.

 

[BobCochran1]

I had no problems upgrading my mid 2014, 15 inch Retina MacBook Pro to Big Sur, but I notice that Safari has a problem with loading long web pages (like those on MacRumors). In addition, someone texted my iPhone while my MacBook was in the upgrade process, and that conversation doesn't show up on the MacBook version of iMessages.

 

[Stratus Fear]

Interesting how Apple put out the Public Beta months ago and this is discovered just now? You mean nobody with a 2013/2014 MBP ever had a bricking issue all the time during the public beta? Hmmm. Sometimes I get the feeling that these issues are made up in order to crap on Apple when they release new products. Furthermore while I'm not saying bricking should happen I think it's a stretch trying to install the latest OS on near 7 and 8 year old computers and expect to have no issues.

The problem is that the firmware update that Big Sur does on upgrade was only released with the release candidate ~2 weeks ago. Before that, Big Sur was using the same firmware updates as Catalina. So yeah it didn’t have enough testing probably.

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

that is just hate ......for people like us who use both operating systems, maybe even 3 like linux, we know the real thing...windows10 is old, of course is more stable when you dont add new stuff..Apple chose to add infrastructure and make it both available for arm and x86
I saw how windows 10 arm is working on devices...or how well windows RT was made, now arm win10 and so many...Microsoft focus on services more than real OS. Microsoft like samsung is cannot bring new good OS, they are done, and they know it
So again, Big Sur is a new release, while windows 10 is an old grampa that in a decade will be left behind
End of debate, at least for me.

PS: again, until today Apple didnt had full control for hardware , at least for mac platform. A new era starts from today.I hope you learned something.

I learned that with Apple fully in control (your words) that they screwed something up and now a couple generations of MacBooks are screwed on their "new" OS.

The rest of your post is so full of bias and misinformation... It seems you learned something from this election...how to ignore the facts!

 

[Malus120]

And what does the pandemic have to do with people wanting to install Big Sur on machines that are 7 & 8 years old on release day? I doubt if anyone with Macs this old needed Big Sur on day one. Don't use the pandemic as some reason why people with very old Macs should be installing it right away. It's completely irrelevant. Stick to the topic please.

Quite a lot actually. More and more people are working from home, AKA they NEED their Mac to make a living and there's no corporate IT to save them from something like this. If they're mac doesn't work, they can't work so you better believe they'll be hightailing their ass to the Apple Store to get it fixed ASAP.

Yes, those of us who are IT professionals, "tech savvy," "pros," enthusiasts, long time mac users, whatever you want to call it, KNOW that you really shouldn't upgrade a "production" system to a .0 OS release, particularly on day one. But to listen to Apple talk about it, "Big Sur is the best thing since sliced bread and you should update on day one!" Just because you're not convinced doesn't mean their aren't tons of less tech savvy people who are. During normal times many of those people would be protected from themselves by their IT departments, but, during a pandemic that's just not how it works.

Furthermore, once again, I want to emphasize, THIS ISN'T NORMAL. BUGS are normal for a day one OS release. BRICKING computers such that even advanced end users can't fix it on their own need to be return it to the manufacturer for repair is almost unheard of.

I don't know why you want to pretend like its ok that Apple bricked these macs just because these people had the audacity to, as Apple always suggests, "upgrade to the latest version of macOS" in this case Big Sur on their "7-8 year old Macs." They're still on Apple's support page. If Apple doesn't want to support them anymore they're free to remove them.

 

[Springman]

Damn. My late 13 MBP is updating right now. Say a prayer for me....

 

[ginkobiloba]

I got news for you buddy. The "Big Bucks" you paid for your 2013/2014 Macs has served it's purpose. You're not entitled to a free OS year after year, especially for these Macs that are near 7 & 8 years old. Years ago Apple charged $129 for an OS upgrade and people happily paid it, and Macs weren't any cheaper back then they are now.

I got news for you buddy : Apple says you're 100% nonsense , because it says on its website that the 2013/2014 are "entitled" to a free upgrade to Big Sur, and even harass you to upgrade to it as soon as possible.

Perhaps you should contact them and explain to them that they shouldn't "entitle" those Macs to upgrade ?

 

[Serban55]

Damn. My late 13 MBP is updating right now. Say a prayer for me....

If it bricks , Apple will fix it for you for free. If they cannot fix it for you, they will exchange it for free with a new one (comparable in specs)

 

[oldmacs]

You're not entitled to a free OS year after year, especially for these Macs that are near 7 & 8 years old

I'd happily go back to paying for MacOS if it meant more stable releases.


Ironic that Microsoft gives better software support to Macs than Apple does. My 12 and 13 year old Macs can run Windows 10 fine, but were dropped years ago by Apple.

 

[Serban55]

I learned that with Apple fully in control (your words) that they screwed something up and now a couple generations of MacBooks are screwed on their "new" OS.

The rest of your post is so full of bias and misinformation... It seems you learned something from this election...how to ignore the facts!

Again, not my words...i put the text between lines

and here who told you that, that wasnt me...read the thread. I said from now on Apple has full controll..until now Intel is not under Apple company

This shouldn't happen, period. We pay big bucks for Macs instead of going for cheaper Windows because Apple tells us that controlling both the hardware and the software leads to more stability. Obviously this isn't happening.

So stop with the misinformation

 

[mithion]

I still think their development cycle is too short. Currently they spend about 9 months on feature development and 3 months give or take on stabilization. That is too short for something as complex as an OS. Should be 1 yr on feature development and 1 year stabilization with a new release every two years.

 

[oldmacs]

And what does the pandemic have to do with people wanting to install Big Sur on machines that are 7 & 8 years old on release day? I doubt if anyone with Macs this old needed Big Sur on day one, especially if it's a mission critical machine. Don't use the pandemic as some reason why people with very old Macs should be installing it right away. It's completely irrelevant. Stick to the topic please.

The point was that COVID has made many people's lives harder finically = less ability to upgrade to newer Macs = more people likely to be running older Macs.

Yes it is sensible to wait to update, but Apple starts pushing their OS updates hard the moment they come out. Now that major MacOS releases show up in the software update section, people assume that it's like any other minor update and once it auto downloads, install it, now knowing its a huge big release. It was much better when MacOS 10.x updates were in the Mac App Store and it was clear that they were a new OS, not just a minor software update.

 

[Serban55]

and only you know about Linux

really? a lot of people knows about Linux. No wonder you dont know anything about linux or macOS
you can learn about it. Just to start Linux is very good to control every aspect of the operating systems and its open-source
I already lost a good of my time, and for nothing.
Stay on windows its ok,old enough to be very stable...it would been embarrassing not to be stable after 20 updates since its released

 

[Maconplasma]

Quite a lot actually. More and more people are working from home, AKA they NEED their Mac to make a living and there's no corporate IT to save them from something like this. If they're mac doesn't work, they can't work so you better believe they'll be hightailing their ass to the Apple Store to get it fixed ASAP.

Yes, those of us who are IT savvy, pros, long time mac/computee users, whatever you want to call it, KNOW that you really shouldn't upgrade a "production" system to a .0 OS release, particularly on day one. But to listen to Apple talk about it, "Big Sur is the best thing since sliced bread and you should update on day one!" Just because you're not convinced doesn't mean their aren't tons of less tech savvy people who are. During normal times many of those people would be protected from themselves by their IT departments, but, during a pandemic that's not how it works.

Furthermore, once again, I want to emphasize, THIS ISN'T NORMAL. BUGS are normal for a day one OS release. BRICKING computers such that even advanced end users can't fix it on their own need to be return it to the manufacturer for repair is almost unheard of.

I don't know why you want to pretend like its ok that Apple bricked these macs just because these people had the audacity to, as Apple always suggests, "upgrade to the latest version of macOS" in this case Big Sur.

Oh so you're suggesting that people with mission critical machines NEEDED to install Big Sur on their 7 & 8 year old machines? Are you suggesting that their previous OS wasn't working? You're stretching it so thin here. I hope you realize what your saying is nonsensical? Anyone during the pandemic who is relying on their older computers is not going to instantly upgrade the OS unless the software they needed for work or school requires Big Sur.

And show me where I said it was okay that Apple bricked the machines. Furthermore Apple did not brick anyone's machine. You do not have all the facts. People with old machines have a lot of old software or toxic files that could cause bricking. If Apple bricked the machines then everybody who installed Big Sur post the 2013/2014 Mac would have a bricked computer also.

 

[InGenius]

My 13" late 2013 isn't bricked, but restarting no longer works at all - since updating to Big Sur restarting the machine simply shuts it down.

It also seems to take an age to display the Apple logo when it boots, and has a very strange boot sequence that involves showing the Big Sur background with a progress bar, then reverting back to a black screen with an Apple logo, followed by a really weird graphical distortion with tearing all across the screen and then finally the loaded desktop.

Late 2013 13” here too. Didn’t update on the first day (couldn’t) but did it the next day. Was plugged into a thunderbolt display, and when the update went to a black screen and didnt seem to be doing anything, I unplugged the Thunderbolt Display. Macbook seemed to be off, so I took it off power and pressed power button, nothing. Held it down for 10 secs, then it booted to Apple logo before resuming the install (was at 29 minutes remaining)...after that, I plugged it back into power (but not the display) and the update went fine.

Haven’t noticed the restart issue, but did notice the graphical glitch on first boot.

Not the smoothest of update processes (only a mild sweat), but enjoying the OS since.

 

[Maconplasma]

The point was that COVID has made many people's lives harder finically = less ability to upgrade to newer Macs = more people likely to be running older Macs.

I haven't once suggested that anyone go out and buy a new computer. You're using that as a defense against me and others stating that it doesn't make any sense to instantly upgrade to the latest OS on old machines that are mission critical to the users needs. Catalina a Mojave work perfectly and are still being fully supported with the latest software. Once again using COVID as a defense is nonsensical.

 

[serkankocak]

A lot of people are reporting black screens and reporting their machines because of this issue. I would suggest them to just be patient. I updated my late 2013 MBP 13" on Friday and everything went smooth. It took a good hour and during most of the time the screen was black or even off but it came back every now and then. During the process I had to login twice using my password as the MBP rebooted but just as I said it was absolutely pain free and Big Sur runs great on an old machine like this.

 

[Audit13]

Upgraded my late 2013 13" on release day with no issues. Bootroom upgraded to the latest release (427.0.0.0).

I've been running the beta on a mid-2014 13" from release day as well. It upgraded to the latest GM release with no issues either.

I hope others have the same experience as me. If not, I sincerely hope Apple fixes the problem for anyone encountering this issue.