Snow Leopard to El Capitan

[nancyspeed]

I tried my best to research my question first. iMac 7.1 running 10.6.8 Snow Leopard. Have downloaded El Capitan and when I click on installer it says "Installmacosxdmg not recognized." What does this mean and what can I do now? I cannot move my accounting software to my old iMac unless it is at least running Maverick. Just thought I would move up a level or two. I'm afraid it means there isn't enough available space on my computer.

 

[Slydude]

I think what has happened is that you need at least OS X10.7 in order to download newer versions of the OS.The download file for OS X 10.7 can be acquired for free from Apple here.The system requirements are also listed on that page.

Others may chime in with better ideas.

 

[nancyspeed]

It says I can. If it were a memory problem would it say that is what it was?

 

[MBAmtloin]

I went from Snow leopard to El Cap 2 weeks ago off their website
i had 20 GBs free and used a MacBook air 2010 4gb-ram.
there could be a permissions stopping this, or just a weird default were you need to try again.
i hope this helped.

 

[nancyspeed]

Thanks for your reply. I don't have a clue. It did download but it took 13 hours (rural area). It was from the Apple website. I may just have to go to the Apple store and try Yosemite to see if that will work.

I went from Snow leopard to El Cap 2 weeks ago off their website
i had 20 GBs free and used a MacBook air 2010 4gb-ram.
there could be a permissions stopping this, or just a weird default were you need to try again.
i hope this helped.

 

[nancyspeed]

Also need to add--I have a 2017 iMac I use. Once I update the old iMac it will be disconnected from the internet.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

Where did you get the installer from? I assume the error message you posted has a typo, because it should be "InstallMacOSX.dmg". If there is a period missing for you, that would explain it. I would just re-download it again. Here's the support article with the official link direct from Apple:

How to upgrade to OS X El Capitan - Apple Support

Edit: to be clear here, according to the support article, you can upgrade from Snow Leopard on iMacs from 2007 onwards.

 

[MBAmtloin]

Thanks for your reply. I don't have a clue. It did download but it took 13 hours (rural area). It was from the Apple website. I may just have to go to the Apple store and try Yosemite to see if that will work.

i dont think they support any OSX but High Sierra to Catalina now. You can use their internet and download the el cap OSX there.
El Captain is nice, high sierra will work on your Imac as well.

 

[nancyspeed]

Where did you get the installer from? I assume the error message you posted has a typo, because it should be "InstallMacOSX.dmg". If there is a period missing for you, that would explain it. I would just re-download it again. Here's the support article with the official link direct from Apple:

How to upgrade to OS X El Capitan - Apple Support

Edit: to be clear here, according to the support article, you can upgrade from Snow Leopard on iMacs from 2007 onwards.

Yes, there is a period in the correct place. I downloaded it from the apple support site. Downloading it again to see what happens. I just need it to run my accounting software that takes maverick at least since they will not update to a 64 bit system.

 

[JohnCL]

You will get that error in Snow Leopard. Did you make a bootable USB containing El Capitan? That would be the best and easiest way to upgrade. You can run the following command in Terminal replacing "MyVolume" in bold in the string with the name of your flash drive. You will need an 8gb or larger flash drive to make this happen.

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app

 

[krs]

There is a bit of incorrect information in this thread.
:

I think what has happened is that you need at least OS X10.7 in order to download newer versions of the OS

Not true - you can update directly from 10.6.8 to ElCapitan

i dont think they support any OSX but High Sierra to Catalina now.

Also not true - El Capitan is available from Apple for any Mac where El Capitan is the latest macOS that Mac supports - and your iMac is one of those

I see two potential problems:

One is that your El Capitan macOS may be corrupt because of the very long download - I think you mentioned 14 hours which probably means dial-up.
You should be able to verify that the installer you have is not corrupt.

The other is that the amount of hard space at 8.8 GB I think is marginal.
The ElCapitan installer is just over 6 GB and it will fit on a 8 GB USB flash drive, but it may require more than 8 GB during the installation process - it would be good if you could free up a total of at least 12GB on your hard drive.

There was a recent thread a bit similar to this one that might give you a bit more insight on upgrades to El Capitan
El Capitan on Early 2009 MBP and other stuff

PS: I just came across this article - they claim you need at least 8.8 GB to just install ElCapitan - more to run it
OS X El Capitan Minimum Requirements

 

[krs]

You will get that error in Snow Leopard. Did you make a bootable USB containing El Capitan? That would be the best and easiest way to upgrade.

What error in SnowLeopard?

And why make a bootable USB Flash drive?
That only makes sense if one needs to upgrade several Macs to El Capitan and one doesn't want to download the OS for each one.

 

[nancyspeed]

Thanks to everyone helping me. I do believe my problem downloading was I live in the boonies. I do have DSL but it isn't anything like citified DSL. So today I took it to the Apple store and it downloaded in 15 minutes. I figured I didn't really have enough memory and I don't. So now I will buy some memory and install it. I'm fairly competent so may look up the instructions. Apple said they would not do it and that's fine with me.

Obviously it would be easier to just give up and not update to Catalina but now I'm determined.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

Thanks to everyone helping me. I do believe my problem downloading was I live in the boonies. I do have DSL but it isn't anything like citified DSL. So today I took it to the Apple store and it downloaded in 15 minutes. I figured I didn't really have enough memory and I don't. So now I will buy some memory and install it. I'm fairly competent so may look up the instructions. Apple said they would not do it and that's fine with me.

Obviously it would be easier to just give up and not update to Catalina but now I'm determined.

Well your iMac can't be updated to Catalina, so I wouldn't worry about going that far. You should be able to get going with El Capitan, although I would at least consider going to Sierra or High Sierra so you'd get security updates.

You can find guides to upgrade your memory in the link below. I recommend replacing all your modules so they are matching, and max it out. Don't simply add new ones. You can get exactly what you need from OWC. Link to them below also.

iMac Intel Repair - iFixit

Memory Upgrades for Apple iMac 2007 - Up to 6GB

 

[krs]

.....although I would at least consider going to Sierra or High Sierra so you'd get security updates.

One cannot upgrade that iMac 7.1 to Sierra or High Sierra - at least not without some 'hacking'
El Capitan is the last macOS that is officially supported.

I run ElCapitan on a number of Macs and that OS is perfectly fine.

Increasing the RAM as planned is a good, probably necessary move.
I would also try to free up some hard drive space.

 

[nancyspeed]

I think OWC has what I need. It looks simple to install also.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

One cannot upgrade that iMac 7.1 to Sierra or High Sierra - at least not without some 'hacking'
El Capitan is the last macOS that is officially supported.

I run ElCapitan on a number of Macs and that OS is perfectly fine.

Increasing the RAM as planned is a good, probably necessary move.
I would also try to free up some hard drive space.

Whoops... my bad. Forgot to check on what it supports.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

I think OWC has what I need. It looks simple to install also.
View attachment 31001

You should be able to run comfortably with 4 GB RAM if spending that much on 6 GB is a bit much for you.

 

[nancyspeed]

The upgrade to El Capitan is only to transfer some accounting software to my old computer I don't use. The company just announced that they have decided not to make it Catalina compatible.

You should be able to run comfortably with 4 GB RAM if spending that much on 6 GB is a bit much for you.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

The upgrade to El Capitan is only to transfer some accounting software to my old computer I don't use. The company just announced that they have decided not to make it Catalina compatible.

Oh, so you have a newer Mac that you normally use? Have you considered just running an older version of macOS in a virtual machine just to use that accounting software? Apple allows running Lion and onwards in a virtual machine on Macs. VirtualBox is free, but I can tell you that I've never successfully gotten macOS to install in VirtualBox, so I went ahead and bought a license for VMWare Fusion and it works fantastic. I have Mojave and Windows 10 that I use in it on occasion. Parallels is very popular for vms, but that has gotten stupidly expensive.