best upgrade from 10.6.8

[ytsim]

MacBook Pro 5,5
June 2009
2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
4GB memory
Available: 78.04 GB

Enable to run two apps, I must upgrade to at least 10.7. My question is - which upgrade would work the best given my current reality. I understand I will probably lose my CS2 Illustrator.

So many of the reviews talk about how unhappy folks are with any of the upgrades.


Thank you for any guidance,

Misty

 

[pigoo3]

So many of the reviews talk about how unhappy folks are with any of the upgrades.

EXACTLY. If you search the internet you can find someone…somewhere saying something negative about EVERYTHING. Including just about EVERY OS version Apple ever released. There are always unhappy people out there for one reason or another (nothing is 100% perfect in everyone's eye's).

Enable to run two apps, I must upgrade to at least 10.7. My question is - which upgrade would work the best given my current reality. I understand I will probably lose my CS2 Illustrator.

The big question is…how many apps do you currently have installed that (depending how far you upgrade your OS)…you will lose in the process. You mentioned CS2 for example.

I should mention that OS 10.6.8 was the last OS version that still supported old PPC apps. So any PPC apps you have…you will lose with a 10.7 or higher upgrade.

If you're going to lose all your old installed apps by upgrading to 10.7 or newer/higher…then you might as well upgrade the OS as far as your MacBook Pro will go (as long as the 2 apps you want to run are compatible with that OS version).

Your MacBook Pro can run the newest Mac OS (10.10 Yosemite). So if there are no strong reasons not to upgrade to Yosemite…go for it.

- Nick

 

[ytsim]

thank you.

 

[ytsim]

Actually, I do have one clarification. You may have answered it by referring to PPC apps, but I am not familiar with that term, so forgive my ignorance.

Will iWork '09 work on 10.10?


misty

 

[ytsim]

...and (don't know if this should be a separate thread), is the recommendation to do a clean install or just upgrade?

misty

 

[pigoo3]

Will iWork '09 work on 10.10?

I just checked…and there seems to be mixed results. Maybe a situation where some things work & some things not.

If iWork '09 is important to you…then upgrading to Yosemite may not be a good idea. Problem is…the next older OS version (Mavericks OS 10.9)…is not currently available for download (unless you downloaded it previously when it was available).

So this then leaves you with wither OS 10.7 or 10.8. Either of these OS versions will cost you $19.99 (Yosemite is free).

Another option is you could purchase newer versions of the Apple iWork apps (Pages and or Numbers). Each of these costs $19.99. So you could upgrade to Yosemite for free…then use the same $19.99 you would spend on 10.7 or 10.8…and buy either "Numbers" or "Pages".

- Nick

 

[johnodd4]

Ok i can answer and fix this for you really easy and you don't have to lose a thing.

Get a 1 TB laptop hard drive install it go into disk utility and dual partition it one partition name snow leopard so you can keep your CS2 because cs2 files have problems on newer adobe software this is why people still are able to download it from adobes website.

the second partition install your other o.s 10.7 10.8 10.9 10.10 which ever you choose and name it macintosh hd

now you get the best of both worlds

 

[pigoo3]

I thought the upgrade for iWorks was free? I believe the OP will be eligible for free upgrades for all iWork apps as soon as the OS update is installed, as long as the old versions are installed.

If that upgrade is still active…that would be awesome for the OP!

- Nick

 

[chscag]

I thought the upgrade for iWorks was free? I believe the OP will be eligible for free upgrades for all iWork apps as soon as the OS update is installed, as long as the old versions are installed.

That's correct, but as far as I know, it was free from iWork 09 only or if you purchased a new Mac, then the iWork apps were free regardless. iWork 08 was not eligible for the free upgrade.

A work around to get the free Yosemite apps even if you were not eligible was to download the free trial version of iWork 09. As soon as the App Store update detected the trial version of iWork 09 it offered the new iWork apps for free download. And before anyone asks, this was legal as pointed out by an article in Macworld Mag. Apple has since discontinued that, however.

 

[harryb2448]

PowerPC applications were made exclusively at the time for, of course, PowerPC machines, the last of which were the G5 models. Heading the list of these application would be Office 2004. Office 2008 and of course 2011 are compatible.

For what it is worth, I wpould download Yosemite, do a backup as I suggested to an external drive, burn a thumb drive with Yosemite on it, boot from the thumb drive, leave Installer and in Utilities > Disk Utility > Erase and format the drive Mac OS Extended (Journaled), back to installer and run.

Update to OS X.10.2 and with that external backup connected, run Migration Assistant from Utilities.

 

[chas_m]

To answer the question posed by the thread title, the best upgrade path for ANY Mac is to keep up with updates and upgrades in a timely fashion. You don't have to be bleeding-edge day one type upgraders, but don't allow yourself to fall too far behind ... that itself creates easily-avoidable issues.

Keeping all your software up-to-date is important, nearly as much so as making backups. Not doing this results in headaches, issues, and up-schmidt's-creek situations, and 100 percent of it is self-inflicted.

For this particular OP I'd say you should probably just bite the bullet, max out the RAM in that machine and then upgrade to Yosemite (which is probably your only free option anyway). You'll then need to upgrade your software to the modern versions, and find alternatives for any that don't work and can't be upgraded.

Then, make yourself a promise that you won't let this jarring transition happen again.