Can I install Sierra on to a new MacPro for Logic?

If I bought a Mac Pro from the Apple shop, can I install Sierra on to it? even though it comes with High Sierra?

I need to use Logic and other various software/hardware with Sierra, not High Sierra.

 

many thanks

If you google ‘OS X Sierra download’, there’s an official Apple download for Sierra. Bear in mind that it won’t be like updating your OS but a clean installation, so you’d need to do that as the very first thing before installing Logic or absolutely anything else. I think the link on the Apple page leads to an App Store page, so it should appear in your account for reinstalling later if necessary.

If you google ‘OS X Sierra download’, there’s an official Apple download for Sierra. Bear in mind that it won’t be like updating your OS but a clean installation, so you’d need to do that as the very first thing before installing Logic or absolutely anything else. I think the link on the Apple page leads to an App Store page, so it should appear in your account for reinstalling later if necessary.

 

Cheers Keith, good advice too

Hope it works out fine for you Kerochan, I don’t see why it shouldn’t.

UPDATE

So I saw a refurbished Mac Pro on the Apple site, and I asked the adviser if I could install SIERRA on it, as it is delivered with HIGH SIERRA, she asked me to hold while she checked with the technical staff, and after doing so she said NO, its impossible to install Sierra on to it.

 

Of course they may be just saying this coz Apple want us to run High Sierra, which I am guessing is the case?

If I bought a Mac Pro from the Apple shop, can I install Sierra on to it? even though it comes with High Sierra?

Officially, you cannot install Sierra on a machine that comes with High Sierra installed on it: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208202

If I bought a Mac Pro from the Apple shop, can I install Sierra on to it? even though it comes with High Sierra?

Officially, you cannot install Sierra on a machine that comes with High Sierra installed on it: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208202

 

Cheers David

The mac pro is refurbished, so it would have had Sierra or earlier installed on it originally.

Cheers David

The mac pro is refurbished, so it would have had Sierra or earlier installed on it originally.

Then as long as the Mac is one of the listed ones in the article you should be fine.

Sorry, Kerochan, there are details that I inadvertently missed out there simply because reverting to a previous OS isn’t something I do very often. You may have to make a bootable drive (a DVD or large enough USB drive) , erase your computer’s boot drive and install from there. There are plenty of resources that explain the process, there’s no point in my trying to dredge it up from memory. I think I’ve done it twice over 20 years of using a Mac.

If you have a local Apple maintenance shop, it might be worth asking them if they can do it if you’re not sure. In my experience they’re often very obliging with this kind of thing - it shouldn’t be very expensive.

and i have to ask: why? what can't you do in high sierra? (just curious)...

Cheers David

The mac pro is refurbished, so it would have had Sierra or earlier installed on it originally.

Then as long as the Mac is one of the listed ones in the article you should be fine.

 

All the macs listed as "ok" say something like "Mac Pro 2010 and later". Which in my mind means there is no legal problem with installing Sierra on any mac hardware that is new enough to technically support it, including the very latest iMacs that came from the factory with High Sierra on them. Some macs older than 2010 may not support Sierra, not as a legal matter, but purely technical matter.

All the macs listed as "ok" say something like "Mac Pro 2010 and later".

AND with MacOS OS X El Capitan, OS X Yosemite, OS X Mavericks, OS X Mountain Lion, or OS X Lion installed. At least that's how I'm reading it...

I guess.

 

Following the link to the "OS Versions", it uses the word "should" a lot, not "must". It basically lists which OS was bundled with the hardware model id, so you can know from that which OS came with the machine. It says many times, basically, Apple recommends High Sierra for everyone. but if you really want sierra, here it is...and I don't really see anything that says you're not allowed to use sierra on a brand new mac that came with High Sierra. Not legally anyway. They are making the download readily available for anyone that wants to try to download it and install it and see how it works.

 

Now that being said...Apple is horrible at backwards compatibility, so any time you get a new mac that came with some version of OS X and you attempt to downgrade it to an older version of OS X, you are taking a chance that something might not work and you can forget about support if you go into an Apple store with your downgraded iMac. Personally I don't think there will be any big issue with running Sierra on all of the current brand new macs that shipped with High Sierra, but if you have a new mac with a touch bar, for example, probably not a good idea to downgrade. But obviously, a refurbished older mac that comes to you with High Sierra on it, should be no problem whatsoever to revert back to Sierra.

 

Lastly, if you do decide to downgrade any mac from HS to Sierra, I highly recommend you entirely wipe the Hard drive and reformat it because you want a clean Sierra file system.

I don't really see anything that says you're not allowed to use sierra on a brand new mac that came with High Sierra. Not legally anyway.

I wasn't thinking legally, but simply whether or not it's possible to do it, trying to help out Kerochan figure out if he CAN do it or not.. According to the article, a Mac that originally came with an OS older than High Sierra is required. If that's not the case, then I'm not sure why "High Sierra" isn't on the list?

As a further side note, I want to comment that its really important when each new version of OS X comes out to "purchase" the OS X update in the App Store, and let it download to your machine, even if you don't allow the installer to run after it downloads. You can even delete the download. Once you have "purchased" it, then you will be able to obtain that version of OS X directly from the App Store pretty much any time in the future if you decide you want an older version. My app store account can still get Mavericks, El Capitan, Sierra and High Sierra. I am not running High Sierra yet. At some point in the future I may decide High Sierra is all sorted out and I'm ready to upgrade, even though Apple has already moved on to the next thing..and I will be able to get it from the App store because I have already "purchased" it. If you don't do that purchase step, then it will disappear from the App Store when the next OS X version comes out.

 

Its very unusual for Apple to provide a link to the previous version, as they did in the above link for Sierra. They did that this time, probably because there were a lot of changes to High Sierra and a lot of unhappy people that wanted to get back to Sierra until its all sorted out. So thank you Apple for making it easier then normal this time. But in the future you can not count on having access to the previous version of the OS unless you "purchase" it in the app store during its normal cycle.

This is important advice.

 

Lastly, if you do decide to downgrade any mac from HS to Sierra, I highly recommend you entirely wipe the Hard drive and reformat it because you want a clean Sierra file system.

 

Certainly it would not be a good idea, never ever, to try to run the OS X "upgrade" to an existing High Sierra machine of any kind. When downgrading, you need to wipe the machine and start completely clean. When you run the Sierra installer, at some point you can get disk utility up and do that.

 

A refurbished mac that originally came with something older then High Sierra, can obviously run Sierra perfectly fine, so long as you install it cleanly onto a cleanly formatted hard drive.

 

The only risk of the newer machine is that there is some hard-ware specific changes in the new hardware, that are only addressed by High Sierra. I'd say the touch bar would be a good reason to go with High Sierra, for example. Its possible the new iMac also has some kind of hardware stuff that only High Sierra will properly manage. So honestly..using a brand new mac with Sierra is a technical risk, there is no way to know for sure whether Apple did stuff. Google the net and try to find other users that have already experimented with that hardware model to make sure it works ok.

Lastly, if you do decide to downgrade any mac from HS to Sierra, I highly recommend you entirely wipe the Hard drive and reformat it because you want a clean Sierra file system.

I'm not sure what you mean exactly by "entirely wipe the hard drive and reformat it"...? If you really entirely wipe out the boot drive and reformat it then you can no longer turn the computer on.

 

The only risk of the newer machine is that there is some hard-ware specific changes in the new hardware, that are only addressed by High Sierra.

No. The risk I'm talking about is that the newer machine will simply not let you install Sierra. In that case you'd simply get an alert saying the application you're trying to install is too old to run on your machine:

 

well I should add, you can't run the installer from the boot drive directly as you do when you

"upgrade" using the app store..you have to boot from another drive or partition, or make a bootable installer volume.. There are many instructions for how to do this on the net. You basically take the downloaded Sierra installer, and put it into a separate bootable volume, and then boot from it. Then you can wipe and install sierra cleanly on the real boot volume. you can use USB flash drives, DVD's, USB HDD's, another partition, etc. Google around to find out more about how to install OS X cleanly to a new hard drive. The downloaded installer will do it fine, you just have to have it available on another volume to boot from when you run the installer.

too-old-to-be-opened.png

 

If you get that message then obviously Apple is protecting you and it won't work. That's great to hear they are preventing it. So if it doesn't prevent it, then you're probably ok.

 

by the way, MacPro's haven't been changed in a long time. There is in my mind, ZERO CONCERN about installing sierra on any mac pro newer then 2010, including if you bought it this morning and it came with High Sierra on it. But install cleanly as noted above.

you have to boot from another drive or partition, or make a bootable installer volume.. There are many instructions for how to do this on the net.

Right, but those are workarounds, they require multiple drives, can be difficult to perform for the non-technical minded user, and can lead to issues... not exactly a straightforward process. Unless you can share a link that shows us how to do it in a straightforward manner?

exactly why Apple says "should should should" just use High Sierra and don't bother us if you try to be a rebel on sierra

Here's one: https://lifehacker.com/how-to-make-a-bootable-macos-sierra-usb-flash-drive-1786853248

That was my point above - you need to erase the system drive and install from another bootable drive, I think that’s what people usually mean by a ‘clean install’. My 2017 iMac was originally supplied with High Sierra, there are no problems with Sierra at all on this machine.

Here's one: https://lifehacker.com/how-to-make-a-bootable-macos-sierra-usb-flash-drive-1786853248

Yes, that's what I was thinking... it's not exactly straightforward, requires operations that can intimidate non-technically minded users, additional equipment, and can lead to issues with some applications and your home server not functioning properly... as described here: https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/01/29/video-how-to-downgrade-from-macos-high-sierra-to-sierra

That article is basically saying people had problems on High Sierra, such as home server problems, as being a "legitimate" reason to downgrade back to Sierra. Not that going back to sierra caused home server problems.

 

I agree, its not for snowflakes to do the downgrade, but its not really that hard to do a clean install. You just have to be in a position where you don't mind going to clean install and reinstalling all your apps and everything.

That article is basically saying people had problems on High Sierra, such as home server problems, as being a "legitimate" reason to downgrade back to Sierra. Not that going back to sierra caused home server problems.

You're right, I was reading too fast.

OMG

I didnt expect all this response, good to read however, thank you.

 

If I buy a new (used) computer, I will get one that has Sierra installed! or even an earlier OS and then update to Sierra.

 

I am not ready to face High Sierra at this point!

I'm running a 2010 MacPro that was refurbished with 3.33ghz 12 cores...and its great, runs Sierra without any issues whatsoever. The 2012 model is essentially the same and you can get them also refurbished with faster CPU's then they originally came with. Either the 2010 or 2012 models are basically the same hardware and will work with Sierra or High Sierra as you wish. But I'm with you on waiting until later for High Sierra.

 

Apple says they have new Mac Pro coming out...and we shall see when and what that is. When they do, I am confident it will be substantially different then the 2010-12 models. Apple might use that as an excuse to deprecate the 2010-12 models, which would be unfortunate, but they tend to do that.

 

Me personally I'm staying on Sierra until software that i use and must use tells me I have to upgrade to something newer in order to continue using it. LPX will probably do that at some point. But for now its happy with me on Sierra, so I'm not going past that. When it gets to the point that I have to in order to upgrade LPX, then I will go to the minimum OS upgrade I can get away with at that time...never the bleeding edge new.

 

At some point LPX will require a version of OS X that won't run on my 2010 mac..and most likely I will keep using the older version of LPX for a while because I have no plans to buy some $5000 future mac pro that Apple might come out with for a variety of reasons...so... I'm happy that for now I can still run the latest stuff...but in time eventually...i Ill have to either use older versions of things for a while or get a brand new mac. For me at least, that time is going to be at least 5 years out from now, one way or another...

 

good luck.

So I have seen a MacPro that I really like,

it is only 10 months old and eligable for Apple care.

 

Unfortunately the seller updated from Sierra to High Sierra last year.

 

Is it gonna be painlessly possible to downgrade to SIERRA? and whats the procedure? I am not the brightest button re computers, so it needs to be easy!

 

I wont have to save anything as I wont have anything of mine on the computer yet!

 

Any help appreciate