[HN Gopher] Block the "Upgrade to Tahoe" alerts
___________________________________________________________________
Block the "Upgrade to Tahoe" alerts
Author : todsacerdoti
Score : 300 points
Date : 2026-02-28 19:04 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (robservatory.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (robservatory.com)
| thecopy wrote:
| Im planning on getting the new M5 MBP i expect to be released
| next week. Is it possible to downgrade? I assume it comes with
| Tahoe :(
| mpalmer wrote:
| Almost certainly not :|
| mhurron wrote:
| Typically no, Mac's don't expect to run versions of macOS
| before the one they were released with.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| Why not buy a used M4 Pro/Max?
| layer8 wrote:
| It's not worth it, especially since the M6 MBP is rumored to
| already come out later this year (though likely with a price
| hike): https://9to5mac.com/2026/02/26/two-unique-new-macbook-
| pros-a...
| cosmic_cheese wrote:
| Depends on what one is looking for. I'm considering upgrading
| to an M5 model because while the M6 redesign might come with
| some nicer specs, it's also going to be coming with some
| teething pains by virtue of having a new design. The M5
| generation is probably going to be a speed bump with a
| chassis and screen that's a known quantity and has had the
| kinks smoothed out.
| DavidPiper wrote:
| I'm also cautious of the redesign. But I got burned by the
| first Touchbar Macbook back in the day, so twice shy etc.
| ProllyInfamous wrote:
| I skipped the touchbar/buttery era, but before that the
| GPU/ballgate disaster plagued the MacBookPro lineup --
| pushed me away from Apple hardware for over decade!
|
| My vision has since gotten bad enough that I _can 't
| really use laptops/phones well_, anymore -- but recently
| got a 15" MacBookAir, M3 pre-Tahoe (for bedtime
| youtubies).
|
| The hardware is exceptional, battery life _even more
| so_... and I 'll never update the operating system.
| sgloutnikov wrote:
| It's possible if you do a wipe and do a fresh install. You
| essentially boot into the Sequoia installer. I'm also looking
| at possibly picking up a M5 MBP and was the first things I
| looked into.
| grliga wrote:
| I bought a refurb m4 mac recently just to avoid tahoe slop ...
| worth considering, I think.
| bla3 wrote:
| https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/02/how-to-downgrade-fro...
| describes how to downgrade.
| latexr wrote:
| From that page:
|
| > As a rule of thumb, Macs will not run any version of macOS
| older than the one they shipped with when they launched.
| Apple provides security updates for older versions of macOS,
| but it _doesn't_ bother backporting drivers and other
| hardware support from newer versions to older ones.
|
| So the answer is "no", they probably won't be able to
| downgrade on the models that are about to be released.
| DavidPiper wrote:
| I accidentally hit the wrong button a few weeks ago and upgraded
| to Tahoe. I didn't think it was that big a deal at the time, I'd
| just been putting it off.
|
| But having used it for a few weeks now I can confirm it is a
| strict downgrade over Sequoia for me. I use none of the new
| features it has introduced, and the changes to existing features
| are just worse.
|
| Some UI animations are slow and jittery - and this is on an M4
| Pro. The Finder has gone from fine to janky once again,
| especially with horizontal scroll. The window corners and mouse
| interactions are indeed annoying (I'd assumed the many complaints
| were at least slight hyperbole). Left-aligned window titles are
| unbalanced and ugly. I've had weird (visual) app duplication
| issues with the Application smart-folder in the Dock. Cross-
| device copy-paste SEEMS to be more flaky than usual. And most
| petty of all I really don't like the new icons - especially the
| Trash icon for some reason.
| Hamuko wrote:
| I have Tahoe on my work laptop and Sequoia on my personal
| desktop, and the thing that keeps me the most rooted on Sequoia
| is the padding. Everything on Tahoe is padded to hell and back.
| And the new tab design sucks so much. iTerm2 tabs look fucking
| terrible in it.
| dgemm wrote:
| Same - 13" macbook screen becomes less functional when you
| fill it with padding.
| mxs_ wrote:
| they have really tried hard to make the entire OS less
| usable. I'm not an "iToddler", I paid for a Unix workstation
| and will not have lower information density forced onto me.
| deadbabe wrote:
| Why are you not using Ghostty instead of iTerm2?
| chrisandchris wrote:
| Not OP, but iTerm is the one I knew and it does it's job.
| No need to move away from something that works.
| yearolinuxdsktp wrote:
| No ability to search the scroll back buffer. Stuck on the
| latest 1.2 release, there shall be no more, even though
| important bug fixes like memory leaks when using Claude are
| not backported. That's a wild "go F yourself" decision.
| Ghostty crashed the other day for me, I have zero
| expectations that crash will be fixed for me until the 1.3
| release. And when that release happens, the cycle of
| ridiculousness will restart. All the windows are gone when
| it crashes. I'm not ready to run Ghostty nightlies, last
| thing I need is the increased chance of crashing or bugs.
|
| About to switch to native Terminal.app since it now
| supports truecolor. Or back to iTerm2.
| Tom1380 wrote:
| Give Kitty a try. It's my go to on both Mac and Linux, I
| really enjoy it
| wpm wrote:
| Why should an iTerm user switch to ghostty? What do they
| gain by moving away from a highly mature, feature rich,
| native offering?
| deadbabe wrote:
| iTerm is slow as fuck. cat large files in iTerm vs
| Ghostty and you will see the difference. Ghostty always
| stays responsive, and has much lower memory usage. The
| typing latency on Ghostty is so low it really enriches
| the terminal experience. People still using stuff like
| iTerm2 are likely just either not using their terminal
| very often or are ignorant to the wider terminal emulator
| market.
| iaaan wrote:
| Not the person you replied to, but I immediately switched
| back to iTerm2 after finding that Ghostty broke SSH to
| nearly all my servers by having an odd custom terminfo
| thing or something. iTerm2 requires no extra configuration
| after install on my end, whereas I needed to change several
| things about Ghostty and the UX for changing settings is
| terrible.
| deadbabe wrote:
| sounds like user error, SSH is fine in Ghostty.
| gib444 wrote:
| > Some UI animations are slow and jittery - and this is on an
| M4 Pro
|
| On an M4 Pro! Pure planned obsecelence. Noticed it regularly
| with major MacOS releases. Nothing will convince me otherwise.
| teaearlgraycold wrote:
| Yeah they should have bought the M5 Pro /s
| kdheiwns wrote:
| I got an M5 and it unfortunately had Tahoe preinstalled. Out
| of the box, Quicklook is choppy. My non-Tahoe M1 is buttery
| smooth. I don't know how Apple managed to ruin a feature
| that's been running smoothly for decades.
| Barbing wrote:
| Yikes. That's terrible (it's a great feature[+]).
|
| [+]just discovered this, thanks Sindre who I always run
| into searching: https://github.com/sindresorhus/quick-look-
| plugins
|
| (but I'm on Sequoia so they work perfectly!)
| Gigachad wrote:
| Anecdotally, I've had Tahoe installed for ages now and it
| runs perfectly smooth on my M1 Pro with an external 4k
| display as well.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| Same for me on a standard M1. The UI is degraded though.
| stevekemp wrote:
| I run a terminal, emacs, and firefox. That's about all I
| need to work/develop, and I've not noticed anything
| negative since the upgrade.
|
| I guess I'm not a power-user though.
| TuxSH wrote:
| Also Apple Music is much worse (harder to bring miniplayer,
| seek bar harder to use) and list of misfeatures goes on and on
| and on
| ed_mercer wrote:
| Oh man, that's concerning since it was already terrible on
| Sonoma. I've been using Museeks for years now.
| wombatpm wrote:
| You have to give Apple credit where credit is due. They have
| managed to make first iTunes and now Music worse with every
| release. Which is truly amazing.
| dgxyz wrote:
| Aye it's fucking terrible. Seek bar is impossible.
| laserlight wrote:
| I've lowered my expectations over the years, but there's this
| single stupidity that drives me crazy: When you search for a
| keyword and play a song from the results, playback continues
| with the rest of the search results. Why the hell would I
| want to play all of the songs with similar names? iOS Music,
| on the other hand, does the expected and creates a station
| from the first played search result.
| cmg wrote:
| The fact that in the miniplayer you can't display both the
| album art and the track information at the same time unless
| the cursor is hovering over the window absolutely boggles my
| mind. If I'm listening to a station, I want to glance over
| and see what I'm listening to. And I like the album art
| showing. This worked until Tahoe.
|
| View menu > Hide Large Artwork will show the track info, but
| you of course lose the album art.
|
| Of course it's not a major issue, it doesn't make the system
| unusable, but it was a nice little experience thing.
| hedora wrote:
| All I know about modern Apple Music is that it's always
| active in now playing when nothing else is playing, and
| accidentally pressing play sometimes summons an account
| setup screen.
|
| I never use it, and wish I could delete it.
| apparent wrote:
| Good to know. My dad recently asked and I didn't know the
| pros/cons. I haven't upgraded but that's because I don't have a
| need to. He has a new Mac mini, and I thought it might make
| sense for him. But it sounds like it's not an upgrade, and is
| possibly a downgrade, especially if it will make things harder
| to find.
| DavidPiper wrote:
| I've also had a proper Thunderbolt display freak out where
| the entire desktop just suddenly decides to ultra-
| saturate/ultra-contrast. Happened twice, across restarts.
| After the second restart it stopped, but I can't explain it
| and nothing like it has happened before/since/with other
| machines I connect to the screen with the same cable.
|
| Not sure about "harder to find" but the sheer number of
| unexplainable glitches and slowness means I wouldn't
| otherwise have upgraded had I known. Waiting for a higher
| 26.X release might be worthwhile.
| charles_f wrote:
| I did the same mistake a few weeks ago ; my company enforces
| security updates and I picked the Tahoe update instead of the
| security one. I told myself, what the hell, might as well give
| it a try!
|
| I wiped my computer and reinstalled Sequoia last week.
| a012 wrote:
| You're lucky that you had a choice. The security policy in my
| company forces our laptop to be up to date no matter what.
| You can resist to update for some time but then they'll force
| update through management system and sometime it happens in
| the middle of out meeting
| userbinator wrote:
| _Some UI animations are slow and jittery - and this is on an M4
| Pro._
|
| It's clear that no one at Apple (or any other big tech company
| these days) has ever watched old demoscene productions, then
| contemplated their performance against the available computing
| power of their current products and the experience thereof, and
| thought "something is very wrong".
| psychoslave wrote:
| I don't know, I started using a Mac only 3 years ago when
| joining my current job. The UX always felt so wrong on every
| matter to me. I don't get where the reputation came from, maybe
| from an era that was already only mere memory when I started to
| use it.
|
| I would pick a default bare gnome 3 agaisnt any Mac os version
| UX without any hesitation.
|
| With a lot of tools from third parties, it puts back the level
| to supportable, but that's the highest satisfaction level it
| ever procured to me. Rectangle and some alternative window
| switcher plus brew are the minimum to survive without going
| crazy after 2 minutes of exposition. Having finder always
| present in window switcher and no way to close/hide it? What a
| monstrosity!
|
| I'm still looking for a working solution to select and paste
| with middle click.
|
| Glad I don't have to use it out of work.
| lapcat wrote:
| > I don't get where the reputation came from, maybe from an
| era that was already only mere memory when I started to use
| it.
|
| Peak Mac design was 20 years ago, before iPhone. That was
| where the reputation came from.
|
| Since iPhone became Apple's darling, and especially since
| Steve Jobs died, the Mac UI has been systematically wrecked,
| year by year. iPhone design has also been systematically
| wrecked since Jobs died. Tim Cook clearly had no idea what he
| was doing when he put hardware designer Jony Ive in charge of
| software with iOS 7, something that Jobs never did with Ive.
| thunky wrote:
| > I would pick a default bare gnome 3 agaisnt any Mac os
| version UX without any hesitation.
|
| Yeah it's a head scratcher for me too.
|
| So many devs only want to work on a Mac yet they build
| software that runs on NOT Mac. Then they have to jump through
| hoops like architecture mismatch and docker having to run a
| Linux vm anyway.
| rdtsc wrote:
| I prefer Linux as well just to get the same tools and
| architecture like you said. But at work everything
| corporate is configured for mac by default. So running
| Linux is a battle to having to keep up with VPN and other
| stuff they have.
| robhlt wrote:
| All that Corporate IT stuff can work on Linux, we just
| have to start demanding Linux for them to put in the
| effort. Macs used to be in the same position, Corporate
| IT only knew how to manage Windows so that's what
| everyone got. Eventually the ability to use a Mac became
| enough of a recruitment draw that they had to make it
| work. The same thing can happen with Linux.
| lmz wrote:
| I guess it depends on the kind of "Linux" you want.
| Corporate IT will probably roll out RHEL or similar to
| the desktops, take away your root access, and install a
| virus scanner too.
| jonasdegendt wrote:
| I worked at a bring your own distro place before, ISO
| certified. I don't exactly recall what we had to install
| for compliance but one of them was Clam AV. So it's
| possible.
|
| I recall Arch, Ubuntu, Debian and Fedora being used.
| Relatively small shop though, like 40 devs.
|
| Ironically we were contracting with ASML at the time and
| ended up having to work on Windows machines using Remote
| Desktop 99% of the time.
| wolvoleo wrote:
| It technically can but it's a lot more hassle.
|
| As one example, on Linux most developer tools don't obey
| the system proxy configuration, each tool has its own
| archaic configuration for that. So we end up with a
| lengthy list of how to configure each tool for our MITM
| proxy. Sure, MITM proxies aren't ideal anyway but we're
| unfortunately stuck with this.
|
| Many security tools have a Linux version but omit the GUI
| component where users can do stuff like request
| exceptions. Another big thing for developers because they
| often need that.
|
| WiFi certificate auto provisioning is missing from the
| MDM tool we use. So it has to be all scripted. On windows
| and Mac we just click a box to turn it on. And this works
| differently on different distros.
|
| So yeah as someone who builds Linux management I can
| imagine some companies don't bother.
| matthewmc3 wrote:
| Tahoe will be gone in 7 months when macOS 27 comes out.
| Meanwhile we've been talking about ads in the Windows 11
| start bar since 2021 and Gnome 3's Gnaval gazing since who
| knows when?
|
| Apple tries something weird every now and then and then a
| year later we get something different. Yes, Tahoe was a
| giant miss, but I'd wager macOS is not what really attracts
| devs to Apple anyway - it's the hardware that makes Macs
| such an appealing dev machine. Large glass trackpads with
| incredible touch controls, aluminum bodies, long lasting
| batteries, cool and quiet, great screens, years of support
| - the list goes on.
|
| Snapdragon is only just now finally taking off in the
| Windows/Linux space, so the landscape could finally change
| here soon, but for now anyone who's gone ARM is not looking
| to ever go back to x64 hardware - at least for development
| (gaming is another convo).
| PearlRiver wrote:
| I am at that age were I do not want anything new. Windows
| is still basically what it was when I was young- with the
| caveat that you have to spend a few hours tweaking it.
| Which is not a huge deal for something you do once every
| 5 years.
| thunky wrote:
| > it's the hardware that makes Macs such an appealing dev
| machine. Large glass trackpads with incredible touch
| controls, aluminum bodies, long lasting batteries, cool
| and quiet
|
| Probably so, but I've seen more than a few Macbook Pro
| keyboards dome up due to heat so bad that you couldn't
| close the lid.
| wolvoleo wrote:
| For me KDE, I can't deal with gnome especially 3. But yeah
| moving to KDE from Mac was a breath of fresh air. Finally
| options again to configure my computer the way I want it.
| wpm wrote:
| Alt-tab is an app switcher, not a window switcher, and Finder
| is always running, hence, it appears in alt-tab
| Itoldmyselfso wrote:
| I also accidentally upgraded due dark pattern of auto-selecting
| Sequoia instead of update for Sonoma. Now my external monitor
| won't wake up when waking my macbook from sleep (in clamshell
| mode, lid always closed). Nothing fixes it, beyond infuriating.
| pier25 wrote:
| It's much easier to simply use this with whatever date you
| prefer: defaults write com.apple.SoftwareUpdate
| MajorOSUserNotificationDate -date "2030-03-03 12:00:00 +0000"
| egb wrote:
| I've got that in place and still get the Tahoe popups, so
| there's some other mechanism here.
| testing22321 wrote:
| Same for me.
|
| I setup a focus for do not disturb that runs from 12am to
| 11:59pm every Day.
|
| Have not seen the popup on 4 weeks since I set it up
| nottorp wrote:
| Confirming. I tried that several times and it never sticks.
| Sequoia here.
| fidotron wrote:
| Same problem here.
|
| Linux + KDE surpassed Windows many years ago, now I find I also
| prefer it to the Mac laptops, which are otherwise better only for
| portability.
|
| Apple need to get their software act together. Such a shame
| because the hardware is awesome. A near perfect inversion of the
| era of Tiger on the G4.
| OsrsNeedsf2P wrote:
| Linux + KDE has a significantly worse UI than Tahoe
| coeneedell wrote:
| I'm gonna need a more detailed argument than that.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It isn't really a worthwhile argument. Linux has so many
| window managers, whatever somebody likes about MacOS
| there's one that does it better.
| nurettin wrote:
| Started with kde2, then openbox (2000s), then i3 (2010s),
| these days I got so used to gnome, anything else feels
| like a downgrade. So probably it is just what you're used
| to.
| notpushkin wrote:
| One thing I really like about macOS is the shortcuts. You
| can fairly easily get 90% there on KDE, though. The last
| 10% is tricky regardless of the WM you choose: some apps
| just don't want you to mess with the shortsuts in this
| way (looking at you, Mozilla).
|
| Apart from that, honestly? With global menu, KDE is
| nearly indistinguishable from how I use macOS.
| dotancohen wrote:
| I'm a KDE user who is currently on his second stint using a
| Mac - the last was in 2017. I'm trying to be as objective as
| possible, but my list of "it works better on Linux" is far
| longer than the "it works better on Mac" list. I'd love to
| know your arguments.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| KDE's spacing, fonts, margins, iconography and lack of
| consistency is painful to look at. Gnome is far outpacing
| KDE in that regard
| notpushkin wrote:
| Could you elaborate? I see no glaring typography problems
| on KDE (while there are quite a few on macOS, IMO).
| Iconography - IDK, fairly consistent on the default
| theme, but it is a bit of a peculiar look.
| 201984 wrote:
| Ugly doesn't matter as long as it works better (and I
| heavily disagree on all of the things you stated.)
| dotancohen wrote:
| Aestheticly to each his own. Maybe I'm used to KDE
| aesthetics. But KDE-on-Linux far outshines the Mac for
| window management, copy-paste via highlight, Always-on-
| top, mobile phone integration (KDE connect), keyboard
| control, accessibility (especially Sticky Keys), keyboard
| language switching options, click handling in background
| windows, proper readline support in bash and zsh,
| integration with third party software such as Emacs (I
| practically live in Org mode), proper handling of
| multiple users on a single machine, and so many other
| things that I just can't think of right now.
| blahgeek wrote:
| Apple is and always has been a hardware company. I would like
| to use the Linux ecosystem, however there's simply no laptop
| other than Mac that is light and powerful and runs 15 hours in
| battery.
| skydhash wrote:
| I much prefer to plug a charger every 5 hours (not that much
| of an inconvenience) than to suffer bad UX and distractions
| continuously.
| olyjohn wrote:
| Where the hell do people go that they are away from power
| for 15 hours and are on the computer the whole time? Are
| they video editing while in the middle of a safari?
|
| And besides, every time I see comments like this, all I can
| think is that they never have even tried to find a PC
| laptop that is small, fast and has good battery life.
| Believe it or not they exist.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| 15h on light use is a full workday of more heavy tasks
| einr wrote:
| And how often do you work a full day with no access to a
| charger?
| technothrasher wrote:
| > in the middle of a safari?
|
| Long running batteries would have been useful when I
| first was on safari in 2002. But last year I was on
| safari again, and at camp there was power and wifi in the
| tents. It actually kind of killed some of the romance.
| PearlRiver wrote:
| I feel the same way with smartphones, everyone wants more
| battery. Ten years ago it might be difficult to find a
| place were you can charge your phone but now there are
| sockets everywhere.
| dangus wrote:
| The gap is narrowing every day. I would come close to saying
| this isn't true anymore.
|
| For example, the ASUS TUF A14 is only one hour shorter on the
| real world office productivity test than the M5 MacBook Pro:
|
| https://youtu.be/3Q837Uclwp8
|
| (Battery life section)
|
| It also lasts _longer_ than the M4 Pro MacBook Pro 14".
|
| Bonus points: it has replaceable, upgradable, DUAL full size
| SSD slots and replaceable WiFi card.
|
| You're also getting a better discrete graphics chip that you
| can use for higher performance applications, or go on still-
| good integrated graphics to get that great battery life.
|
| Intel Panther Lake systems are rolling out and they have
| graphics performance slightly exceeding the M5 MacBook Pro
| along with excellent power efficiency.
|
| Macs still win out on certain CPU benchmarks and certainly on
| creative benchmarks like video editing, but the truth of the
| matter is unless you're making money editing videos, that
| doesn't matter. It's not like Apple chips are so far ahead
| that buying something else will make you sit in purgatory
| waiting for builds to complete.
|
| I took the plunge recently and got off Mac. I was pleasantly
| surprised that, yes, other hardware is fine. Much of it is
| good, actually.
|
| There are even PC laptops with haptic trackpads, but also,
| you really don't need that. macOS has made itself require it
| by designing around it unnecessarily, presumably to sell more
| $150 external trackpads (e.g., a three finger swipe is really
| not easier to accomplish than a keyboard shortcut, it's just
| overengineering).
|
| Even if you can't get the same battery life...that's
| something a $50 external battery can solve, and I would
| suggest that anything above ~8 hours of battery is more of a
| nice to have than a necessity.
|
| Is it 100% as good in every respect? No. But if you'd rather
| use Linux and the hardware is the only thing in your way, I'd
| start actually looking at other laptops to find one that
| works for you rather than assuming MacBooks as the best. (One
| of the challenges is that there are _so many options_ once
| you leave Mac-land).
| beacon294 wrote:
| I read the old forums carefully:
|
| [BIG Warning: this didn't work for child commenter]
|
| - simply decline/reject the TOS on install. It will auto
| uninstall the installer and go away.
|
| Life has been good since.
| 1f60c wrote:
| I TRUSTED YOU! Nooooooooo!
|
| Anyway, I hope you're happy.
|
| (I thought it would show me a TOS prompt again, but it did not.
| My bad.)
| beacon294 wrote:
| What? Let me put this warning in the top comment. I got one.
| xbar wrote:
| Thank you. I own several Macs. One is on Tahoe. It feels the
| worst. More than myself, though, I need to give my less technical
| family members a respite from the tricky traps that lead to
| inadvertently installing it.
| n8cpdx wrote:
| As bad as it is, I don't think it is bad in ways that non
| technical users are likely to notice unfortunately. Mostly
| because I think years of horrible software have trained people
| to not have expectations.
|
| Tahoe is still a breath of fresh air compared to Windows, and
| iOS 26 is still great compared to Android (as I've
| unfortunately learned from a failed switch attempt).
| mjorgers wrote:
| What makes you say that about Android? I'm a iOS user, but
| was under the impression that Android was already quite
| polished, especially the stock experience (as it is with
| pixel phones)
| n8cpdx wrote:
| It comes down mostly to app quality. The apps that are
| present are not as polished in ways that I found
| intolerable:
|
| - myNetDiary: seemingly equivalent features, but was super
| stuttery on Android - like 20fps just scrolling and
| interacting. It also didn't feel native at all
|
| - Transit: the app was extremely glitch when trying to
| scroll. Seizure inducing.
|
| - Wire guard supports on demand tunnel on iOS and macOS. No
| such option on Android. Inconceivable.
|
| - If you want a polished experience, you have to install
| the Pixel/Google equivalents of apps, and it is hard to use
| them in ways that aren't associated with your Google
| account. The built-in messages app is horrible so you need
| to install Google Messages. If you're logged into Play
| you're logged into Google Messages; no choice in the
| matter. If you want a good camera you need to install Pixel
| camera, and they leverage that to lock you into Google
| Photos. iOS is no better, but the trade off with Android is
| less polish for more choice, not less polish for the same
| strong arm lock in tactics.
|
| - the OS hijack navigation in ways that are horrible for
| day to day browsing. In particular, there are no forward
| gestures because android insists on making swipe left from
| the right edge go back. I was told android is customizable
| but there is no option here. Consequence: no draggable
| scrollbar, no forward navigation in browsers.
|
| - the built-in calendar (Google calendar) doesn't support
| drag and drop for adjusting event times. It made the
| calendar app excruciating to use - everything takes many
| more taps than iOS. Also, no support for CalDAV and CardDAV
| out of the box means Android is a bad choice if you self
| host. I tried DAVx5 but found it unreliable.
|
| - Google Calendar won't show local calendar entries on open
| until you navigate to a different app then go back.
|
| - The back gesture works differently more or less at
| random. Sometimes an app screen is part of the navigation
| stack, sometimes it isn't. Because android apps assume you
| will have a back button, they don't provide any back
| option, but it is always ambiguous what back will do -
| close the keyboard, close the app, close the menu, navigate
| back within the app. On iOS the options are different but
| more clearly presented and overall far more consistent than
| android.
|
| - copy and paste is less consistent than iOS. Sometimes it
| for some reason makes me do a detour through a full screen
| text editor. Not really sure why.
|
| - app design is inconsistent - a mix of pre-material,
| material 1, and material 3/you.
|
| - doesn't have basic features I've come to rely on. Like on
| iOS I can make an app require biometrics to open. No such
| option with stock android launcher. Similarly, basic
| android doesn't seem to have the photo slides how option
| for backgrounds, which I love on my iPhone.
|
| - Android has poor support for RCS. RCS just worked on my
| iPhone, but it failed to set up after a day of trying on
| the Pixel.
|
| - Health Connect does a bad job deduplicating data. On iOS
| my watch, phone, earphones, etc all contribute data. IOS
| can handle this without eg double counting steps. Health
| Connect cannot. There are also fewer options for
| visualizing the data, since Health Connect is very new,
| whereas HealthKit is well over a decade old.
|
| There are parts of android that are polished. I think the
| basic launcher experience is overall better if you turn off
| the Google Now stuff. I like that the animations are
| faster. Material You, although underrealized, looks great
| where it is implemented, far better than liquid glass.
| kjuulh wrote:
| Upgrading to Sequoia was a mistake, and so was upgrading to
| Tahoe.
|
| I like new and shiny software, but these two releases aren't
| great. Outside of a good amount of bugs. It is wild to me that
| Apple can't even get their own UI consistent.
|
| Apples own apps are pretty much the only things you can't close.
| Finder: can't quit. System settings, somehow doesn't expand
| horizontally (are we still in the 2000s apple?) I haven't felt
| the liquid glass or whatever too much on the laptop, but I just
| used one of my family members Iphone today, and man it was
| distracting, it seems crazy that contrast has gone out the
| window.
|
| But especially the bugs. Apple should really take a release that
| is just bug fixing. I had to switch out Spotlight because it kept
| trying to want to index my entire system, which is hard when you
| work in both Rust and typescript projects (lots of small files).
| roughly wrote:
| I've been a pretty die hard Mac user for 25-odd years now (I own
| a HomePod, for fuck sake), but this is the first time I've taken
| pains to _not_ update to the latest OS. The Tahoe UI/UX is really
| just inexcusable, and nothing else I've heard or seen makes me
| willing to put up with it. I'm very much hoping they course
| correct soon, but as sits, my Linux box is suddenly starting to
| look like the future.
| halapro wrote:
| I'm the guy who installs OS betas on their main/only devices
| (going back to Windows Vista beta) and I don't think I'll be
| installing this OS anytime soon. I'm more hoping that they get
| their act together by September 2026's release.
| dzink wrote:
| Dear Apple, no latency from brain to action is the greatest
| design you can possibly have. We want to feel one with the
| machine. That's the greatest joy and difference between a Mac and
| a Windows machine. Adding latency to the fastest machine possible
| is criminal. Please STOP DOING IT with unnecessary animations.
| halapro wrote:
| I think you're in the wrong ecosystem if you don't like
| animations. Over the top animations have been at the core of
| Apple, I still remember the "drop in the water" animation of OS
| X Tiger's Dashboard. 20 years ago.
| dijit wrote:
| I think you're overselling it, the minimise? Sure.
|
| But I can't think of a single animation that added a _delay_
| to processing on MacOS.
|
| Compare to say, Windows, at least.
| dzink wrote:
| Try Liquid Glass on iphone. Absolutely horrible if you
| don't turn off all the motion.
| fooster wrote:
| I don't find that to be the case.
| bee_rider wrote:
| The changes of Liquid Glass are the what everyone is
| complaining about, right? Previously they were OK at
| designing UI.
| bryzaguy wrote:
| I was really nervous about the update to Liquid Glass
| based on comments like this but my experience has been
| really positive. I love the new contextual tooltip menu
| when I try to select text and other thoughtful details.
| Maybe there's things I'm not bumping into?
| Oreb wrote:
| I honestly don't understand why Liquid Glass provokes so
| strong reactions. To me it's not that radically different
| from the old design. I don't love it, and I don't hate
| it. There is nothing new that in any way impacts how I
| use or experience my iPhone, my iPad or my Mac. My
| reaction to Liquid Glass was pretty much a neutral "looks
| a little bit different, I guess" before forgetting about
| it.
| misiek08 wrote:
| For me it was (or is) funny. After update I had a lot of
| controls in the same color as background. Wondering why I
| can't do some actions I took my friends phone and built
| in apps looked different than mine. Photos didn't even
| show the top bar. Rebooted - I have it! Then photos
| started crashing every few days and I'm not heavy user.
| Currently I'm fed up, because Camera starts up once per
| 20-30 runs for more than 10 seconds (I wait to see if it
| will start in the end).
|
| I was hater of Apple, then switched around 2018 to be
| happy user until 2025. Looking for Android brand that
| allows loading clean system to not get bad experience
| after few months like with Shitsung.
| lynndotpy wrote:
| Switching desktops on MacOS is a >1 second long animation
| that blocks input which can't be disabled. It can only be
| replaced with a fade in/out which is just as long.
| exitb wrote:
| Unless you disable ProMotion in favor of static 60Hz.
| Then it's reasonably fast again. It's been broken like
| that for ages.
| dieulot wrote:
| No, it's >1 second on every machine.
| exitb wrote:
| I don't know about your particular case, but there's lots
| of people pointing to this exact issue.
|
| https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/438188/latency-
| whe...
| dzink wrote:
| I use their accessibility features to stop all animations I
| can. Maybe if more people upvote here they will hear us. No
| point in suffering in silence.
| lynndotpy wrote:
| I agree with this entirely:
|
| > no latency from brain to action is the greatest design
| you can possibly have. We want to feel one with the
| machine.
|
| But... I used Windows growing up before switching to Linux,
| and I've been using a Macbook in recent years. Both Windows
| and Linux can be configured to run with no animation lag,
| but AFAIK this is just not possible in MacOS. I can't
| imagine doing anything serious on MacOS with animation log
| completely interrupting my train of thought or flow state.
|
| I'm no Windows fan, but at least circa 2019, I know Windows
| 10 could be configured to be similarly snappy and free of
| laggy animations.
|
| The greatest sin in MacOS is the immense lag when switching
| desktops ("Spaces"). It's a baffling design decision, I
| can't believe it's intentional.
| freetonik wrote:
| The speed of the desktop switching animation also depends
| on the refresh rate of the monitor, by the way. Baffling.
| Citizen_Lame wrote:
| Same applies to iPhones. Lag (animation) between action
| and result drives me crazy. Accessibility settings don't
| help much.
|
| At least Android still allows you to set animation scale,
| for now.
| p_ing wrote:
| Of course "Apple" isn't listening here. Leave the upvote
| begging to reddit.
|
| Apple has proper channels for this, including
| https://www.apple.com/feedback/macos/.
|
| Given Apple has provided a workaround, don't expect any
| changes.
| bartread wrote:
| Any competent product leader will look far beyond the
| bounds of their official support channels for useful
| feedback.
| p_ing wrote:
| This is Apple you're talking about.
| OptionOfT wrote:
| Except auto-playing videos in browser.
| JSR_FDED wrote:
| I've used Little Snitch to block the installation of Tahoe. I get
| a notification every few days, it when I click on it there's a
| message that it can't download the update. Massive stress reducer
| knowing I can't accidentally upgrade to Tahoe.
| lapcat wrote:
| > I get a notification every few days
|
| Blocking mobileassetd should stop that:
|
| https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2026/1/6.html
| schmeichel wrote:
| Out of curiosity, how did you go about doing that? That sounds
| really nice and I'd be interested to see if it could work with
| LuLu as well.
| post-it wrote:
| Adding my opinion: Sequoia was fine and so is Tahoe on a base M2.
| Can't say I've noticed a usability difference. I also prefer
| using a trackpad over a mouse and I don't know very many keyboard
| shortcuts, and I only use one monitor.
| CharlesW wrote:
| I'm happy to report that Tahoe is also no slower on M1 Macs.
| celsoazevedo wrote:
| Some animations (eg: a popup) are choppy on our M1 Macbook
| Air. I wonder why it's smooth for some, but not for others.
| dirasieb wrote:
| no issues here either, macbook air m4 + 2k 180hz monitor + a
| bunch of usb and bluetooth peripherals
|
| the only thing i miss from sequoia so far is the launchpad, but
| i've already adapted to just using spotlight
| travisvn wrote:
| Hey everyone, I'm the owner of the repo that Rob references in
| his blog post (https://github.com/travisvn/stop-tahoe-update)
|
| Just wanted to comment to see if I can help answer any questions
| as well as mentioning that we improved the instructions in the
| README based on some of the points Rob made a few weeks back.
|
| There really are a large number of us out there that _know_ Tahoe
| would be a downgrade to their current setup
|
| If you have any ideas on how to improve the resilience of the
| workarounds, _please_ connect on the GitHub, or just starring the
| repo would help, as the project would get more attention and
| hopefully more solutions offered as a result.
|
| It's frustrating to feel like your computer isn't.. yours anymore
| when you're pushed so insistently like with this "upgrade".
| Hopefully we can figure out some sustainable ways to get some
| autonomy back.
| the-mitr wrote:
| Thanks for your work!
| tempodox wrote:
| I just wanted to thank you for this work. I wouldn't have known
| where to start. Reading about all the hoops to jump through I
| can't help but think that macOS is getting ever closer to being
| malware, just like Windows. An OS you have to fight to stay
| productive. I've been a Mac user since 1995, but the way this
| has been going over so many years now, I can't imagine my next
| computer to be yet another Mac any more. I have been forced to
| view Linux as the last refuge. It was nice while it lasted, but
| eventually Stallman was right the whole time.
| MagerValp wrote:
| You'll be disappointed to learn that the deferral is 90 days
| from the release of the major OS version, not 90 days from when
| the configuration is set. There appears to be a bug in the
| delay logic in 15.7.3, but you really shouldn't be running that
| -- there are some important security fixes in 15.7.4.
| p_ing wrote:
| Not all security fixes are backported so unfortunately if
| you're concerned about vulnerabilities, updating to the current
| release OS is a requirement.
|
| https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/software-update-p...
| lapcat wrote:
| On the other hand, not all new security vulnerabilities are
| backported either.
|
| Do you think that new major OS versions introduce only fixes
| and not bugs?
|
| I think version N-1 is a good balance between getting the
| fixes and avoiding the new bugs.
| p_ing wrote:
| If you can deal with known vulnerabilities and cross-
| reference all of Apple's CVE notes, more power to you. I
| can't say I have that much free time (Liquid Glass sucks,
| though).
| lapcat wrote:
| > cross-reference all of Apple's CVE notes
|
| I never suggested that. But Apple itself prioritizes
| patches by severity when deciding what to backport.
|
| Some issues are so severe that Apple occasionally
| releases a new security update for previous OS versions
| that no longer receive security updates otherwise.
|
| A lot of issues are merely privilege escalation, which is
| not necessarily a big problem on a personal computer.
| dont__panic wrote:
| Much easier: switch to the Sequoia public beta channel!
| burnt-resistor wrote:
| Exactly. I was going to write this. The "beta" channel, once
| RTM, becomes the release channel of that version.
| bouke wrote:
| I'm curious about what updates will get pushed through that
| channel. Is it just RTM updates, or will it also include beta
| updates? It's currently offering 15.7.5 through that channel.
| kgwgk wrote:
| Thanks for the idea. Now MacOS is happy and so am I.
| seabass wrote:
| A few weeks ago Apple had a tiny (<10MB) update for media codecs
| ready to install on my MBP. I expanded the details for that
| software update and saw that if I had run it, it would also have
| downloaded and installed Tahoe. Apple is burning so much trust
| right now with these dark patterns.
| treesknees wrote:
| It's been like that for several years.
| fuzzythinker wrote:
| Comments here paints Tahoe very poorly, and I trust comments here
| on this topic. This is very bad for Apple as OS from new Macs can
| not be downgraded and customers like myself will either delay
| purchases til hopefully next OS fix these issues (not having high
| hopes) or buy in the 2nd hand market for older OS.
| brandonmenc wrote:
| I held out.
|
| Then I upgraded my work laptop to test it out. Then my phone. Now
| my personal laptop.
|
| I actually like it.
|
| Everything is snappier. The glass effects are not nearly as
| annoying as I expected.
|
| ymmv
| techacolyte42 wrote:
| I got a work computer that was on Sonoma and had to update. Was
| prepared to be angry, especially after the time spent updating,
| and then it's eh, fine. The picture of Lake Tahoe makes me
| happy.
| nottorp wrote:
| Hmm. You get to see the desktop picture. You only run one
| application at a time and close it when finished then?
|
| I suppose Tahoe's performance regressions wouldn't count
| then.
| yearolinuxdsktp wrote:
| Your passive-aggressive comment doesn't deserve a response,
| but I'll bite.
|
| You see the desktop picture when you walk up to the Mac to
| unlock it, or immediately after you lock it before walking
| away. Or momentarily when you use Expose or move windows
| out of the way to access files on the desktop.
|
| Or if you are running multiple monitors, it's common to
| clear out a side monitor or half of one for a new
| window/different app.
|
| And I have more windows open than a Microsoft test lab.
| jedberg wrote:
| Interesting, I'm running Sequoia and have never seen that.
|
| However, I'm running Sequoa developer beta. In my system settings
| under Beta updates, I have "Sequoia developer beta" selected.
|
| At this point it's basically just getting the Sequoa security
| patches a few days early. But I guess it also suppresses this
| message?
| nikcub wrote:
| so we're all going to hold onto sequoia like we did snow leopard.
| only reason i'm not buying a new mac at the moment is because it
| would force me to upgrade.
|
| the situation is absurd ..
|
| fwiw switching to the sequoia beta channel in system settings
| killed the nag notifications for me (I believe the profile as
| defined in OP will stop _all_ updates - which you probably don 't
| want)
| ProllyInfamous wrote:
| My historic "sticking points" have been macOS 9.1, 10.8, 10.13,
| & presently 13.2
|
| I'm getting old enough that it's rational thinking: _pre-AI
| /pre-Tahoe operating systems_ will be accompany me into death.
| lapcat wrote:
| But you probably don't want to receive all and only beta
| updates either, which is what the beta channel will give you.
| olyjohn wrote:
| Might as well just rip off the band aid and learn to suck it up.
| Fixing Windows and MacOS with these fucking shitty hacks and
| doesn't work forever. You will be upgraded, like it or not, or be
| harassed the rest of your life to do so.
| ProllyInfamous wrote:
| Just use a PiHole to block Apple, entirely.
|
| (\\.|^)apple\\.com$
|
| LittleSnitch _is not enough_ for such a systemwide block.
| notpushkin wrote:
| > Run the script as described in the project's Read Me
|
| I don't think this warrants a whole installer script - if you
| replace UUIDs by hand, you can as well read through the
| .mobileconfig file and make sure you understand what the profile
| does, then double click it to install :)
|
| Note that you might also want to remove some other entries from
| the profile, as, from a glance, those might still delay minor
| updates by 30 days. (Or does `forceDelayedSoftwareUpdates=false`
| make these harmless?)
| silvestrov wrote:
| Note that step 3 is not needed anymore (replacing UUID by hand)
| as the script automatically was updated 2 months ago to do that
| automatically.
| lupinglade wrote:
| Apple has been going down hill at an exponential rate since the
| loss of Steve (and subsequently just about all real engineers at
| Apple).
|
| Swift is turning into a mess and SwiftUI is complete, utter
| garbage. Tahoe's UI is unbearable.
|
| The problem is there is no real alternative - Linux is the
| closest thing (but has its issues).
| hedora wrote:
| I've got two linux desktops and a mac. Combined, the linux
| desktops hit issues far less often than the mac.
|
| The Linux desktop environment I use (LXDE) is not perfect, but
| it hits fewer issues than Mac OS. For instance, my Linux box
| doesn't try to melt due to finder reindexing, and alt-tab
| works. Also, I don't have to position the mouse cursor outside
| the window to resize (that bug predates tahoe, fwiw). I haven't
| had any system services or local IPC crap wedge on Linux like
| they do on MacOS (I have seen systemd wedge those sorts of
| things, so I don't use it).
|
| The integration with iMessage, Notes, Photos and phone calls
| are clear wins for the mac, but that's about it.
|
| Some people would say you need nvidia+linux for local
| inference, but, in practice, AMD iGPU and Apple Silicon both
| work well (and you can get 32GB of unified ram for much less
| than a 32GB video card), and the ecosystems are fine. So, I'd
| call that a tie for anything that can reasonably be called a
| personal computer or workstation. Some people would argue Linux
| wins.
|
| If you grab a copy of devuan and slap steam on top of it, then
| it'll be able to run far more commercial and open source games
| than MacOS.
|
| As a daily driver, Linux on a modern vanilla SoC box comes with
| far less day-to-day hassle. (It's getting the same level of "we
| actually tried this exact config" as MacOS does.)
|
| Anyway, I wouldn't really claim Linux has "issues" vs macos at
| this point.
| sunaookami wrote:
| Still on Sonoma, don't plan to upgrade, I'm sick of upgrades that
| break everything or change the UI for the worse. Does anyone know
| how to block the "there is a new version" popup for Pages etc?
| ProllyInfamous wrote:
| This is my favorite PiHole rule (DNS blacklist):
| (\.|^)apple\.com$
|
| One can then _manually_ install OS updates, directly from Apple,
| via <https://mrmacintosh.com/how-to-download-macos-catalina-
| mojav...> directlinks (should one choose to).
| warpspin wrote:
| There were times when we couldn't await to upgrade to the next
| Mac OS version. Tahoe is not one of those versions.
|
| Already iOS 26 made me consider switching to Android, and now
| I've pondered returning to Linux after 26 years on Mac OS.
| Bizarrely, right now it's the quality of the hardware alone
| holding me at Mac OS. Wouldn't have expected that 6 or 7 years
| ago.
|
| Sick of the forced UI refreshes and "modern" designs. Will Apple
| understand again this is where I work and basically live in and
| not some kind of entertainment system where I need design
| refreshes so it feels all shiny and new?
| sgt wrote:
| I just don't get the resistance to Tahoe, and I speak as a macOS
| power user through a couple decades.
|
| Been on Tahoe now for a few weeks. The new rounded corners bug me
| a bit, but aside from that it's been rock stable. The trick with
| macOS is of course not to immediately upgrade. Give it a few
| weeks before you go to a new release.
|
| I've been through all the releases since Jaguar in 2003. There's
| been some ups and downs, and a lot of complaints, but I'd say it
| still remains the most rock solid UNIX(tm) desktop OS out there.
| troad wrote:
| I'm not a huge fan of Tahoe's aesthetics, but the response has
| been near hysterical. It's fine. Apple has done much worse (iOS
| 7 - present).
|
| I wish some of the anger being directed at rounded corners
| would be redirected at the rapidly accumulating list of long-
| standing bugs in macOS instead.
| skort wrote:
| > but I'd say it still remains the most rock solid UNIX(tm)
| desktop OS out there
|
| That doesn't mean that they aren't still constantly making it
| worse.
|
| Apple themselves note that most of the new features in the OS
| are "design" and "apple intelligence". I really don't care for
| these features, so I don't really care to upgrade. Even on the
| Tahoe page, they note many of the features as updates to
| individual apps themselves, so why can't they just release
| those as individual app updates?
|
| I'd rather have a solid OS with a UI that isn't re-imagined
| every other year with more focus on usability improvements and
| bug fixes. And as you note, it is one of the most solid
| UNIX(tm) desktop OS'.
|
| So when Apple puts out a major update that I think is going in
| the wrong direction, how else should I signal my distaste? I
| sent feedback. I posted on their customer forums (which are a
| terrible place for discussion btw). Now I just want to not
| update, but they use dark patterns to try to force it on me. So
| I'm going to be more annoying and vocal about it because I
| think they can and should do better.
| gib444 wrote:
| Also need a solution for Numbers nagging me in the app to upgrade
| (popup blocking my work).
|
| So annoying. I don't want the Numbers-with-AI/premium-upsell-crap
| edition
|
| Anyone in London want to buy a 32GB M4 MBA at a big discount (got
| some cosmetic damage)...?
| mberning wrote:
| The constant, exhausting, and frankly pointless changes to macos
| is really driving me back to rolling my own desktop on freebsd or
| linux. At least under that environment nothing changes unless I
| change it.
| Fethbita wrote:
| The biggest annoyance for me is the removal of Firewire support
| with Tahoe. That's why I keep Sequoia for the time being. I'll
| probably create a new APFS volume and dual boot with Sequoia for
| the foreseeable future for Firewire support.
| delecti wrote:
| What mac hardware still has Firewire ports? My exposure to
| their hardware is mostly limited to the Macbooks of coworkers
| and family members, but I didn't realize there was any overlap
| between Tahoe support (seems to only go back to hardware
| released around 2020) and Firewire ports (seems to only go
| forward to hardware released around 2012).
| Fethbita wrote:
| Thunderbolt port still supports Firewire, so if you have the
| correct adapters, you can connect your old Firewire camcorder
| to digitize cassettes, but with Tahoe, Apple removed the
| Firewire drivers so they no longer work.
|
| See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44504994
| delecti wrote:
| Oh neat, I didn't know that. Thanks.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2026-03-01 23:01 UTC)