Macs are generally known for being very dependable machines that produce little bugs, have a secure sandboxed space to fight off any intrusions (especially so since macOS 10.15 Catalina), and usually present minimum problems for the whole duration of their ownership.
The printer-pausing problem in OS X 10.6.8 may be fixed by replacing the print system's backend file which your printer is using. By Topher Kessler June 27, 2011 After OS X 10.6.8 was released last Thursday, a number of people found that their printers were no longer printing, where the system would show the printers in a paused state and no. It doesn’t just keep you cool, it helps to propel hot air away from your Mac. Air Conditioning The converse to sitting in the sun, working in an air conditioned office means a lower ambient temperature which means that your Mac is not soaking up lots of external or ambient heat. To maintain my sanity, I have done my best to keep as many Macs as possible on the same version of the Mac OS. With few exceptions, that means System 7.5.5. (Or 7.5.3 for a few Macs that are not compatible with 7.5.5.) I find it complete and stable. At this point, I see no reason to ever change most users to Mac OS 8 or newer.
However, occasionally, Macs do allow clashing processes to result in bugs, accumulate too much cache files from resource-intensive apps, and even let in a rare piece of malware if you’ve given it your admin access credentials (please don’t do it).
So there might be a time when you think that your Mac is not the same as it used to be and you probably want to queue a Mac reinstall OS process to start anew. To do that, you need to launch the Mac Recovery Mode.
Chances are you might’ve never even used your Recovery Mode Mac feature before. So what is it?
Recovery Mode is an essential part of macOS utilities and lets you get out of precarious situations when your Mac is seriously stuck or some process is invading your system so much that regular Mac restarting doesn’t seem to help. A thing to do then is to boot Mac in Recovery Mode, which only allows for a few core features to operate.
In such system restore Mac environment, you’re able to:
Restore from Time Machine backup
Reinstall macOS
Get help online (browse Apple’s documentation)
Disk Utility (repair or erase your hard drive)
The natural thing to try and do if you see that your Mac is not working as expected is to go ahead and reinstall OS X. But before you proceed with the Mac system restore process, let’s see if you can fix your Mac using more accessible tools.
You can think about the Mac reinstall OS procedure as some heavy artillery you have at your disposal but that’s reserved for true emergencies. For most situations — Mac slowing down, files piling up, and apps spreading leftovers — a good Mac optimization software should be more than enough.
CleanMyMac X is just the kind of a powerful app that’s able to keep your Mac clean, fast, and secure in no time. It presents you with an easy-to-use toolkit and gives you access to complex operations at the click of a button. For example, you can delete all the duplicate Mail attachments, empty all the Trash bins at once, shred sensitive documents without leaving a trace, run maintenance scripts, flush DNS cache, repair disk permissions, and so much more.
Using CleanMyMac X is as intuitive as it can be:
To speed up your Mac, head to the Maintenance tab under Speed
Select Free Up RAM, Run Maintenance Scripts, Speed Up Mail, Reindex Spotlight, and anything else you find interesting
Click Run
In some rare circumstances, your Mac might become seriously unresponsive, in which case you need to know how to reinstall Mac OS X to pretty much return all system processes back to their default settings.
Another important time to do a Mac reinstall OS is when you’re planning to sell your Mac and want to wipe out all your data completely or perhaps you’ve bought a Mac with someone else’s stuff on it.
In both situations, the process for going into the Recovery Mode Mac feature is the same:
Turn off your Mac and start it back up while holding ⌘ + R
The Recovery Mode Mac menu will open. You can then choose the appropriate course of action. If you experience some systemic problems, you can just choose to reinstall macOS. If you have a Time Machine backup available, choose that. If you’re about to sell your Mac, use Disk Utility to erase your hard drive first and then start your Mac with ⌘ + R again and reinstall OS X. Click here to know more about how to use time machine on mac.
Click Continue and follow the directions for the chosen option
When it comes to using the system restore Mac functionality, most of the time you’d just reinstall macOS you’ve had before. A lesser known trick is to use Mac Recovery Mode to install an older (or in fact the newer) version of the operating system.
So while you use ⌘ + R to go into Recovery Mode for the same macOS, you can use Option + ⌘ + R instead to install the latest compatible macOS or Shift + Option + ⌘ + R for the possibility to get the original macOS that your Mac was shipped with or the oldest available version after that.
Why would you ever need to run an old operating system? Mostly because you might find that some software you depend on is not yet compatible with the latest version of macOS.
Before you go into the Mac system restore environment, it’s good to check that your WiFi is stable and fast or, better yet, connect to a wired connection via Ethernet.
Still, if your WiFi has broken down for one reason or another while you’re in Mac Recovery Mode, there’s a way out:
Find and click the WiFi icon in the menu bar
Select a WiFi network
Enter the password if needed and press Return
Talking about your Mac malfunctioning and all the important macOS utilities that help you with its recovery, it’s impossible to skip the notion of conducting frequent backups — the only thing that stands between your sanity and losing all of your files in an accident. But backups are boring and not something most people would want to bother themselves with, so automation is key.
Get Backup Pro is the most flexible solution for keeping your files safe, regardless of what happens with your Mac. It offers you easy ways to synchronize your Mac with another device, to clone your hard drive to an external one, to establish a scheduled versioned backup routine, and even to do frequent incremental backups of the most important files. Even better, you can mix and match, and create multiple clones of the same files or break up your hard drive in different ways for extra security. A very small price to pay to be able to reinstall Mac OS without losing data at any time.
You might not think about it right now, but it’s likely that at some points you’re going to lose some of your files. Maybe it’s because you’ve overwritten changes on the same document, you’ve accidentally deleted an important file, or your Mac just simply crashed. A robust backup solution would be your first go-to, but what do you do if you need the last version of the document that hasn’t yet been saved anywhere?
Disk Drill is an essential Mac recovery app that can quickly scan your affected hard drive and extract all the recently deleted information in seconds:
Open Disk Drill and wait for it to display all the connected drives
Click Recover next to the hard drive with deleted files and follow the guide
Note: Even though Disk Drill is able to recover old files in most circumstances, it shouldn’t replace your comprehensive backup strategy. Think of Disk Drill as an uber-important tool of last resort.
Here you go, now you know how to reinstall Mac OS X, speed up your Mac with CleanMyMac X, do proper backups with Get Backup Pro, and even recover lost files with Disk Drill.
Best of all, you can try CleanMyMac X, Get Backup Pro, and Disk Drill absolutely free for seven days via Setapp, a platform with more than 170 cool macOS utilities and apps that make your days 10x more productive and fun. Download them all at no cost today and see for yourself!
What’s the best version of the Mac OS for your Mac? It depends on the hardware.
DR writes:
I enjoyed reading How Can I Prepare for Mac OS X?, especially about the different Macs that you’ve owned. I got a Macintosh (yes, just plain Macintosh) in February 1985. Upgraded to a Mac 512K, a.k.a. Fat Mac. Upgraded to a 512Ke (with 128k ROM and a double-sided disk drive!). Got a Mac Classic 4/40. Got a Quadra 605 8/160. Got a used Quadra 630 8/250. Got a Power Computing PowerBase 180 32/1.2. Got a Power Computing PowerCenter Pro 240 64/2. And what a fun ride it has been. : )
While the “How Can I Prepare for Mac OS X?” author is looking forward to Mac OS X, my feelings toward system software, as they called it in the old days, is a bit different. Whichever Mac I’ve owned has been a non-networked computer. A lot of times a newer version of a Mac OS would just run a little slower and take up more hard drive space. The question I like to answer which helps me decide whether to upgrade or not is, “What do I want to do on my Mac that I could do with the new OS that I can’t do with the old OS?” If I can’t find anything, then I stick with what I’ve got. Reason’s I’ve upgraded in the past have been: 1) newer OS required for certain applications 2) hope that the newer OS doesn’t crash as often as the older one (shades of 7.6.1 and the PowerBase 180) and 3) to get HFS+.
There are two possible computers that I may upgrade. Please tell me what you think is the best version of Mac OS to run on each and why. First, my computer. I have a Power Computing PowerCenter Pro 240 with 64 MB RAM, 2 GB hard drive, CD-ROM, Zip drive, Personal LaserWriter 300, external speakers, 56k modem, mic, and a Color QuickCam. I’m running Mac OS 8.1 and thinking about upgrading to 8.5. “What would I want to do on my Mac that I could do with 8.5 that I can’t do with the 8.1?” Also the potential hard drive problem causes me to hesitate upgrading as well.
The second computer: my sister has inherited the Macs that I didn’t sell. Currently, she has a Quadra 630 with 20 MB of RAM, 250 MB hard drive, inkjet printer, external CD-ROM, and a 33.6 kbps modem. She is currently using version 7.5.5. She’s not a power user. She just uses the Internet a little and uses WriteNow a little. She’s had some difficulty keeping her Internet connection. This could be related to the noisy phone lines in her rural area, but different system software may help her also. What version of Mac OS do you think is best for her?
During the day, I support a network of 70-some Macs. The oldest, sold about two years ago, was a 2.5 MB Mac Plus with 20 MB GCC HyperDrive. The newest are a Power Mac G3/266 and a PowerBook G3/233. And there are probably two dozen different models between those extremes.
To maintain my sanity, I have done my best to keep as many Macs as possible on the same version of the Mac OS. With few exceptions, that means System 7.5.5. (Or 7.5.3 for a few Macs that are not compatible with 7.5.5.) I find it complete and stable. At this point, I see no reason to ever change most users to Mac OS 8 or newer. None.
The only Macs I would hesitate to run 7.5.5 on are the old 8 MHz 68000-based ones. While they can run System 7.5.5, they feel a lot more responsive with System 6.0.8.
A couple machines need Mac OS 7.6, so that’s what they get. Just a few of us are using Mac OS 8.1 – some because it came with the computers, three others so we can be familiar with it (and we’re now testing 8.5.1). By choice, I don’t use HFS+, a choice I made before Norton Utilities 4, which has problems with HFS+.
Nice as HFS+ would be, the extra 100 MB it frees on my hard drive hasn’t been worth the struggles of getting it to work correctly. Twice I’ve invested over half-a-day in trying to make my system work with HFS+. Both times I’ve reverted to HFS. I’m sure I’ll go HFS+ soon, but I need to have the free time to troubleshoot any problems that may arise. (See HFS+ Nightmares and Beyond HFS+ Nightmares for the full story.)
Unless you work with a lot of small files on a large drive, I don’t see HFS+ as a compelling reason to upgrade. I’m happily using Mac OS 8.1 without it.
That said, I love the spring loaded folders, which really reduce desktop clutter. At home, I love the PPP stability – even better than FreePPP. Contextual menus are nice, but the main reason I switched at home was because I have 8.1 at work. It’s much easier to work on the same version of the OS than to go back and forth.
I haven’t run Mac OS 8.1 on a 68040-based Mac, but my son (who now uses my old Centris 610) did the upgrade and says it’s very stable – and faster than 7.5.5 was. I’ve heard similar reports from others. The ability to jettison pre-68040 code allowed Apple to make 8.1 more streamlined than earlier versions that had to support the 68000 and 68020 (through 7.5.5) and 68030 (through 7.6.1).
Update: Apple claimed they jettisoned pre-68040 code, but we have evidence from Scott Barber and the Born Again program that 68030-based Macs can run Mac OS 8.0 and 8.1. This is sort of like the way Mac OS X is “unsupported” on some Macs, yet XPostFacto allows it to install and run.
I’ve found Mac OS 8.1 stable enough and feature-laden enough to recommend it to anyone with a Quadra or Power Mac who is willing to spend $40 for the upgrade.
As for Mac OS 8.5, I must admit I’m a firm believer in Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will. At work, we were approved to buy three copies and test it. The rare hard drive problem, estimated to trouble less than 1% of all systems, would almost certainly choose one of those three, trash a 1.2 GB to 4 GB hard drive beyond repair, and cost one or two days of down time.
Sure, we do daily backup. But if the drive is so seriously damaged that it must be replaced, even an overnight shipment means a day without a usable computer. It’s not a risk I’m prepared to take, especially since nobody seems to have pinned down the underlying cause of this problem. (Apple is collecting hard drives from the field.)
But Mac OS 8.5 was mostly a matter of when: After Apple discovered the cause of the problem and released a fix for it, we bought it and installed it on a few machines for testing purposes. I think it will be especially helpful in a networked environment (that includes using a modem to reach the Internet), since all the I/O drivers are now PowerPC native and Open Transport has been significantly upgraded.
So my vote is Mac OS 7.5.5 on pre-68040 models, 8.1 on 68040 and PowerPC machines, and either 8.1 or 8.5.1 on Power Macs and Mac clones.
Chik writes:
I had no problems installing Mac OS 8.5 on a Power Mac 6200. No hard drive corruption, etc. It was a clean clean install.
But it is so much slower than OS 8.1 that I can’t recommend anyone use it. I had to disable much of the OS to get it to speed up e.g. AppleScript, file sharing, etc.
Also have Speed Doubler 8.x.
BV writes:
Regarding problems in reformatting to HFS+: I wasn’t going to do it, because I didn’t think it was worth backing up and initializing my hard drive to save the space.
Surfing through Macworld I found a mention of an application called Plus Maker from Alsoft ($19.95; www.alsoft.com). I downloaded it and near-instantaneously reformatted the hard drive on my PowerMac 6500/250 (OS 8.1) without initializing, without backing up (I’m a home user – what have I got to back up a 4 GB hard drive with?), without losing data or any (more) stability problems than I had before. I saved over 1 GB of space on my drive.
If this sounds like an ad, I could damn sure write them a genuine, uncompensated endorsement (schmuck that I am).
Thanks for what you’re doing; I just bought Vimage’s PF G3/240-225 upgrade card on your say-so, since I’m apparently running the same system you are.
We used Plus Maker on all of our Mac OS 8.1 systems at work to convert the drives to HFS+. It was a bit risky, but only because at that time neither Norton nor any other hard drive utility could work with HFS+ drives. Mine was the only drive to have problems, which may have been due to file corruption or third-party software. As of last week, I am successfully using HFS+ on my hard drive at work.
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