Macintosh HD Macbook Air 11 ?

[LIA]

I finally got a computer for school! It's a Macintosh HD Macbook Air from 2015, and I'm wondering if I can update it. I've looked it up but I can't really find anything about it :( If anyone can help or know if I can please let me know!

[Melooon]

Oh exciting! Those 11 Airs are super cute! I had a 2012 one for my whole college and masters degrees and it was a good friend, though I’m also aware of some of the quirks they have! 

Ok, so for older macs the best info site is called Everymac: I’m guessing this is the one you have - https://everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook-air/specs/macbook-air-core-i5-1.6-11-early-2015-specs.html

It has ALL the info (prob more than you want) - but the last supported OS it lists is macOS 12 -  that’s not the latest, but it still gets security updates and it should run all modern software just fine ^^

You can check what version you have by clicking the Apple logo and doing “about this Mac” - and updates are done in System Preferences.

I know that @Cobra! does hacky upgrades to unsupported versions of macOS. Iv never tried that and I dunno that I’d actually recommend that for a computer you need to use for school, so I’ll leave it to them to explain if that’s possible! 


Extra tips:
If you are unsure how old the battery is, I recommend using an app called coconutbattery, it will show you if it needs to be replaced (most repair shops can do this)

Use Safari instead of chrome/firefox, it tends to be faster on older macs. Generally speaking, Apple made apps work best on macs, or other native indie made apps! There is a good list here! Avoid Electron apps (like VSCode!)

Sometimes going into Preferences and disabling all of the Spotlight options can help speed things up (but this will also make its search functionality kinda useless  )

Adventurous: reinstalling the latest macOS from scratch sometimes helps freshen up these laptops. This is kinda complex so I won’t go into detail here, but in short (go into Web Recovery Mode (startup holding Option-Command-R), Erase the HD in Disk Utility, then reinstall the latest OS)

Keep a cleaning cloth between the keyboard and the screen when you have it closed; it will stop the screen getting damaged!

[Cobra!]

I finally got a computer for school! It's a Macintosh HD Macbook Air from 2015, and I'm wondering if I can update it. I've looked it up but I can't really find anything about it :( If anyone can help or know if I can please let me know!

You can use OpenCore Legacy Patcher. It creates a bootable installer from a USB stick that can be used on any Mac. (You'll obviously need a USB you're fine with formatting) I used it on my 2010 MacBook Pro, now it runs Sonoma, which is still in beta.

Although I'm not sure if it's a problem with my laptop in-particular, but it can be very slow at times, but it's surprisingly usable. Not bad for a laptop that Apple says isn't compatible.

It's also worth noting that it seems battery performance has improved as well. I feel like the laptop can last much longer now.

I think this gives validity to the theory that Apple uses Planned Obsolescence on their products.

That said, if you like to play older games or apps, it's probably a good idea to have a partition of an older version so you can keep playing those, because Apple doesn't seem to give a toss about backwards compatibility.

[Melooon]

2010 MacBook Pro, now it runs Sonoma,

Those Pros were the first to have dedicated GPUs that would hot swap depending on what kinda graphics you’re using! (They were also faulty and the GPUs started failing, around 2014 there was a big recall) Do you happen to know if that’s still working? This looks way more polished that I expected and really cool, but the Nvidia drivers that some older macs use is the killer

[Cobra!]

Those Pros were the first to have dedicated GPUs that would hot swap depending on what kinda graphics you’re using! (They were also faulty and the GPUs started failing, around 2014 there was a big recall) Do you happen to know if that’s still working? This looks way more polished that I expected and really cool, but the Nvidia drivers that some older macs use is the killer

I can't say I've experienced any issues there. Any game I tried to run on it ran butter smooth, though it drain the battery in a matter of seconds (I'm not joking), so I don't play games on it very often, at least without a charger.

[LIA]

Ok, so for older macs the best info site is called Everymac: I’m guessing this is the one you have - https://everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook-air/specs/macbook-air-core-i5-1.6-11-early-2015-specs.html

Extra tips:
If you are unsure how old the battery is, I recommend using an app called coconutbattery, it will show you if it needs to be replaced (most repair shops can do this)

Use Safari instead of chrome/firefox, it tends to be faster on older macs. Generally speaking, Apple made apps work best on macs, or other native indie made apps! There is a good list here! Avoid Electron apps (like VSCode!)

Sometimes going into Preferences and disabling all of the Spotlight options can help speed things up (but this will also make its search functionality kinda useless  )

1. Yes! I do have that one!

2. I already know the battery needs to be replaced  My mother-in-law gave me this and she doesn't exactly know how to remove her profile so it still says her name on the macbook and she's still admin ;-; so i need to take it back over to her and have her give me admin privileges or help her remove her account bc i was just trying to download sierra the night before (but knowing now i can download 12!) and i need an admins creds to download it RIPPPPP

3. Can you explain more about what electron apps are?

[Cobra!]

3. Can you explain more about what electron apps are?

Isn't Electron basically Chromium? Any app that runs on Electron is basically running on a stripped down Chrome browser?

[Melooon]

sn't Electron basically Chromium?

Yes Electron apps are basically mini versions of chrome that use Javascript to make a desktop app instead of a website. Its really handy if you wanna make apps that work on basically every computer; but for programs that you keep open all the time its super inefficient and totally gross

The two most famous electron apps I can think of are VSCode, Discord, Facebook Messenger; but pretty much any app where the UI is identical to the website of the app; then its prob Electron - Spotify might be too!

[Cobra!]

The two most famous electron apps I can think of are VSCode, Discord, Facebook Messanger; but pretty much any app where the UI is identical to the website of the app; then its prob Electron - Spotify might be too!

Yeah, I want to switch to a different code editor, because VSCodium isn't very efficient at all.

[Melooon]

My mother-in-law gave me this and she doesn't exactly know how to remove her profile so it still says her name on the macbook and she's still admin ;-;

If its not connected to her iCloud; you can use the reset method I described briefly and it will remove her admin account and give you your own; but if its still connected to her iCloud its important to get her to disconnect it ^^ (If you have a look in System Presences you should be able to see if its connected by clicking stuff at the top!)

Yeah, I want to switch to a different code editor, because VSCodium isn't very efficient at all.

Its the best free IDE editor that Im aware of (I think all the free ones might be Electron based) - thats the cost you end up paying  Otherwise you've only got simple text editors like Nodepad++ or TextMate; then you've got expensive IDE type editors like DreamWeaver and Nova - I think Nova and Espresso on mac are totally worth it; but I feel a bit guilty recommending them because they really are too expensive for causal web crafters.