The 4K Dell OptiMac - 9020 MT - Core i7-4790 - Radeon RX 570 - LG 4K IPS Monitor

[trs96]

As an add on to the last post about why I'm waiting to move to Catalina, read this post by slam2019 from earlier today:

Just to share my poor experience with my mac mini 2012 upgrade (more like downgrade), it crippled my mac: 1/2 the apps not working (all the 32-bit - is expected but still hurts), bluetooth devices all disconnected (requiring reset), iTunes library all messed up. It felt like a Windows 10 "upgrade". I wonder what are the real benefits for upgrading, security reasons ? and being able to use a 10inch iPad screen as a second monitor? I'm staying away from it on my Hackintosh.

So as always, my recommendation, "Don't upgrade on your current working Mojave system drive." Make a clone first and then try and upgrade on that cloned drive. Have your Mojave drive completely disconnected to avoid any possible mistakes that could mess up that drive. You really don't know if the programs you depend on every day will work in Catalina. Say you use Davinci Resolve to edit video and it's just not working well with Catalina yet. If you have to go back to Mojave and start all over from scratch that's a lot of work to do.

See what problems come up with Catalina and determine if it's the right time to upgrade or not. Very simple and safe approach. If you don't see a reason you must have it, stay with Mojave.

See: https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...able-clone-of-your-macos-system-drive.254705/

Since this is a free way to make a clone there's no reason not to do it first. All you need is a 4GB or larger flash drive and a hard drive or SSD slightly bigger than your current system drive's installation in GBs. You will use a PC to do this or a Windows drive running on your hackintosh. Follow the steps carefully and take your time to do it correctly.

 

[trs96]

10.15 Catalina Public Release
​

I tested this today by creating a USB installer using the createinstallmedia method outlined here:

How to Create a macOS Catalina Public Beta Installation USB

Here's a quick guide to create a macOS 10.15 Catalina Public Beta Installation USB using Clover. Please note, this guide is not universal, and may not work for all systems. STEP 1: Download macOS Catalina Public Beta 1. Enroll in the Free Apple Beta Software Program 2. Download Public Beta...

www.tonymacx86.com

You don't need to use nullCPUPowerManagement kext as the guide suggests. Use Clover v2.4k 4961 from Downloads section -> Clover builds, works with no problems. After Clover is installed make sure to add HFSPlus.efi to the Drivers64UEFI folder. You can just delete the VBoxHFS driver there. Follow Step #1 of the guide for the rest of your USB setup.

After you've got your USB installer created you can either clean install or install over Mojave, without formatting the Mojave drive. Either way should work. I installed to the partition I had created with Catalina beta on it and it worked just fine.

Post install everything will work if you install the three kexts, Lilu, WEG and AppleALC to /Library/Extensions with Kextbeast and complete the Multibeast install as shown in Step #4 using Multibeast for Mojave. My audio didn't work initially till after I installed the latest Lilu, WEG and ALC kexts to /L/E with Kextbeast. Then I ran kext utility and rebooted and audio worked. The one minor glitch introduced with Catalina is a reboot after waking from sleep. Other hackintosh owners, of desktops and laptops, are also reporting this. A fix is being worked on.

So in summary, either clean installing or upgrading to Catalina via the guide in post #1 is very uneventful. Sorry I didn't have anything more dramatic to report. This guide is written well enough to prevent any major calamities from happening. Keep your Catalina USB installer around if anything unforseen happens and you need to boot back to the desktop.

Clone your Mojave drive first anyway just in case. Better safe than sorry.

The Sunny Shores of Santa Catalina Island on the California Coast​

 

[trs96]

The Catalina Dynamic Wallpapers are super high quality, especially with a 2k/4k monitor. I would be really impressed if they would have made them "live" wallpapers such as you can have on a Smart phone. Add some ocean sounds too and it would be a great experience. I've attached the day and night, default Wallpapers for anyone that wants that new OS feeling even if they won't be upgrading to Catalina right away.

 

[lcann25]

I know this is primarilly about the Dell OptiMac, but I have been reading posts with people having issues with Catalina on the Mac Mini. So I just wanted to throw out my experience on my own late 2012 Mac Mini. I did a fresh install on it today, and then used my Time Machine backup. So far, it is running perfect, and the restore from backup went flawlessly. Maybe doing a clean install is the answer to those having issues?

 

[trs96]

Maybe doing a clean install is the answer to those having issues?

That may be a good idea. As you know 32 bit apps have all been deprecated so a clean install should clean everything up that won't work in Catalina. The person I quoted was just griping a little bit about what doesn't work anymore. The other thing Mac owners should know: If using a 5400 RPM mechanical drive and APFS, it will be even slower than it was using HFS +. An SSD is a must have for a Mac running Catalina. Without one performance will slow to a crawl.

 

[lcann25]

An SSD is a must have for a Mac running Catalina. Without one performance will slow to a crawl.

Yes I forgot to mention that my mini is running an SSD, and it was by far the best thing I have ever done to it.

 

[skyrkt]

I'd like to seriously thank trs96 (and everyone else involved) for this incredible guide! I just recently picked up an Optiplex 7020 (SFF) from a local credit union for only $25 the other day. I've been wanting to jump back into the Hackintosh community and macOS as a whole, so I figured why not see if this Optiplex is Hackintosh-able! Plugged in the macOS Mojave (ancient... running 10.14.0) SSD from my other build and it booted! Ran across this wonderful guide, grabbed another SSD, and had Mojave up and running in the matter of a few hours! Such a fun and smooth process and boy, what a great little machine, too!

 

[trs96]

I'd like to seriously thank trs96 (and everyone else involved) for this incredible guide! I just recently picked up an Optiplex 7020 (SFF) from a local credit union for only $25 the other day.

Thanks for sharing this ! When we keep these older unwanted PCs working it's a win-win for us and the environment. As the old saying goes: "One Credit Union's trash is another man's awesome hackintosh." Hope you enjoy using it for many years to come. An insanely great deal. You got a PC that can run the latest macOS really well for less than the cost of a night out with dinner and a movie.

 

[trs96]

Here is a very detailed video showing you all the changes that made their way into the public release. Even though macOS now looks exactly like iOS and runs iOS apps at least they didn't merge the two together completely. Many had predicted that would happen. The Mac OS is still a separate piece of software and not a single Mac runs on an A series processor. This transition started in 2014 with Yosemite and now looks to be complete in 2019. I'm really interested to see what's next in 2020.

 

[uli27]

Dell 9020
i7 4790
Gigabyte Radeon RX 570

Everything works great after waking from sleep. Someone has a solution?