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Apple has stopped providing standalone updaters in macOS Big Sur

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Ah... I thought you just didn't want to download it over and over...

The full Catalina installer is ~8GB.
The full Big Sur installer is ~12GB. (approx 50% larger than Catalina installer)

The Catalina 10.15.7 Combo Update is ~5GB.

I don't know how large a Big Sur 11.1 Combo Update would be if it existed but assuming it's ~50% larger than the Catalina update, it would be ~7.5GB. So you're just saving about 4.5GB. If you have more than two systems to update, it would still be faster to just use the full installer because downloading 12GB once is < 7.5GB twice.

View attachment 501486
I think with Dual binaries the Combo updates would take around 60-70% size of The Installer.
Apple now pack prebuilt cache instead of individual binaries/files, so even a minor change in a single file has to be replaced by a entirely new cache in the target system. You can check the size of the dyld shared cache by opening /System/Library/dyld/ (9.73GB for 11.0)

I do not know which way apple is heading.
 
Maybe but not nearly to the extent of windows XP. They stopped windows 7 support much sooner than XP support. It was a huge deal for banks since many ATM machines were running on XP.
Ah you knew the reason why. LOL, I was blown away when my buddy told me they were using XP at their bank. It's all good and I hope companies move forward sooner. :)
Have a wonderful holiday.
 
I'm not convinced it's fact.

If they wanted macOS to be iOS:
  • The Apple Silicon MacBook Air and MacBook would both have touchscreens.
But if they did that they couldn’t tell you that you need to buy a new computer to take full advantage of iOS mac! It’s all about throwing away your old hardware cause you can’t upgrade anything in it and buying a new computer (I mean reinvesting more of your money to Apple).
 
But if they did that they couldn’t tell you that you need to buy a new computer to take full advantage of iOS mac! It’s all about throwing away your old hardware cause you can’t upgrade anything in it and buying a new computer (I mean reinvesting more of your money to Apple).

There's a real easy solution to this. Don't buy in to the ecosystem in the first place.

You can continue to use your 286 and upgrade to Windows 10.

If you do buy in to the ecosystem, accept the consequence that Apple depreciates old hardware at a fairly rapid pace.
 
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There's so much complaining here, it's sickening. If there's something that displeases you, do something about it rather than complain.

Don't like the direction that macOS is heading? Stop using macOS.
Don't like the planned obsolescence of Apple hardware? Don't buy Apple hardware.

I remember being in a bar and a guy telling me how depressed he was that his girl left him and how he wanted to kill himself. I said the exact same thing to him, stop complaining and go do it. I told him of a really tall building about two block away where if he jumped, it would be fool-proof.
 
There's a real easy solution to this. Don't buy in to the ecosystem in the first place.

You can continue to use your 286 and upgrade to Windows 10.

If you do buy in to the ecosystem, accept the consequence that Apple depreciates old hardware at a fairly rapid pace.

I am not sure 7 years in computer terms is rapid at least not from a professional standpoint. While the buyback is not anywhere near the buy price; Apple does buy stuff back these days. The Iphone X that is now 3 years old still gives you $300 ($233 a year) and the 2018 Mac Mini gives you $400 ($300 a year) the for trade-in the last time I looked. Not totally terrible probably get a bit more trying to sell it yourself but then you have to deal with the hassle.

Windows always had an end life also albeit longer than 7 years upgrades to the new OS cost until windows 10. For example, If you were running windows xp when the EofL came about you had to buy windows 7k. Those OS upgrades had minimum system requirements also so depending on your hardware it might have been shut out. Hardcore gamers totally dump their systems every 2 or 3 years. I myself try to dump my system every 3 to 4 years with a GPU upgrade every 2. Apple's change to the M1 SOC has put me in a peculiar place so I have placed my upgrades on hold for the next 6 months.
 
I am not sure 7 years in computer terms is rapid at least not from a professional standpoint. While the buyback is not anywhere near the buy price; Apple does buy stuff back these days. The Iphone X that is now 3 years old still gives you $300 ($233 a year) and the 2018 Mac Mini gives you $400 ($300 a year) the for trade-in the last time I looked. Not totally terrible probably get a bit more trying to sell it yourself but then you have to deal with the hassle.

Windows always had an end life also albeit longer than 7 years upgrades to the new OS cost until windows 10. For example, If you were running windows xp when the EofL came about you had to buy windows 7k. Those OS upgrades had minimum system requirements also so depending on your hardware it might have been shut out. Hardcore gamers totally dump their systems every 2 or 3 years. I myself try to dump my system every 3 to 4 years with a GPU upgrade every 2. Apple's change to the M1 SOC has put me in a peculiar place so I have placed my upgrades on hold for the next 6 months.

I agree. I think the longest I kept a system as my everyday computer was about 5 years. The lack of any true innovation from Intel for years certainly contributed to this.

That being said, I was pretty miffed when my 2008 MacBook stopped getting Mac OS X updates after 2011. After that, I only bought one more MacBook and a used one at that. After that, I used HackBooks until now.

I want an Apple Silicon Mac too. I'm hoping I have enough self control to hold out until second gen is available.
 
I want an Apple Silicon Mac too. I'm hoping I have enough self control to hold out until second gen is available.

That's where I fell down - no self control! :rolleyes: Hey, but no regrets with M1. It's everything the tech reviewers say it is. Eat my dust i7/i9 - and yes, my i5 is a poor relative now - even graphics. :lol:

I actually like Apple's update methods way better than Microsofts' itty-bitty approach. You hit the nail on the head previously. Don't bother with a Combo update just get the full installer. Well we can still do that, it's just not "delivered" to us as a Software Update any more. A pity though we can't keep our own libraries of the smaller stuff like Safari updates.

But that's just my male, hunter-gatherer, hoarder trait coming to the fore ... :D
 
That's where I fell down - no self control! :rolleyes: Hey, but no regrets with M1. It's everything the tech reviewers say it is. Eat my dust i7/i9 - and yes, my i5 is a poor relative now - even graphics. :lol:

I actually like Apple's update methods way better than Microsofts' itty-bitty approach. You hit the nail on the head previously. Don't bother with a Combo update just get the full installer. Well we can still do that, it's just not "delivered" to us as a Software Update any more. A pity though we can't keep our own libraries of the smaller stuff like Safari updates.

But that's just my male, hunter-gatherer, hoarder trait coming to the fore ... :D

I'm also trying to control my spending... The pandemic lockdowns in New York is bankrupting our bar so I lost one my income streams. Hopefully, by the time second gen comes around, things will be back to normal.
 
I want an Apple Silicon Mac too. I'm hoping I have enough self control to hold out until second gen is available.

I was about to buy M1 Mac mini then I realized the EGPU did not work with it, that slowed me down for a second then I looked at the tires on my 4-Runner and realized I needed to replace them, then the new contract is not going to come in till after the new year so the extra funds were not available so I have not ordered and put it off.
 
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