Apple recently unveiled its new operating system – macOS Monterey. They’ve cleaned up the Safari app making it more streamlined and added some key new features to FaceTime, something we’ve all been using more and more of these days. Most notably you can now share your screen, add grids so multiple people can appear on the same screen and they’ve also added noise-canceling technology so that you can have a better FaceTime experience if you’re in a busy environment.
Whilst these new features are impressive, many users have become frustrated that they cannot use them. Apple has selected only a handful of devices that can currently run the beta version. This is because the new operating system will not run as effectively on older Macs. It’s likely that running macOS Monterey on older Macs will cause lagging, very poor graphics rendering, and ultimately crashing. Here’s a full list of the devices the new operating system will currently run on.
- Mac Pro (2014 or later)
- Mac mini (2014 or later)
- MacBook (2015 or later)
- iMac Pro (2017 or later)
- MacBook Pro (2014 or later)
- iMac (2014 or later)
- MacBook Air (2014 or later)
If your device does not appear on this list, do not fret, we have a couple of potential workarounds for you to try. The first is fairly straightforward however the second method will take a bit more concentration but is more likely to work.
Important: Make sure you complete a backup of your current operating system that you can download later from the cloud if anything goes wrong.
Now we’ve got the warnings out of the way, how can you go about installing macOS Monterey on your unsupported Mac? There are two different ways you can download macOS on your unsupported Mac.
Method 1: Download to an external SSD card
The first way you can try and install macOS Monterey is to simply download it to an external SSD card first and then boot it from your SSD card once it’s done. This method has worked for some and it might work for you too. Of course, make sure you create a backup of your current Mac system first.
Here’s how to do it;
- Visit developer.apple.com on your Mac.
- Click on the Discover tab.
- Click on the macOS tab > macOS Monterey
- Click Download > Download to your SD card location
When the download has finished, open the file from your SSD card and boot it.
Method 2: Download script from GibMacOS
The second way you can try and download the new operating system is to go to GibMacOS and install the script. Normally you would download a new operating system from System Updates but because you have an unsupported Mac, you can use this as a workaround.
- Make a backup of your operating system in the cloud
- Visit gibMacOS on your Mac.
- Click on the ‘Code’ button and then select Download Zip
- Extract the .Zip file to your working directory
Next, you need to download the actual operating system, macOS Monterey.
- Double click on gibMacOS.command to open. You’ll get a list of available products to choose from.
- You’ll get several options to choose from: M,C,I,S,L,R,U,Q. Type ‘C’.
3. You’ll then get the options to choose from 1,2,3 or 4 as below. Choose ‘4’, ‘Developer.
4. When the next screen pops up type ‘1’ and your download will begin.
5. When the download is complete it will appear in your directory as;
/Users/yourusername/Downloads/gibMacOS-master/macOS Downloads/developer/071-51840 – 12.0 macOS 12 Beta
6. Simply replace ‘yourusername’ with your actual name
Now you need to access the installer
1. Open the InstallAssistant.pkg file using double click which you downloaded in step #2
2. Install the package file. When prompted, enter your password and proceed with the installation
After installing the package file, the macOS Monterey installer will appear under the Applications folder. Quit the terminal and proceed with the install.
And that’s it. Have you found a different way of installing macOS Monterey on unsupported Macs? We’d love to know in the comments.
