We installed macOS 10.14 Mojave on an unsupported MacBook Pro 2009. Result: it works.
As we already wrote about here, dosdude1 programmed a patch to give us all the chance to install the newer macOS systems (10.12 – 10.14) on older, officially not supported Macs.
As 10.12 and 10.13 run perfectly fine, 10.14 is a different situation: as Apple mentions a Metal compatible graphics card as necessary, there are some more glitches with different machines. Check dosdude1’s page for that.
Our 2009 MacBook Pro though is support fine: Webcam works, Wifi works, everything works. Well, yeah, there are a few graphics glitches, but that is it. Remember, 10.14 is still in Beta and the patch might get better over time.
We chose the dark theme, of course, to check out the new macOS and feeling and at nighttime, it is a huge step forward. During daylight, it is just a different design philosophy.
As Apple drops support for a few GPUs, we were quite surprised that the DVD player is still on board (System > Library > CoreServices > Applications) and even the IR remote works fine. The one thing not working was the Activity Monitor’ dock icon. But hey, beta.
So what is to say? Well, if you need a stable system on your Mac, that still gets security updates, go with the official 10.11. If you want the most current system on an old Mac and are willing to invest some effort, go with 10.13. If you are curious how the situation with 10.14 turns out, be a bit patient and wait for more information.
Update: Feel free to check out our tutorial on installing Mojave on an old Mac in the Forums >>>
