known compatible MAC operating systems

[carlmichael]

I'm thinking of purchasing a MAC laptop. What MAC operating system on the MAC BOOK PRO machine is known to work, i.e. (export of VSTi), without any issues using HISE?

[hisefilo]

@carlmichael El Capitan works for me. Never checked Sierra or High Sierra

[dustbro]

Similar topic... has anyone successfully used Virtual Box to run MAC OS? That would be a lot cheaper than getting a whole new computer.

[Christoph Hart]

Nah, VirtualBox will 100% not work correctly. Even if it loads, there are some many things (like the native UI rending or core audio drivers) that will make it a terrible experience.

The best bang for the buck Apple hardware are used mac minis (the older ones from 2012. Pick up an i7 with 16GB RAM and you're set for development).

I am working with Sierra, and it runs smoothly here. Sometimes new OS updates break minor things (Sierra for example didn't render the code font with font size 15.0 which made the scripting code invisible), but apart from these glitches different macOS versions are not a regular source of trouble

[carlmichael]

thanks for your prompt replies guys

[carlmichael]

would a 2010 macbook be ok?

[orange]

Hello @carlmichael

You can check the mac performances from this benchmark list. On this list; look at the multicore tab for the real performance.

https://browser.geekbench.com/mac-benchmarks

I'm using Mac Mini Server (Late 2012) : Intel Core i7-3615QM @ 2.3 GHz (4 cores) - 8 GB RAM -- it has 10656 benchmark on this list. I've put a SSD to it so it became faster than the untouched version. It works smoothly good on High Sierra.

I can say you can use a mac that has above 11000 benchmarks.

By the way, you can see that 2010 Mac is pretty slow acording to this consideration.

[dustbro]

@orange if the only purpose of the mac is running xcode, can you get away with 2010 or older?

[hisefilo]

@dustbro check IPP support. As far as I know it only works on Sierra an higher.

[orange]

@dustbro HISE is using XCode 8. And you must use at least Sierra for XCode 8. If your mac can work Sierra with IPP support, I think it would be enaugh, but I'm not sure. You should try the functions.

Actually, mac release year is not important. As you can see in the benchmark, a Mac Pro (Mid 2010)
Intel Xeon X5670 @ 2.9 GHz (12 cores) is much more faster than iMac (27-inch Retina Mid 2017)
Intel Core i7-7700K @ 4.2 GHz (4 cores)

It's about XCode 8 & IPP comptability...

[hisefilo]

@orange that's right. Just want to add 2009 MacBooks won't support Sierra. IPP is available for Sierra and High Sierra ( at least when I downloaded it)