I’m using an iMac running macOS Catalina (10.16). When launching Roon, I was - entirely predictably — greeted once again with a notification that an update was available. Since updates are supposedly meant to improve things, I clicked it as dutifully as ever.
After installation, it turns out the new version only works with macOS 12 or higher. My system? Apparently obsolete overnight. And rolling back to a previous version? Of course not — that would be far too user-friendly.
So what I genuinely wonder is: at what point in the development process was it decided that compatibility checks are optional? Or is it now standard practice to push updates first and let users figure out afterward why nothing works anymore?
And if you’re going to corner users into a forced upgrade anyway, is it really too much to ask to at least leave a download of an older version lying around somewhere?
See the release notes, which provide a link to download the previous version:
Going forward, a free option is to update your Mac with the OCLP app. This works with nearly all Intel Macs at least to update to macOS 12, which is all you need.
Ah, I was just looking for this link. I can understand the OPs frustration with this, both suggesting an update that is known to not work and the release notes being next to impossible to find if you don’t click the link when the app is trying to update!
For anyone struggling like me, search for “release” and before you press enter, select the second Software Release Notes (with the blue and yellow flag) that appears in the dropdown. If you press enter, you will instead get topics from several years ago.
You can go there and click the notification button top right. Then it sends you a forum notification or an email (depending on your forum settings) whenever new release notes get posted:
I can’t say it was obvious how to get here, even after being given this information, but I have worked it out now. I am not sure why it is not just pinned to the top. I do find the usability of this site in general less than optimal, often frustratingly so, notwithstanding being a quality assurance analyst by trade.
It’s far to the top on the homepage. Only one thing can be at the top and choices have to be made. Other people complain that other things are not at the top…
Yep, the link was fine, but I was trying to set myself up for finding it again in the future. Thanks very much for the yellow circled picture, that has eased things greatly.
Given the large change in requirements for the latest version of Roon, it would of made things a lot smoother if the updater had checked if the new requirements were met before asking me to install the update.
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mjw
(Father! Father! Resist not! Let us destroy the core! Set us free!)
9
…that Apple stopped supporting in 2022, so it is not unreasonable for current software to break on an obsolete version of macOS.
Fortunately, you can get more life out of your Mac by installing OpenCore Legacy Patcher.
I’ve been venting my frustration with this in another thread to no avail. I’m running pre-2.65 on two Macs running 10.15.8 as remotes and every time I open roon on them I get a notification there’s an update. No there isn’t, not for these machines. It should be coded to know these machines cannot be updated.
I really have to point out how much this kind of anti user support sucks. Just agreed to an usual update on my qnap and then I needed to invest half an hour to get this running again in basic - still hours to invest to get everything set up as it was before!
It would expect you to install some pop-up warning message when releasing an update, which f*cks up a hole system! I had no backup of my server (never felt the need for it // never expected you to build suicidal user traps!) and after the update there was no chance to do some anymore. Thanks for that one, it’s hard to point put how pee-pee-d I am.
I hate to say it but the warning was pinned to the top of the forum literally weeks ago, with detailed instructions on hat some NAS users may have to do
Overall it feels as if Roon have handled this really poorly. Sure, it was mentioned in the email update but it was nowhere near the top nor was it the big bold main headline it should’ve been.
The notices on this forum were only useful to users who actually visit the forum.
Roon should, if possible, have not allowed the update to be installed at all on non compliant machines. At the very least there should have been a manual opt-in with a very large warning and links to relevant information.
The last few days, the forum has been full of people who’ve been taken completely by surprise. That’s a pretty clear indication to me that this was poorly communicated and executed.
