macOS Big Sur (version 11): Share your experiences
 

Hey guys. I know it’s super early, but I’ve seen lots of people out there installing the Big Sur Developer Beta. Wanted a place to start discussing it.

Also, some big changes are coming to this version of macOS, notably the depreciation of kernel extensions. This could mean better stability for the platform moving forward, but also means certain current drivers will no longer be supported.

For example, a friend of mine noticed the Realtek Ethernet Driver is not supported, meaning some USB 3.0 accessories with Ethernet ports may not work. Obviously there’s lots to discuss here about changes that exist within Big Sur and the effects they’ll have, even aside from the Apple Silicon part.

Apple’s Platforms State Of The Union goes into more detail about the underlying changes coming to macOS, and goes over the demos done in the keynote in more detail (a long video, but they start with Apple Silicon and macOS):

https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2020/102/

Anyway. Let’s get the discussion rolling. I’m sure it will be a fun one freshflowe

Dang the extension thing means no testing for me until both MOTU and Akai put out some sort of new beta driver.. Oh man this better not take Akai 10 years to do either, I need to back up my MPC regularly! I got a notice about Little Snitch needing to update too when Big Sur drops. There is a way to enable the old extension method that he's going to post for us, but Im assuming he's not going to release the how to until Big Sur is released and he puts out the update to the new version that moves to the Framework instead.

I’ve been running it on a non-mission-critical MacBook Air. It’s rough around the edges but will be polished as we get closer to release. Reaper functions without any intervention. Firefox refuses to play video sometimes, and sometimes will play without sound, but that’s a Firefox bug. Overall, it’s what I expected from it, a bit buggy with a fresh UI but no major functionality has really changed.

Interesting, this sounds promising. I’m assuming this means we’ll be seeing some similar workarounds from other devs.

So for fun I decided to clone my main system, and install Big Sur Dev Beta 2 as an update, rather than a clean install (played around with a clean install last week).

Right off the bat, I got messages saying "System Extension will not work in future versions of macOS," similar to the ones we got for 32 bit software prior to Catalina. One popped up for Avid, but I was still able to launch Pro Tools successfully and open a session. So it looks like certain System Extensions will be allowed for now, but we're being warned that they're deprecated and won't work in future versions of macOS.

I really love the new UI. It's stunning, and feels like a breath of fresh air.

I opened up a few Logic projects that had a lot going on, and everything worked pretty smoothly. As far as third party stuff, I was using Omnisphere, Kontakt, Equator (ROLI), Massive X.

As I went through my entire synth list, most opened fine, some crashed Logic immediately (updates will be needed from the devs).

Overall impressions; WAYYYYYYYY less buggy than Catalina. Like OMG. Night and day difference. Feels so smooth, so stable, and snappier. There are some obvious things that are just regular old beta bugs, but overall usage feels way better. Hopefully we can leave Catalina in the dust and say goodbye forever to one of the buggiest macOS releases of all time.

Fan behavior and CPU temps (I'm on the 2.4 GHz i9 16" MBP) are the same.

I love the Finder redesign and the Safari redesign. I'm not a big fan of the "Files" app Apple now includes natively with iOS and iPadOS, and was worried that they would ruin Finder for the Mac. To the contrary, the UI change is, again, a breath of fresh air, and quite enjoyable to use, with all of the same functionality as before.

I have to side with the Internet on this point: some of these new icons are just UGLY. Some are great. I think with time the designs will either be tweaked or replaced, so I'm not stressing (some may even change before the official release).

That's what I got for now. Happy to test anything out for you guys (I have lots of plugs) or answer any questions.

Im curious to see how the video on the new Mini's is going to handle scaled resolutions.. According to one poster on MacRumors its been improved alot on Big Sur.. Most of us seem to be seeing lag and CPU hits with 4K scaled down to 1440 resolution in Catalina. My machine isn't too pokey but I can see the hiccup when I open the Applications drawer in the dock. If I set it back to native 4k its liquid but then my brain becomes liquid from trying to read text at that size..

I had the exact opposite reaction. Plugins in LP that work in catalina, many don't load or crash LP. Live won't load at all. Understandably, many 3rd party apps and untilites don't work yet. I was stoked to try it, but quickly gave up and went back to catalina. that said, the last good OS to me was the final Mojave. I am a tinkerer. BS is a set it and forget it kind of OS that doesn't seem real friendly to 3rd party apps so far. yeah early beta. bla bla bla.. We'll see..

Big Sur beta 5
 

Am running the latest beta 5 (public beta 2) in a multi-boot system. Surprised, UA console, plugs, Apollo x8 & LUNA all run well. Likewise, Nuendo, Wavelab, Logic, Steinberb eLicencer, iLok.

Am much preferring Big Sur to the awful Catalina & certainly has less of the old bugs, even for a beta. So far, so good.

Ive got the beta but Ive been holding off installing despite it tempting me to try it.
Someone on the MOTU forums mentioned running it, but he never answered me back about his hardware.
If your Apollo is still fine, Id imagine the MOTU drivers might be too, they usually are.

I was good with the 1st 2 betas, then 3&4 I had plugins that didn’t show up in Logic. Even plug in manager, the plugins didn’t show up at all to try and re authorize. Also the invisible plugs were still in AU components folder. No solution, very odd. All plugs up to date.
I haven’t tried beta 5 though hear it’s the same. Some plugs just not there.
I deleted the Big Sur and back to Catalina, just because I had work todo.
Reported to Apple and the plugin manufacturers.

Yup, 100% agreed. Its far from being ready for me to work in because of software needing updating, but I love the new UI and the overall feel of it vs. Catalina.

Audio I/O failed for the following combination:
- macOS 11 Big Sur, Beta 6
- MacBook Pro, 2017
- Motu 16A, USB or Thunderbolt
It forced me to downgrade back to Catalina.
Be warned.

Same here. I think I started at Beta 3 or 4 and from the get go, none of my D16 plugs show up (I just bought Drumazon a couple weeks ago in hopes they WILL finally update their plugs after 4 or 5 years), and oddly Exponential's R4 and Excalibur dont show up but PhoenixVerb does. Go figure, the one piece of software I was worried about, the drivers for my MPC Live actually work beautifully. One thing Im really missing right now is Audio Finder, it won't even open just closes right back down.

Aside from that, its working great here, especially considering its a beta. Im testing out the new Little Snitch right now, and it turns out I cant use my VPN with it. There's some bug with DNS tunnels in Big Sur so if I have my VPN running while Little Snitch is installed, it kernel panics the OS and reboots constantly. Have to pick VPN or internet watchdog, cant use both right now.

@ vromr - my 828x is working perfectly fine here over USB (dont have $100 to spend to try to use the Thunderbolt 2 connection haha) but I did have a weird issue that happened after the newest beta this week. Ive always had it connected to an Anker 7 port USB hub that's either daisy chained to my TB/USB3 drive enclosure or directly into the Mac with a USB-A to C adapter. After the last beta, the MOTU no longer showed up, got scared it broke the driver and I was going to have to go back to Catalina (my Time Machine Catalina backup is almost a month old now eeek). I could see it in System Profiler, the kext was loading and everything, but it just didn't show up. Finally unplugged it, and plugged it straight into one of the Mac minis USB-A ports and its up and running. It used to work fine with the hub whether it was plugged into the USB-C ports, or daisy chained to the drive. Now after Beta 8, it has to be plugged straight in. Tracked a 24 channel project in Logic last night, its working just as it should again. With Beta 6 it worked as it should connected to my hub though.

Anybody know if there's a software compatibility list yet like the one Sweetwater made for Catalina?

It's a beta, it's still changing, and at this rate its every two weeks or so. Nobody is committing to anything with Big Sur until it's finished and released. We're all lucky we're working as well as we are. Best bet is to just read posts here, or the couple that are at MacRumors already. You won't see any devs do it until we have a GM release.

If memory serves me right, this Sweetwater article was first posted before Catalina was officially out, since software companies were getting ahead of it and emailing users or posting articles on their websites about compatibility with Catalina.

https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare...tibility-list/

Obviously it's been updated subsequently.

But yeah, just was wondering if there was anything like this yet for Big Sur. Doesn't appear to be.

I didn't play with any of the Catalina betas (this is actually my first one since the original OS X beta) but Big Sur has been an up and down thing from beta to beta so Id guess nobody wants to commit to it yet heh. The first few betas 'broke' some plugins here that just magically reappeared tonight after installing beta 9. None of them were apparently broken, they all validated and opened just fine as usual, but you would've thought they were dead in the water before tonight's update.

Received my first email from a plug-in developer about Big Sur compatibility. I think it’s likely this means Big Sur releases next week, and Apple has notified developers.

https://i.imgur.com/IfLR7y4.png

For anyone who might be out of the loop, Apple announced a release event next Tuesday, and there is a slight possibility we see the first Apple Silicon Mac as well.

I hope Virus guys wake up for this bus stop)
Or is this company dead?

Dang I wonder if it IS close. The event is supposed to be the iPhone 12 but 'one more thing' can always happen..

Theres still some issues for sure and we're on Beta 9 already, the Macrumors folks were expecting at least one more and maybe GM in 2 weeks. Knock on wood, now that all my plugins show up again my audio system has been rock solid even my MPC Live, but the weather and clock widgets won't even hold your location and always go back to Cupertino and those are just widgets. Theres bugs with DNS encryption and tunneling too, causing kernel panics left and right. If I use a third party client like Tunnelblick or Viscosity, my VPN works fine but my actual VPN providers client takes out my connection after awhile. If I run it while Little Snitch is running, it will instantly kernel panic and send my Mac into a boot loop when it starts up again after login. The Little Snitch dev was hoping the bug would be fixed back in beta 6, but he's updated the Known Issues to say 'should be fixed by release' now hah.

Did you update your main system, or you're messing with the beta on another partition?

Yeah, I've read plenty about the bugs that are still present. The same rules will apply as always, give it a few versions before upgrading to allow Apple to work out more bugs.

I definitely will be a very slow adopter on my main system, will be playing around with Big Sur on a separate partition even once it releases. I anticipate it will take a while for plugin developers to update as well.

Yeah I updated my Mac mini. I only use this thing for recording stuff and mixing it down when its done on my MPC/MIDI gear so Im not in the same boat most folks here would be if it went to complete crap. Its a given Logic is going to work on it so as long as my MOTU worked and my MPC still mounted to back it up, that's all I needed really. I kept my Catalina time machine backup for the first month or so, and finally called it good enough. Luckily from day 1 its been really good as far as the audio side of things go. Now my D16 plugins are back, which Ill probably never use anyways, and everything else is good.

At least the Quicktime icon isn't that ugly baby blue color they made it in the first few betas anymore! :D

Interesting. Any other instruments/plugins not working for you yet?

Why not just install it on a USB flash drive to test if you are curious, folks? No risk of hurting your present install that way.

So far so good for the most part. I have a bunch of Waves stuff, Plugin Alliance, iZotope, Eventide, Soundtoys, etc all working as they should. The first beta I tried was 4 or 5, and immediately my Exponential R4 (that I just bought!) and all my D16 plugins were gone. Logic just didn't see them, but saw the rest of my Exponential stuff. After beta 9 they all show up again. One app that I am missing that doesn't work is Audio Finder, so Im out my sample browser/editor right now. I use it for very little editing (its quick when you want to chop up a cd length sample track or make a loop) but the browser is my lifeline for organizing and auditioning samples. The dev seems like it may be abandoned at this point but who knows.
I bought Wavelab Essentials last week when it was on sale for $50 and Im adapting to its browser and tools. Havent used it since Wavelab 3 on Windows but feels good to have it back.

Cant think of anything else that broke that I use really. VPN is clunky right now because apparently there's a bug with DNS encryption and tunnels. Ive got the Little Snitch beta right now and because of this bug, if I run my VPN while running Little Snitch, it kernel panics the Mac after about 15 seconds heh. Theres little things like the widgets I mentioned, but at least Cupertino is in California so my clock is still right for now haha. I was pretty impressed with how well it ran even back at beta 4/5. I hate that default login screen and wallpaper though. God that thing is ugly and looks like a clown exploded on my screen or something. The Big Sur background only shows up after Ive logged in to my desktop. During one of the betas it stopped showing up after a restart/logout and shows the default obnoxious bright one now.

Does someone have a compatibility list of music software with Big Sur?
I will light a candle in the name of luck for sharing it)

FWIW - BigSur b9 has been nothing but an improvement for this relatively new mac pro that (of course) shipped with Catalina & no backwards OS there. Seems to me & other commentators that Big Sur is really a development and improvement of Catalina (which I found quite awful in places). Otherwise, for earlier machines, I'd stay with Mojave. This computer of course running Big Sur on an independent development disk. When ready, cut over etc.

Pretty much most of my DAWs, NLEs & plugs are installed and running better than Catalina. Eg, A full install of Native Instruments Komplete Ultimate 12, running in Nuendo and Rewired to Ableton Live. Runs like a dream. Ditto DaVinci Resolve Studio. To answer the OP: there's likely too many installs to mention here, but I use quite a lot of plugs & VIs. Likely more relevant to list what to stay away from:

• Avoid anything made by MOTU & will not work (audio interface drivers, VIs, DAW), & in particular, DP10 killed the OS & needed a recovery re-install. No other DAW had this result & that included Nuendo, Wavelab, Logic, Ableton Live etc.
  
• Otherwise: some apps have the same graphical glitches but seem to run, load and play OK. This includes ProTools Ultimate 2020.9 & some of the Steinberg VIs including HALion & Groove Agent.
  
• The main thing to be careful of in my experience: anything that attempts to install .kexts in the HD /Library /Extensions folder - this has been changed in Big Sur & also with endless, increased requirements for setting security & privacy permissions. New .kext requirements & now located at HD /Library /SystemExtensions. Case in point: BlackMagic Decklink drivers, no go.
  
• If a 'illegal' .kext or other driver is installed, the net effect can be that then the Security & Preferences pane will not open and/or presents error messages, & then further installs requiring security permissions cannot be made. Recovery OS reinstall again. If using time machine for restore, ensure that in the OS this is not set to 'automatic', only on-demand as you build and confirm the reliability of each stage. CCC will not yet do a complete re-image & will only back up the data volume.

Mine and a few other MOTU audio interfaces are working fine in Big Sur.. The drivers for both my 828x and MPC Live (which also still works) both live in /Library/Extensions still too? I know this was mentioned before I ever jumped in on the beta, but both have been working since day 1. Maybe they'll stop when the GM finally hits who knows.

Appreciate your thorough response.

Yeah, unfortunately, deprecated kernel extensions is an area we will have to wade through carefully. Many people on here will be angry about this when they find out their legacy drivers and tools for older gear and software won't work.

Everyone here is familiar with the infamous "kernel panic" at this point. Just to explain Apple's reasoning here, kernel panics are caused by third party kernel extensions 80% of the time, or higher. I know this from personal experience as well as from helping clients and friends troubleshoot their systems, and from various discussion online.

Apple is seeking to make macOS more stable by eliminating kernel extensions, which reside at the "kernel-level" of the OS, in favor of System Extensions, which will exist in the User space, as @ prof draper describes above.

The goal here is to make macOS more stable, eliminating more of these show stopping crashes that have existed forever.

The collateral damage here is legacy drivers and tools for older gear and software. Some of them will work for now, with a message that says "Future versions of macOS will not support kernel extensions." Some will not be allowed to run at all.

Oddly I remember getting that message in Catalina when my MOTU software ran, but I havent once seen it in Big Sur. Maybe because it was an upgrade? Im still shocked that the MOTU and the MPC are working but they're letting some extensions slide for some reason still.

On a good note, Audiofinder just got released last night (sort of). He hurried it up and released it ahead of the event today because he's thinking the GM release is right around the corner too. Think just about all of my tools are up and running here now. Even got a test build of VirtualBox last night that runs in Big Sur so now my old Sound Diver/WindowsXP machine is back in action for synth editing!

Im just gonna cross my fingers my hardware doesn't stop working. I know MOTU will have their drivers out really quick but Akai eeek. Those guys have disappeared from the face of the Earth since Covid started and they shut down their support forums.