Upgrading installed software to M1

[Howard Brazee]

If someone buys an M1 Mac, migrates everything over, will he expect that eventually most of his programs will have upgraded to M1 native without having to work at it?

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hi,

It would depend on which versions you start with during the migration. Many recent applications (Intel 64) can run on an M1 Mac now under Rosetta 2, without being a Universal 2 binary updated for Apple Silicon.

I recently acquired an M1 Mac mini, and a lot of software already works even though it hasn't be updated to run natively. But, there is a lot of software that cannot be used yet - things like Logic/Pro Tools audio plug-ins, disk maintenance utilities, etc.

I personally never do a data migration from one Mac to another. I always set new Macs up with a clean slate, and manually migrate anything I store on the internal drive, as most of my files are on external drives.

Are there any applications in particular you are worried about?

C

 

[Cory Cooper]

Oh, and BTW:

iMazing has an application called Silicon, that will scan your software and tell you whether it is Intel 64 (using Rosetta 2) or Universal 2 (M1 - Apple Silicon native).

C

 

[Howard Brazee]

I will be replacing my iMac (27-inch, Late 2013). Right now I have to boot to Mojave to run a 32-bit application, which I won't be able to do with an M1 computer. So I'm following that application's update process. It's likely that it will be ready before the M1 iMac is ready.

When I get my M1 Mac, one way or another, I will have applications that will use Rosetta 2 (I have run Silicon out of curiosity). But I'm curious about what will happen after that. Will my apps gradually be replaced by native ones? Whether eventually I will be able to uninstall Rosetta 2, whether I will have to do that manually or what.

I figure even with Rosetta 2, my performance will be much better than what I have now, so I'm not worried. But it would be nice to understand the upgrade path after that.

 

[Cory Cooper]

OK, thanks.

Yes, Rosetta 2 runs very quickly...I have actually run an Intel 64 and Universal 2 version of a few applications, and can't really tell any speed difference. Of course, they aren't heavy processing applications like Logic Pro or Final Cut Pro.

Once you install Rosetta 2, it is there, since it is actually a component of macOS Big Sur. It is a pretty small install and it only runs when needed, so you won't need to uninstall it. And yes...Rosetta 2 emulation of Intel 64 apps on Apple Silicon is definitely faster than your current iMac.

I think that some applications may be updated to be Universal 2 simply by their built-in updater. Others may be a free update download, in which the installer will replace the older Intel 64 version with the Universal 2 binary version.

C

 

[Howard Brazee]

That's what I've been guessing.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Guess we won't really know until some developers start doing that.

As you can see by running Silicon, some developers have already updated to the Universal 2 version within their software update mechanism.

C