
macOS Catalina, 64-bit, 32-bit, and related Questions - bangonkeyboard
https://support.aspyr.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000214186
======
vimy
A lot, probably the majority, of the games in my steam library are still
32-bit. I wonder how many I'll lose if I upgrade to Catalina.

------
starman100
My Windows 10 machine runs 32-bit apps alongside 64-bit apps just fine. It's
no big deal on the Intel architecture. Why is this such a hard thing for Apple
to do?

(I can also run most 16-bit apps!)

~~~
AlEinstein
MacOS has supported 32-bit apps and 64-bit apps for years. I don’t know why
Apple has decided to drop support for 32-bit apps.

I still use Photoshop CS6 because I never signed up to the subscription model
so if I upgrade to Catalina I won’t have Photoshop anymore (unless I run it in
a VM).

~~~
rangerpolitic
Photoshop CS6 is 64-bit.

Source: [https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/64-bit-os-benefits-
limi...](https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/64-bit-os-benefits-
limitations.html)

~~~
AlEinstein
Unfortunately for people who never switched to the subscription model, the CS6
updates stopped at 13.0.6.

You need 13.1 to launch in 64-bit, which is only available to CC subscription
holders.

Edit: it seems that at one time it was possible for non-CC license holders to
upgrade to 13.1 but it doesn't work anymore.

~~~
rangerpolitic
The linked source is directly from Adobe and directly contradicts the claim
that "you need 13.1 to launch in 64-bit."

The source says:

> Photoshop CS6 and CC only install a 64-bit version on Mac OS.

Further, it says:

> Photoshop CS5 installs a version that can launch in either 32 bit or 64 bit
> when you install on a 64-bit version of Mac OS (Mac OS X 10.5 or later).

If CS5 install can launch in 64-bit, it wouldn't make sense for CS6 to be
32-bit only from the first version.

Even further, I know from personal experience that your claim is highly
unlikely. This is a screenshot of Photoshop CS5 (12.0.4) running in 64-bit on
my machine (High Sierra). Noticed it says "12.0.4 x64."

[https://imgur.com/a/nCTghcy](https://imgur.com/a/nCTghcy)

I am not sure of the source of your information, but it's simply incorrect.

Edit: This is another article directly from Adobe.

It says:

> On Windows, both Adobe Photoshop CS6 and Adobe Photoshop CS6 Extended have
> the option to run natively in either 32-bit or 64-bit editions. On
> Macintosh, only a 64-bit edition is available.

[https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/release-note/release-
notes...](https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/release-note/release-notes-
photoshop-cs6.html)

~~~
AlEinstein
I don’t know what to tell you. Every time I launch CS6 on my Mac it tells me
that it won’t run on Catalina.

I have no reason to believe that’s not true.

I think it’s quite possible that when Adobe says “64-bit” they’re not saying
exactly the same thing that Apple means. I’m no expert with macho binaries and
MacOS library linking.

------
lostgame
'Doom 3', 'Quake 4', 'Star Wars: Jedi Academy', 'Bioshock: Infinite'...this
reads like a list of my favorite MacOS games. I know I won't be upgrading,
between this and the way it will kill some of my favorite legacy audio
plugins.

------
gfiorav
Can someone summarise why we should care about 32 bit sw other than old things
that might not be ported?

~~~
concatime
Games. Seriously. You have a lot of old (even new) games that depend on 32-bit
binaries/libraries. And that’s why the recent “clash” between Canonical’s
Ubuntu and Valve’s Steam[1].

[1]
[https://twitter.com/Plagman2/status/1142262103106973698](https://twitter.com/Plagman2/status/1142262103106973698)

~~~
hrktb
can’t old games just be emulated or containerized ?

~~~
pvg
A lot of these games aren't that old.

~~~
masklinn
Yup, for instance The Cave can't be run on iOS anymore, because it was
developed as a 32b application. It's just one of a thousand.

~~~
dmix
> because it was developed as a 32b application

But why? The Cave was released in 2013. We're almost two decades into the
64bit transition.

~~~
ori_b
Why did the game need to pay the performance penalty for going 64 bit if it
wasn't going to address more than 2G of memory?

------
xmichael999
Can someone explain to me what Apple gains by dropping 32-bit app support?

~~~
msbarnett
32 bit code is stuck with the older ObjC runtime, which can’t support a bunch
of new language features and suffers from from fragile ABI issues which make
changing the internals of classes extremely problematic.

It’s not simple to fix (“just upgrade the runtime to support the new
features”) because the newer runtime trades on the fact that a bunch of unused
space in 64 bit pointers can be exploited for tagging, pointerless classes and
a bunch of other things. And if they did fix the fragile ivar problem on the
32bit runtime, you’d need to recompile to use the new way of dynamically
calculating strict offsets to member fields — and these apps are mostly dying
with 32bit precisely because no one is recompiling them.

It’s basically dead-end code that is difficult to maintain and which
increasingly requires the rest of the OS to stagnate just to keep it running.

~~~
mrpippy
Also: the Carbon API set is only supported on 32-bit, and removing 32-bit
means all of Carbon can go away. Carbon is a massive API set, with one or
sometimes two full legacy APIs (often dating back to the 90s) for everything.
Drawing (QuickDraw), multimedia (QuickTime), open/save dialogs (NavServices),
fonts/text rendering (Font Manager, ATSUI), windows/menus/dialogs (both
HIToolbox and the classic Managers), file I/O, printing, and on and on.
Keeping all this stuff functional (to support old apps) while evolving the
system underneath is a huge burden which will be lifted from 10.15 on.

------
badsectoracula
Apple's disregard for backwards compatibility is really the main reason i
avoid macOS and iOS nowadays. I've got an iMac back in 2009 and an iPod Touch
a year after it came out and with every subsequent update more and more stuff
broke to the point where most of the software i had stopped working -
including a some software i paid for (while you can say that the fault also
lies with the developers, you cannot expect developers to update their
software for eternity for free). While Windows software doesn't work 100% of
the time, it works often enough to be practically "100%" \- unless a program
digs deep into the system, chances are it will work either out of the box or
with some tinkering.

My only fear for the future is that since Microsoft doesn't seem to see
Windows as primarily a product to sell to people anymore, they dampen their
backwards compatibility efforts. I hope that doesn't happen.

~~~
zaphirplane
You make some valid points and some confusing points

You want to take advantage of apples free os and app upgrades but still run 13
year old software without paying for upgrades.

Why upgrade your Mac? Just keep the one that is working with the software you
have for 13 years

You want the latest, bug fixed, secure software and OS . The Apple side is
free but you will need to sort out the application side .

BTW ms OS upgrades are not free. Me thinks you want too much

~~~
badsectoracula
> You want to take advantage of apples free os and app upgrades but still run
> 13 year old software without paying for upgrades.

I never mentioned price, i wouldn't care if i had to buy the macOS upgrades -
and in fact that is what i did when they were paid. My issue is with backwards
compatibility.

I'm not sure if with "without paying for upgrades" you refer to OS or app
upgrades but i'll guess the former (which i explain in the previous paragraph)
as the latter makes no sense considering the "13 year old" part.

> Why upgrade your Mac? Just keep the one that is working with the software
> you have for 13 years

Because i also want to run newer software that requires functionality
introduced in later versions.

> You want the latest, bug fixed, secure software and OS . The Apple side is
> free but you will need to sort out the application side .

I'd rather pay the Apple side and be able to use the software i want to use.

> BTW ms OS upgrades are not free. Me thinks you want too much

Me thinks you misunderstood my message. I don't care if OS upgrades were paid,
i care about backwards compatibility. If anything at the very end of the
message you replied to i mention that my fear about Windows is Microsoft not
seeing the OS as a primary source of income and hence dampening their
backwards compatibility efforts.

To be clear: i have zero issues with paying for new versions of the OS if it
remains backwards compatible. OS price wasn't a factor in my message at all
(outside the fear expressed at the end that was targeted mainly to Microsoft).

