So, how is the macOS Sequoia Beta going?

[chmania]

I upgraded to Sequoia Developer Beta the first day. The new macOS acts similar to Sonoma, that is, not giving any problems, except for the slight battery heating and draining, which was due to the new Sequoia wallpaper. This was mentioned in the release notes, so I installed a different wallpaper, and Sonoma as the screensaver -- no more battery heat. Window tiling was long awaited, and quite useful even on 15" screen. Another plus is the calculator app with its always-on-top option. It was strange that these two options were not in macOS before, as it is UNIX -- Linux had them a decade or so ago. The optimised battery charging mode now does not allow charging above 80%. It stops around 76% to 79% and stay there. No idea yet, whether it is a good change. There's no "Charge to full now" atm. The battery usage is good, just as it was in Sonoma.

(Mine is a 15" Intel 2018 dual graphics MBP, the battery usage time is 95% of its original suggested usage time at its production in 2019. This will delay buying a Silicon MacBook for quite a while, which is good as by that time, Apple would have well tested Silicon Macs.)

 

[VitoBotta]

For me all great so far without a single issue. It doesn't look like I am running a first developer beta.

 

[noblesoul117]

…The optimised battery charging mode now does not allow charging above 80%. It stops around 76% to 79% and stay there. No idea yet, whether it is a good change. There's no "Charge to full now" atm. The battery usage is good, just as it was in Sonoma.

(Mine is a 15" Intel 2018 dual graphics MBP, the battery usage time is 95% of its original suggested usage time at its production in 2019. This will delay buying a Silicon MacBook for quite a while, which is good as by that time, Apple would have well tested Silicon Macs.)

I was just reading documentation for the AlDente app, specifically Sailing Mode, which might be operating similar to what Sequoia is doing.

 

[chmania]

I was just reading documentation for the AlDente app, specifically Sailing Mode, which might be operating similar to what Sequoia is doing.

Optimised battery charging mode was there in Big Sur too. What I meant was in Sonoma, it used a bit of the battery and charged it a bit (Charging on hold: Desktop mode), always keeping the battery charge near 80% while the MBP was always plugged in. Now, in Sequoia DB, it doesn't show that, only this;

As you see, the MBP was shut off yesterday, and today it charged up to 80% (shown by Apple, Coconutbattery shows 76.1%, which is the true value) and stays there. This is like that from the first install, from June 10th. Anyway, this is just the 1st developer beta, so we'd have to wait.
Anyway, Sequoia BD works quite nicely.

 

[Fishrrman]

My "main Mac" is a 2018 Mini, and its "regular/daily OS" is STILL 10.14 "Mojave".

But... I like to experiment with the latest releases by installing/running them on external SSDs.

And... my experience with Sequoia (short of an installation failure on the first attempt) has been much like Vito's in reply 2 above.

That is to say, it runs smoothly, doesn't crash, seems to work with most of the apps that work with Sonoma.

Pretty good for the "very first" developer release, I'd have to say.

Let's hope that it remains so through the upcoming betas and eventual release.

My "test copy" is installed on a Crucial x9 1tb SSD, partitioned into two 500gb "halves".
Read speeds in the 915MBps range, very good.
I noticed it boots (from a cold start) a little slowly at first, then speeds up.
Just before the login screen, I get a "pink static" screen for a second or two, but that always vanishes into the login screen -- could be hardware on MY end.

 

[MinimeJer05]

Running just fine on my Mac Studio M1. Surprised by how not buggy that it is for a first beta. Also, not really noticing that much has changed, minus the settings layout.

 

[eoblaed]

So far so good on my M1 Max MBP, though I haven't pushed it much. Tested some dev environments in Parallels, done some minor coding in GoLand and CLion, and basic browsing/email/messaging (not a fan of tiling, so haven't even tried that out yet).

 

[TheodoreCruz8]

I am loving the updated MacOS. The wallpaper is nice haven't had any problems yet just still working around the system settings.

 

[chmania]

Finally solved the problem I mentioned earlier by doing the first 3 points before resetting the SMC for a Mac with a T2 chip. I considered not showing the "Charging on hold: Desktop mode" as a bug, so went on searching for solutions in the internet, but couldn't find a direct solution. I thought maybe, I'd reset the SMC, even though charging only up to 80% looked attractive, but smelled of a bug.

The first steps were enough to get rid of it, without resetting the SMC. The "Charging on Hold: Desktop Mode" and "Charge to Full Now" options are back.

Now, all there's to do is to await the next beta point release. 😊

 

[chmania]

By the way, Sequoia 15 Beta 2 was installed few hours ago. Runs quite smoothly. Will see how it goes tomorrow.