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Participating Frequently
October 19, 2022
Question

Thank you Adobe to force me to buy new equipment [Lightroom no longer supports Catalina]

  • October 19, 2022
  • 1 reply
  • 232 views

Adobe must be teaming with Apple to make me replace hardware that is still working fine with the forelast Lightroom 11.x

Suddenly for the Lightroom12 I need to buy a new imac at minimum €2500. Thanks very much Adobe. This sucks. 
And ofcourse people start to argue my imac is alread 9 years old. But in this age of caring for the environment software should not decide for me that something is "too old".

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1 reply

John Waller
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 19, 2022

I assume your Mac is running Catalina and the new minimum is Big Sur? Will your iMac definitely not run Big Sur?

 

That's unfortunately inevitable with today's software and operating system development. With each new major Adobe version, they drop support for the oldest operating system that was supported by the previous release. So Catalina support has been dropped for this version. It's long been clear that would happen in this upgrade cycle.

Joro11Author
Participating Frequently
October 20, 2022
I think you do not understand my point.

Your reply makes me think you do only see the position of Adobe and Apple.

Adobe just decides to drop support for a still fine working OS on fine-working hardware. Not because it is malfunctioning, but just to skip the need to support too many OSes. So purely a money matter on Adobe side. Also I might even think that this is in cooperation with Apple to make me buy new hardware. But that is just a thought.

But your cost awareness now hits MY pocket. Your cost driven approach makes you forget your customers. Or moreover: you are pushing the costs to your customers.

Apart from that, we are living in a world where being careful with our environment is a raising awareness. Your decisions makes my perfectly, just nine years old iMac, obsolete. Adobe is still one of those traditional companies that keeps spilling our environment by making me te buy new, satin fine working, hardware.

Please rethink your decision!

Regards, John Roeleven
John Waller
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 20, 2022

Understood your point from your first post and I sympathise with you to a certain extent.

 

While I acknowledge your view and position, it does not accommodate the reality of today's IT environment. There will always be innovation and support for older systems will always have to be dropped at some point.

 

If you like Catalina, stay with it and accept that you cannot use the latest versions of Adobe software.

 

However you look at it, 9 year old hardware is ancient in today's world. Adobe is in a highly competitive marketplace driven by an insatiable appetite for innovation. Supporting old operating systems is very time consuming for software engineers, can stunt innovation and can lead to bloated software which no-one wants.

 

We can work out the lifecycle of our hardware and operating systems from the information available on the Adobe website.

 

This year is, and was always going to be, the year for Catalina support to be dropped.