Virtual Machine Creation for Testing

[bbarciz]

Hello!

I'm just curious if anyone is using virtual machines to run different Mac OS versions for testing?  On my MacBook Pro host, I currently have Monterey installed.  However, I'm having issues trying to install any 10.x version (tried 10.13 and 10.14) in a Fusion virtual machine.  The VM will start up, prompt for a language and never shows anything after selecting the option to install MacOS.  Just wondering if anyone has any thoughts, maybe something trying to install an older os?

Thanks

[ljcacioppo]

Is the MacBook Pro you are trying to host the VM on an Intel Chipset or an Apple Silicon chipset? The limitation may be hardware as I do not believe you can virtualize those older macOS operating systems on ARM chipsets.

[bbarciz]

Good detail I failed to mention, it is an Intel processor in my MacBook Pro.

[ljcacioppo]

Ah, ok. Well that's good news then. I've been able to install older operating systems before as virtual machines. 

If I'm not mistaken, when Ive had issues in the past using the installer from the App Store, Ive used the instructions in this blog article to create an ISO to use for installation: https://travellingtechguy.blog/macos-big-sur-on-vmware-fusion-12/

[howie_isaacks]

Check the installer certificates from the macOS install apps. They may be expired. Also, why would you want to visualize these older versions of macOS? I hope you don't have Macs in your fleet running old versions of macOS. 

[bbarciz]

Thanks for the thoughts, do you know if expired certificates stop the install from launching?  Do you know easily how to check the expiration on them?  Reasoning is mostly old iMac hardware that cannot be upgrade and also a need for a 32bit app.

[awoodbury]

The Apple Cert for the older macOSs expired on 20191024, so anything from 20191025 and newer should install.

Mojave is the last macOS to run 32-bit apps, I would run this version if the hardware will support it.