Matthew,
Long as the system hasn't gone silent, just hang on. MacOS is notorious
for looking like it's stalled when it isn't.
A couple of questions:
1. How long is "long?"
2. Do you remember how big the update was? Often it tells you how much
it has to download, then it goes and does it, unpacks the download, does
all its shenanigans, and then you get the new version. If it was several
gigs, like maybe ten or more, all that compressed data has to be
unpacked, and then, file by file, must be checksummed against a master
list somewhere up the line at Appleville, then a determination gets made
as to whether you even need to have that element or file replaced. This
takes time, even with a fast M4 processor.
On 1/10/2026 6:29 PM, Matthew Whitaker wrote:
I’m trying to update to Sonoma 14.8.3, and I’ve been sitting here for a long
time, and it’s still trying to prepare. I’m using a Mac Studio M1 Ultra.
On Jan 10, 2026, at 6:27 PM, Steve Matzura <[email protected]> wrote:
I waited another forty minutes while I had supper, and still nothing. So I got brave and
turned off the power. oddly enough, when I pressed and held the power button for the
usual few seconds to turn it back on, I did not get the classic Mac bong. Instead, the
system came right back up, seemingly where it left off. Pressing keys on the keyboard
elicited the standard Mac don't-press-that-button-again noise, so I left it alone. About
a minute later, I heard "VOCR is ready" in a decidedly different
voice--obviously the one for normal speech output, not my VoiceOver voice choice. I then
turned VoiceOver on properly, and there I was, in Sequoia 15.73, ready to go. I don't
know whether restarting the system manually via the power button had anything to do with
the update, and, like the song says, I guess I never will. All in all, a very tense hour
and a half. One gets used to things behaving in a particular way, and when they don't,
one tends to get a little edgy about it, especially when there's no help available until
maybe a couple more days.
On 1/10/2026 4:52 PM, Steve Matzura wrote:
Thanks. I'll wait, and report what happens either way.
On 1/10/2026 4:46 PM, Krishnakant Mane wrote:
The only way is to wait.
I had similar experience and I waited for 25 minutes.
It finally came up and all was well.
By the way this update has also got some performance enhancements for Voiceover.
Now I can have much longer web pages before “safari is not responding “ happens.
It still happens in long chatgpt sessions but now it happens much later.
The apple guys claim there are few more overall performance fixes as well.
Regards.
On 11 Jan 2026, at 2:55 AM, Steve Matzura <[email protected]> wrote:
I got a message that Sequoia 15.73 will be installed tonight. Instead, I opted
to install it now. The system went down about fifteen minutes ago. I cannot
start VoiceOver, which I can usually do during an update, so I have no idea
what my Mini without a monitor is doing. Any ideas?
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