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Holy crap. I have waited to upgrade and expected a better look on the theme side and better internals to bring APFS and other things into fusion drive domain but hell no. Mojave is plain crap.

Fonts. The biggest thing is the fonts. 3rd party app fonts are not rendered properly and they absolutely look ****. I am using a 2K dell IPS screen with my mac mini but I have to be honest windows 10 does not event come closer to this ****.

Dark theme is an absolute nightmare. Default light theme has proper window bezels and decorations however dark theme looks like it was made by an intern at the last minute. Sorry but they could have hired one of the GTK themers from deviant art to solve all the issues but hell no. Dark theme introduces a phantom layer of 1px black bezel around all windows which absolutely looks terrible. Additionally they have purposefully disabled using the menubar and dock black only. You need to fiddle with default switches to get something that looks like high sierraish.

Docker and hyperkit. Holy crap this thing uses additional 1gb of memory with all the same settings compared to sierra and high sierra. What the hell is going on.

Vista like UAC. OMG! I am already fedup with 3rd party apps failing to install due to this UAC. I have to start the installation second time after I authorize apps to install modules required for them to function (e.g VirtualBox)

I can add more things here but man this was even worse than I felt after switching from maverick to yosemite. It took them 3 generations to make things better on post yosemite branch. I wonder how long I should wait for them to fix this crap. (This may be the last OS update my mac mini late 2012 gets though.)

Sorry for the profanity but I cannot hold myself anymore.

Huh... Mine is just installing...

I guess it is a good thing our IT department told us to hold off on installing it then.

I wasn't particularly impressed with High Sierra either. Seemed like it did not provide any meaningful improvements in functionality, and resulted in a slight reduction in stability (occasional issues with waking from sleep and recognition of external displays).

These teething pains are indeed oddly reminiscent of Windows Vista. Who knows that Mojave moniker isn't just a coincidence - after all, there was a "Windows Mojave" stunt back in the day where Microsoft got people to try out a "new" Windows version, only to reveal it that it's actually Vista. Except that it seems like they forgot about the "actually decent all things considered?"

Looks like I'll be avoiding this version for the time being, too, on the lone MBA in the house...

Avoid at all costs. I should have waited until 10.14.2 or 3 at least but I don't think some of these problems will go away in time. External display issue is a reality. In about 1 in 5 restarts or so my dell display is not detected and I have to restart the monitor and the system again. This was not an issue with High sierra or my Manjaro Workstation.

Also menus fell lethargic and unwilling to obey your commands %20 %30 percent of the time.

Background apps somehow feel like they are stuck in the depths of the RAM Abyss and they may not get alive once put on focus. I had this issue with office 365 in stable and fast track as well.

Even finder may not respond your commands properly.

Avoid at all costs.

SkyWarrior wrote:

Avoid at all costs. I should have waited until 10.14.2 or 3 at least but I don't think some of these problems will go away in time. External display issue is a reality. In about 1 in 5 restarts or so my dell display is not detected and I have to restart the monitor and the system again. This was not an issue with High sierra or my Manjaro Workstation.

I've been having this issue with High Sierra, except it happens on wake from sleep, not cold start.

Uh...is this your first experience with macOS?

So much of that first post is a head scratcher. Like this:

Vista like UAC. OMG! I am already fedup with 3rd party apps failing to install due to this UAC. I have to start the installation second time after I authorize apps to install modules required for them to function (e.g VirtualBox)

You mean how you have to authorize accessibility tools under the Security and Privacy preference pane, like you've had to do since El Capitan? Like, how is this new?

Fonts. The biggest thing is the fonts. 3rd party app fonts are not rendered properly and they absolutely look ****. I am using a 2K dell IPS screen with my mac mini but I have to be honest windows 10 does not event come closer to this ****.

This one is probably going to take specific examples. I upgraded to Mohave on Tuesday and basically everything I use is a "third-party" app, from Brackets to Visual Studio to TextWrangler to Word. Everything looks good here.

On the other hand, there are some issues.

Dark theme introduces a phantom layer of 1px black bezel around all windows which absolutely looks terrible.

Now, this one is true. I had to take a screenshot against a white background and zoom in to see it, but it's there. That pixel is there with the default light theme, but it's about 50% opaque compared to 100% opaque in Dark theme. Since you're not on a high-DPI monitor it's probably more obvious. When I upgrade my work Mac, I'll see how it looks on a standard-DPI display.

derFunkenstein wrote:

Uh...is this your first experience with macOS?

So much of that first post is a head scratcher. Like this:

Vista like UAC. OMG! I am already fedup with 3rd party apps failing to install due to this UAC. I have to start the installation second time after I authorize apps to install modules required for them to function (e.g VirtualBox)

You mean how you have to authorize accessibility tools under the Security and Privacy preference pane, like you've had to do since El Capitan? Like, how is this new?

Fonts. The biggest thing is the fonts. 3rd party app fonts are not rendered properly and they absolutely look ****. I am using a 2K dell IPS screen with my mac mini but I have to be honest windows 10 does not event come closer to this ****.

This one is probably going to take specific examples. I upgraded to Mohave on Tuesday and basically everything I use is a "third-party" app, from Brackets to Visual Studio to TextWrangler to Word. Everything looks good here.

On the other hand, there are some issues.

Dark theme introduces a phantom layer of 1px black bezel around all windows which absolutely looks terrible.

Now, this one is true. I had to take a screenshot against a white background and zoom in to see it, but it's there. That pixel is there with the default light theme, but it's about 50% opaque compared to 100% opaque in Dark theme. Since you're not on a high-DPI monitor it's probably more obvious. When I upgrade my work Mac, I'll see how it looks on a standard-DPI display.

Not really. I have been using it since Mac OS 9 the green G3 Macs were the first ones that I used.

The UAC thing is really annoying. I am aware that I have to authorize apps that are from 3rd party however with Mojave this thing upgraded itself even more that every step that an application takes such as using services or installing a module that was required for proper function such as virtualbox needs additional approval now (Entering your admin password does not even allow virtual box to install its modules properly. You have to authorize and rerun and reenter your password again!!!). This was not the case even when I was using High Sierra. Single approval was enough for most 3rd party installations.

I am using a 2K dell display and the very first thing that I noticed was my default excel metrics were impossible to read on screen even menus were almost corrupt. And this was a clean installation of Mojave and Office 365. Other than that people using retina display or 4K and above resolutions do not observe any issues but low dpi screens strictly depend on sub pixel RGB aa for proper font smoothing.

That phantom bezel looks terrible on low dpi screens believe me. The only way to get rid of that is to go back to light theme.

I guess it's a matter of preference as to whether you like it, but it's fairly indisputable that getting the user involved when new unknown apps try to do unusual things helps prevent applications from just taking over the machine. Same with apps from unidentified developers. They removed the "anywhere" option on the "Allow apps downloaded from" preference, but arguably it's for the safety of the user.

Yeah, I'm not having any of those issues. I've had Mojave Beta installed for some time now and have had the public release installed since the day it came out. I cede the stupid 1px border on dark mode, but I'm having none of the rest of those issues and am not at all bothered by the (in your words) "UAC" likeness. So you have to click an extra box once or twice to install an app that the OS doesn't quite recognize. Meh. Better than macOS getting infected with all sorts of crap because users really are the worst.

I've used Excel, and many, many other "third party" apps on my rMBP 13" screen as well as connected to my 27" 1440p screen and all the fonts look fine to me? Do you have font smoothing turned off/on? (meaning, is it different from what you used to have selected?)

also, i'm not sure your anecdotal (i'll call it) evidence (and more like preferences in a lot of cases) is reason for a thread title of "Mojave is CRAP!," but everyone is entitled to what they believe. Hopefully we can find some way to mitigate the issues for you.

I haven't noticed any font rendering issues on my 2017 15" MBP on it's internal display, an external 4k display via displayport, or an external 1080p display via HDMI. The rendering on the 1080p display is somewhat fugly but it's no different than it was on 10.13 and more an issue of the fact that it's 24" but only 1080p.

I had to OK a few 3rd party tools on the first launch after install, but nothing anywhere near what Vista went through in 2007 with UAC.

SkyWarrior wrote:

Fonts. The biggest thing is the fonts. 3rd party app fonts are not rendered properly and they absolutely look ****. I am using a 2K dell IPS screen with my mac mini but I have to be honest windows 10 does not event come closer to this ****.

Subpixel antialiasing was changed in Mojave in favor of OLED panels.

Mojave removes this feature. A form of LCD font smoothing still exists in System Preferences under General, but this setting now just toggles “linear blend” antialiasing that uses different shades of gray to make fonts look smoother. It’s helpful, but it only works at the pixel level, which means in some cases that fonts will look a bit blockier on non-Retina displays in Mojave than they did in High Sierra.

Apple says that the removal of subpixel rendering is because the effect depends on a specific subpixel arrangement, which could be reliably assumed in the early days of LCDs but can’t be relied upon now that different technologies (like OLED) use so many different subpixel arrangements. For instance, the iPhone X’s OLED screen uses a diamond subpixel layout, a radical departure from RGB stripe subpixels.

ArsTechnica - The subtle death of subpixel antialiasing

That explains why everything looks fine to me. I'm using a high-DPI display. That's interesting.

So the issue isn't "third party apps" or "third party fonts". The issue is that anti-aliasing has changed for the worse on standard-DPI displays.

"If you don't have a high-DPI display you're using it wrong!"

just brew it! wrote:

"If you don't have a high-DPI display you're using it wrong!"

well, the only Macs that sell in quantity are apparently the ones that have high-DPI displays. Who's buying the 2014 Mac Mini or late 2013 Mac Pro today? There's an entry-level iMac that still ships with a 1080p display but it's priced so closely to the entry-level 4K iMac (which also gains discrete graphics and a quad-core CPU) that it might as well not exist. It's the classic "base model" designed solely to get you to spend more money.

derFunkenstein wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

"If you don't have a high-DPI display you're using it wrong!"

well, the only Macs that sell in quantity are apparently the ones that have high-DPI displays. Who's buying the 2014 Mac Mini or late 2013 Mac Pro today? There's an entry-level iMac that still ships with a 1080p display but it's priced so closely to the entry-level 4K iMac (which also gains discrete graphics and a quad-core CPU) that it might as well not exist. It's the classic "base model" designed solely to get you to spend more money.

But also you SHOULD be using a high-DPI display

DancinJack wrote:

derFunkenstein wrote:

just brew it! wrote:

"If you don't have a high-DPI display you're using it wrong!"

well, the only Macs that sell in quantity are apparently the ones that have high-DPI displays. Who's buying the 2014 Mac Mini or late 2013 Mac Pro today? There's an entry-level iMac that still ships with a 1080p display but it's priced so closely to the entry-level 4K iMac (which also gains discrete graphics and a quad-core CPU) that it might as well not exist. It's the classic "base model" designed solely to get you to spend more money.

But also you SHOULD be using a high-DPI display

I'll never go back. Even if I abandon my Mac and go back to Windows for personal use, I'll get a high-DPI display to go along with it.

I've been using it since the summer. No issues. No complaints. I love dark mode.

I use the following hardware:

- 2013 15" MacBook Pro at native resolution (2880x1800)
- 2018 13" MacBook Pro using the "more space" scaled resolution (1680x1050) with most apps full screen


Regarding your "Vista like UAC" comment? Are you referring to app source security? Are you new to macOS? It can be completely circumvented.

derFunkenstein wrote:

DancinJack wrote:

But also you SHOULD be using a high-DPI display

I'll never go back. Even if I abandon my Mac and go back to Windows for personal use, I'll get a high-DPI display to go along with it.

Soon, you'd have a hard time finding a new, lower resolution monitor even if you wanted one. A few months ago I hit up MicroCenter one evening in search of an emergency monitor, as I was on a deadline and my existing 27" monitor had just started throwing severe visual errors. They had about a dozen different models of 27" monitor in stock, but they were split evenly between 1920x1080 and
3840x2160. Almost all the 30" monitors and larger were 3840x2160, as were most of the 24" displays.

I liked 2560x1440, dammit.

End User wrote:

Are you referring to app source security? Are you new to macOS? It can be completely circumvented.

Not true. The "from anywhere" option is gone. You can only choose Mac App Store only or Identified Developers and Mac App Store.

Still it's stupidly easy to circumvent. Right-click the app and choose Open. You'll be asked if you're sure, and then it'll open the app with no future warnings. The only time you'll get blocked again is if you update that app and it's still from an unidentified developer.

derFunkenstein wrote:

End User wrote:

Are you referring to app source security? Are you new to macOS? It can be completely circumvented.

Not true. The "from anywhere" option is gone. You can only choose Mac App Store only or Identified Developers and Mac App Store.

Still it's stupidly easy to circumvent. Right-click the app and choose Open. You'll be asked if you're sure, and then it'll open the app with no future warnings. The only time you'll get blocked again is if you update that app and it's still from an unidentified developer.

Yup, it's different now, but like Funk said all you need to do is hit "Open" once and you should be good at least until an update, and even then some apps won't ask you again. Not a big deal IMO and a good defense measure for dumb dumbs the less educated on the subject.

derFunkenstein wrote:

End User wrote:

Are you referring to app source security? Are you new to macOS? It can be completely circumvented.

Not true. The "from anywhere" option is gone.

(ignore the blurriness, that's because i resized the image)

Yup, I have what DJ has. 2017 MBP 15".

EU was running the beta. Maybe he's got some sort of flag set that re-enables that option that would be missing on a regular retail High Sierra to retail Mojave upgrade.

derFunkenstein wrote:

Yup, I have what DJ has. 2017 MBP 15".

EU was running the beta. Maybe he's got some sort of flag set that re-enables that option that would be missing on a regular retail High Sierra to retail Mojave upgrade.

Assuming he's up to date though, and I feel EU is the kind of person to take updates when they come, he should be on stable Mojave. That's how it was for me. Unless he's on the new dev beta of 10.14.1.

DancinJack wrote:

Unless he's on the new dev beta of 10.14.1.

That would make way more sense than what I wrote.

derFunkenstein wrote:

DancinJack wrote:

Unless he's on the new dev beta of 10.14.1.

That would make way more sense than what I wrote.

Via "spctl --master-disable"

I like how you pretended that it was the default behavior and that obviously everyone else in the thread had done something wrong.

derFunkenstein wrote:

I like how you pretended that it was the default behavior and that obviously everyone else in the thread had done something wrong.

derFunkenstein wrote:

I'll never go back. Even if I abandon my Mac and go back to Windows for personal use, I'll get a high-DPI display to go along with it.

Prepare to be disappointed. HiDPI on Windows is still a dumpster fire.