Early adopter customers have already started receiving their 14-inch M3 MacBook Pro laptops, but there is one caveat: on some you cannot install Apple’s latest operating system, macOS Sonoma.
It appears that a large portion of buyers received M3-powered MacBook Pros equipped with an outdated operating system, namely macOS Ventura. When they tried to update to the latest version through the System Settings app, they found that macOS Ventura 13.5 was listed as the latest version. And apparently it’s not just MacBook Pros either, as the recent 24-inch M3 iMac has experienced the same issue reported by 9to5Mac.
Even an attempt to update through the Mac App Store fails, with one of the error messages reading: “The requested version of macOS is not available. Please check if your Mac is compatible with this software.”
This strange problem has been encountered by Daniel Roter who hosts the YouTube channel ZONEofTECH, as well as other users from all over the world.
Although it can be remedied by downloading the Installation Assistant for the M3 version of macOS Sonoma 14.1 it is still a strange problem in the first place. However, according to researcher and Twitter/X user, yes Aaronthe reason may have to do with which version of macOS Ventura those faulty Macs have.
Apple just mysteriously released 2 new versions of Rosetta for macOS 13.5 (which came out in July). The original Rosetta 13.5 from July has a build number of 22G74 pic.twitter.com/GQWYDgm5TYNovember 7, 2023
As the tweet indicates (and has since been verified by the MacRumors Forums), these Macs shipped with an unreleased build of Rosetta 13.5 with a build number of 22G74. This is important because it most likely means that these laptops have been in a warehouse since July 2023.
Apple needs to do better
Even if those MacBook Pros and iMacs had sat in a warehouse for months before shipping, the idea that they would be released with such a major problem is still disappointing. Apple should have properly inspected these devices, especially if they were in storage for so long.
Presumably, Apple will soon release a patch that will allow affected users to update their Macs via the System Settings app or the official Apple website. Considering how much these products cost in the first place, I couldn’t imagine getting a product that can’t even be updated to the latest operating system.
Let’s hope this will be a lesson for Apple to be more thorough in the future, as multiple cases like this could seriously tarnish its reputation.