This wastes data and time andwhen its all added togethera significant amount of energy.
So why are they so big?
Its mostly about reliability.
Marvin Meyer / Unsplash
Howard Oakleytold Lifewire via email.
Three versions later, Big Sur has just topped 50 GB.
Im…confident that they will significantly reduce that overhead.
Christina@wocintechchat.com / Unsplash
But I don’t think we’ll ever see updates of less than 500 MB.
Part of this is down to Apples new M1 Macs.
Now, every update has to run on both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs, which ups the size.
Muhammed Abiodun / Unsplash
And finally, those M1 updates are themselves bigger.
On Big Sur, the minimum update size for Intel Macs is 2.2 GB.
For M1 Macs, its 3.1 GB.
“With updates often taking anywhere from 30-60 minutes, you will have a noticeable amount of downtime.”
Why So Big?
Part of the problem is Apples security model, which only lets you download authenticated updates direct from Apple.
But the advantages of Apples new approach are clear.
Never again (in theory at least) will a software update leave your Mac dead or unresponsive.
“The sealed system volume in Big Sur should make those problems a thing of the past.”
In this way, its a lot more like iOS, which we update without ever worrying about problems.
Apple seems to have gotten that part down, so now its time to see about shrinking these updates.
But I don’t think we’ll ever see updates of less than 500 MB."
Other computers on the same data pipe can grab the contents of this cache instead of downloading it fresh.
This takes away the waiting part.
Well just have to get used to it.
