Tip--macOS 27 Golden Gate's First-Week Problems and Their Fixes

macOS 27 Golden Gate has been out since September 14, and the problems reported in its first week are smaller than the ones Bill Fox logged in our September 2009 report on Snow Leopard's Mail 4.1, when Exchange mail stopped sending once or twice a day. Nothing we can source says Mail or Exchange is broken in 27.0. What is reported is an Intel app that will not open, Siri AI tools that do not appear, 30GB of disk gone and a few unfixed bugs. On September 20 there was no 27.0.1; the first fix in the pipeline was a 27.2 beta.

An Intel app asks for Rosetta because the upgrade removed it

The Rosetta dialog is by design: Apple's release notes say "If Rosetta was previously installed, it is not automatically restored after upgrading to macOS 27.0." The fix is one click. Apple's support page on Intel-based apps says to make sure the Mac is connected to the internet and click Install, or to run softwareupdate --install-rosetta in Terminal. The same notes warn that Intel plug-ins "may not appear in Settings or trigger notifications of their incompatibility," and name the folders to check by hand: ~/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins, ~/Library/Printers and ~/Library/ColorPickers. A printer driver or audio plug-in that stopped working is likely one of those; the longer view is in our September 15 report on macOS 27.

Siri AI tools are missing, and the AI files took 30GB

Howard Oakley at The Eclectic Light Company has the two causes for AI tools that do not show up: the Preferred Language in Language & Region does not match the language set in Siri, and, right after the install, "it takes time to complete downloading the cryptexes and other support components required." Match the languages, then wait.

Those components are where the disk space went. Oakley's measurements on a Mac mini M4 Pro show used space in the boot container reaching "a peak of 150 GB above previous levels after 24 hours," then settling about 30GB higher than before; Storage settings put the AI components at 29.45GB. The spike passes; the 30GB stays, and his September 20 column says that although you can disable Siri, "there are still parts of AI that continue running, and you can't reclaim all the space it uses."

27.0 fixed three bugs and a reviewer found four more

Oakley's September 17 test found that plain text files beginning with LG, HPA or Draw, which Spotlight has failed to index since Mojave, "eight years ago," are found by Golden Gate 27.0 and still missed by Tahoe 26.6.2. Apple's release notes list fixes of their own: Smart Mailboxes that did not update while Mail was open, a Wi-Fi Details button in System Settings that did nothing, and a window lost when leaving full screen through Mission Control.

What remains is what William Gallagher reported at AppleInsider on September 14, some of it on a late beta: the Phone app on the Mac ("if I call someone, they cannot hear me"), menus in Save dialogs that "won't always work," a video scrubber whose "slider keeps snapping back to the start," and the Shortcuts action to open a Safari tab group, which Apple removed from the Mac rather than fix. None of the four is among the fixes in Apple's release notes.

1. Click Install when an Intel app asks for Rosetta, or run softwareupdate --install-rosetta.
2. Check ~/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins, ~/Library/Printers and ~/Library/ColorPickers for Intel components.
3. Set the same language in Language & Region and in Siri, then give the downloads time to finish.
4. Expect up to 150GB more used space on the first day and about 30GB for good.
5. Work around the Phone, Save dialog and scrubber bugs.

What to do if it did not work

Wait for the update, and know which one. Apple's developer releases page listed macOS 27.0 (26A428) on September 14 and a macOS 27.2 beta (26B5086k) on September 16, with no 27.0.1 or 27.1 between them as of September 20, and Apple's what's-new page for Golden Gate carried only the 27.0 entry that day. MacRumors reported that Apple pulled two Apple Intelligence features from the launch, Suggestions in Messages and the automatic fixing of weak and compromised passwords in Safari, and says "it's possible the features will return as soon as the 27.2 release." If a bug is costing you work, that Mac can stay on Tahoe 26.7, which got 153 security fixes on September 14, as we said in our September 19 report on Tahoe 26.7.

In 2009 Bill toggled an SMTP port once or twice a day to keep Exchange mail moving, and in 2011 we were still at it with a workaround for Mail 4.4's Exchange password bug. A first week whose worst news is a Rosetta dialog and 30GB beats that.