I tried a different tactic in upgrading my iPhone to the new iOS 14, via the Settings since it is often faster than running it through my portable’s version of iTunes. Yes, my personal system is on a lower macOS due to a few critical apps not working in Catalina: Garage Band 6.x, QuarkXpress 9, PhotoShop CS 3; and others I paid for.
It went through pretty smoothly. Then I connected the iPhone back to my portable and a message popped up about some update being needed. I guess this going to address the other matter I immediately discovered, iTunes didn’t mount the iPhone. So I proceeded with the update and obviously it got the iPhone to appear. On I went with my day.
Or so I had planned. Now correlation isn’t necessarily correlation but I suspect the iOS modification to macOS broke my Garage Band since the app would no longer start. I restored GB from a backup and reinstalled from its original source (I have the iLife ’11 DVD!). Both failed. I tried pitching all the related files to GB too, they’re usually buried in multiple Library folders. Nope.
I had to resort to restoring everything back to “when” GB was functional, my Sunday backup through Time Machine. Sure, I lost some things over the last few days yet they were trivial compared to the main tool I use to make podcast/mixtapes. The incident has also gotten me to bite the bullet on moving over more common responsibilities to my new MacBook Air running Catalina. Demote the one on 10.12 to just being a jukebox.
My point? The importance of always backing up your stuff! You never know when there’s a turn of events that won’t go your way!