I’m trying to connect an old hdd via a SATA to usb adapter, the device is not showing in finder or disk management but is shown in sys info connected to usb. I use windows and have no clue what to do, any help would be appreciated.

Looking for advice on transferring all data (photos, voice notes, contacts) from my long-held iCloud account to an external hard drive. Want a fresh start on my new MacBook Air without my past settings and photos overwhelming me. Any tips on a smooth transfer and maintaining my existing iCloud account?

I am looking for a simple VOB joiner/merger utility for Mac, and it is frustratingly impossible. It used to be easy to locate such things, but now all I’m getting in the search results is nothing but pages of companies trying to promote their video converter software. The one halfway promising thing I found was an old Mac forum post with some very vague comments about doing it with command lines on Terminal (which I am not comfortable with, even with detailed instructions). Is there a simple GUI utility that will do this? It feels like if I’d looked for this ten years ago, I would have found something right away. Thanks for any help, it’s much appreciated.

EDIT: Additional info — I am running OSX 10.11.6 El Capitan.

I recently was given my dads old iMac which was working smoothly with, I believe, Mac OS High Sierra. I decided to wipe the computer & restart it from scratch, holding down command + R, opening up the Mac OS utilities menu. However when I did this, my Mac restarted itself in a much older version of MacOS, giving me the option to instead, install a new copy of ‘MacOS Lion’ - which is a much older version of MacOS than when I previously received the computer.

After having no choice but to install Lion, the iMac will no longer run as expected, failing to open Safari, Mail or any of the Applications, saying the computer needs “updating”. When I click on software updates, it says there are no updates available & that the computer is up to date, which I know isn’t true.

Feeling very stuck as cannot access safari or the App Store to try and install a newer MacOS, so I am left with a quite useless computer that’s stuck in the past, as nothing works. Would really like to know how to get my computer back to normal. Thank you

Hello all. Apparently I have a macbook called Macbook 7,1

I used the dvd it came with to reinstall snow leopard. I wanted to upgrade it to its maximum supported os (which im not sure even) but here is an issue I am facing right now:

I first tried lion because everything else tells me that my os is not supported. App store is broken (can never connect) and internet recovery is also broken. I guess its an ssl issue which might be super annoying to fix, not sure.

Anyway so, I got the file from here: https://support.apple.com/kb/DL2077

Put it to my usb and then plugged the usb to my macbook because safari is too old and firefox also can’t run lol

Then I opened the dmg file, it mounted that as “Install Mac OS X”

I then opened that thing too, there was this single pkg file. Unpredictably, I opened that too…

Well, the installer came up, and a popup prompt asking me that it will check whether installation will work.

I continued all and entered password, it said “Running package scripts…” and “Writing files” anddd well, nothing changed. Version is still 10.6.8 after restart and after running this thing again even. What even is going on with this annoying mac? I just wanted it to be in its latest supported version…

Oh, the installer told me the installation was successful, just saying.

i tried to open an app and it asked to make changes and my admin password. i typed it in and nothing happened. now i'm reading everywhere that i just fucked up big time. what can i do now? am i in terrible danger now? pls help.

In general I work on a specific desktop and I do other stuff on the other ones. So I would like to track the screen time of that specific desktop in order to know for how long I have been working. How can I measure this?

I have MacOs BigSur.

Cheers.

A customer brought me a 2012 MacBook Pro with a water damaged motherboard. After checking all other components were undamaged, I replaced the motherboard and it booted up successfully.

Somewhat suspiciously, the customer then asked me to erase the HDD as set it up with a fresh OS X install. Here's what's happened so far:

• Removed HDD and connected to PC (Windows 11); all partitions deleted (AOMEI Partition Assistant); re-built GPT (diskpart via CMD); formatted for HFS (HFS+ for Windows)
• Reinstalled HDD in MacBook, booted up into MacOS Recovery Utility and re-re-formatted for HFS via Mac disk utility
• Reset SMC/VRAM
• Failed to install OS X via internet recovery ('Failed to download additional components')
• Created OS X USB boot key (Basic GPT; HFS formatted) and mounted OS X dmg install file using TransMac
• Booted MacBook into start-up manager and selected USB boot key; 'no entry' sign pops up with a perpetually spinning wheel
• Created multiple other USB boot keys using different OS X versions (Lion, Catalina, etc.) download sources, dmg/iso files, USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 sticks; resulting in either the same result above or the boot key not being recognised at all

As a (formerly) water damaged laptop, I know the chances that this boils down to a hardware issue are high, but as far as i'm aware all the hardware is working fine (definitely no fault with HDD, keyboard, USB ports, WiFi, etc.).

Right now, my current theory is that part of the HDD is still locked to the user account of the former owner, despite AOMEI telling me that the HDD has been fully wiped.

I've also reset SMC + VRAM between each USB boot key attempts. I also read online that a few redundant VRAM resets can sometimes do the trick, but sadly this was not the case for me.

I've trawled through all the forums and have come up blank on what to try next. Anyone able to give any pointers before I give up and take the walk of shame to the genius bar?

​

​

I read that modern mac laptops are able to recognize FAT32 formated USB sticks and view the mp4 files on the stick, but what about old mac laptops?

I started to notice poor battery on my M1 MBA, so decided to do a reset. I copied everything in my Desktop, Downloads and Documents to my externald drive.

1. Anything else I should do ?
2. is there an alternative to treesize for mac ? preferably free or open source?

I have a late 2015 iMac running Catalina. RAM is 32 GB. I'd like to dual boot OSX Sierra.

Can I do this without reformatting the drive and losing Catalina? I'd like to keep Catalina in case it's needed.

Earlier today when my Mac wouldnt boot, I tried installing Sierra from the recovery menu, but it kept giving me an error.

My goal is to use an earlier version of the OS, which is smaller and presumably faster. Then install Linux as a VM inside that.

I'll use Linux online for security -- and Mac for everything else.

And then a file system suitable for both.

Thanks

Trying to help my mom out as I’m the default IT person, but am at a loss. It’s at 10.8 and will not connect to the App Store to upgrade. I’ve made a bootable of Maverick (working way up ladder to get to High Sierra) and the disk is recognized when going through the reinstall. However, when I click the drive with only Maverick on it, it just goes through to the log on screen, as if no installation took place, and stays on 10.8. Can’t install from desktop as it says the version can’t be verified by Apple. Thanks

Hello,

https://preview.redd.it/3h6354lz0pmb1.png?width=2474&format=png&auto=webp&s=759ec0805e59ae5f45ddda3c1c79862a8bfd61a7

I am new to Macs and don't actually know how to delete those files. It's "private" folder and I don't want them to be there anymore. It seems to be locked but I can't change any permission, safe boot doesn't work at all, when I click open in Finder the folder is just empty like the file is hidden. How to do it?

I'm facing a challenge with my older iMac, which currently doesn't have an operating system installed. Unfortunately, I don't have access to another Mac computer to create an installation USB drive. Any assistance or alternative solutions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Since I bought my Mac Mini M1 in late 2019, I've been annoyed by my Mac automatically logging me out. I've tried absolutely everything (including trying to disable the sleep and shutdown). And yet when I left my computer to finish processing something (that didn't need me to sit in front of the computer), I would randomly return to my Mac, displaying the login screen. For years I thought it had had a kernel panic and rebooted (because there was no message to say anything else). Some applications would stop the logoff process if it was doing something that would be affected by it - adding yet more to the confusion - why was it happening in the first place. This had never happened to me before on any of my other Macs.

It turns out there is a setting for "Log out automatically after inactivity":

System Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Advanced (button at the bottom of the window) -> Log out automatically after inactivity.

Posting here, simply to help anyone else who might not have heard of this setting. I suspect it was defaulted to On in a previous version of OSX, but is no longer.

Basically the title, I run into this problem when trying to share my screen on Facetime on Mac:

I have dual monitors, but I only see an option to share one of my screens. Is it possible to share both monitors at the same time? I have looked in the settings and on the internet for possible solutions, but cannot find any.

Thank you.

How to build the XNU Kernel and Darwin Userland and make a installation of it on a machine ( not apple).

Is there any guides to this?

My dock/top bar keeps disappearing on my main monitor whenever my 2nd monitor is full screen.

I tried to go through the options for the past hour, nothing works.

Please help - Thanks.

I noticed today that my photos folder had a date modified time of 2 hours earlier, when I was not on my computer and actually asleep in my bed. My photo sync is not turned on, and nothing would have been active on my mac.

Is there a reason for this, or have I been hacked? Incredibly disconcerting that the date modified changes when I wasn't even using my computer. Thanks.

I'm at a loss with this one. Trying to revive a 2011 MBP 13". Initially I thought it was a failed HDD. I've swapped out the HDD for an SSD and reinstalled the OS. Same issue. I've also tried installing Linux Mint, same issue.

The installs with whatever OS always seem to work fine, but when I reboot without booting to the USB, I just get the flashing ?

​

Has anyone seen this before? Any suggestions? Thanks.

I have four Apple devices - an iPhone, MacBook Pro M1, MacBook Air, and iPad Mini. All seem to be syncing everything correctly using iCloud, except I've noticed that the Notes app on my MacBook Pro does not sync to my other devices with edits I've made on my MacBook Pro; if I create a note on my MacBook Pro it will ripple over to all my other devices, but if I create a note on my iPhone and then edit that note on my MacBook Pro it will never sync those changes. Anyone know how I might be able to fix this?

Cellular

Hello, I am Xuan Han, the creator of Cellular. Cellular was built with a simple goal in mind - to allow your Mac to connect to your Android phone's mobile hotspot seamlessly, as if your Mac has cellular data connectivity.

Cellular is a utility that brings your Mac and your Android phone closer together. When your Mac goes out of range of known Wi-Fi networks, Cellular seamlessly switches your Mac’s internet connection to your phone’s hotspot. And when you go in range of your trusted networks, Cellular intelligently turns off your phone’s hotspot and reconnects you to the trusted network, saving energy while providing ultimate convenience.

Other features include:

• Disconnecting from your phone’s hotspot when your Mac goes to sleep
• Disconnecting from your phone’s hotspot when your phone’s battery falls below a minimum level
• The ability to view phone information such as cell signal strength, network type and battery level from the menu bar of your Mac

Cellular is currently a one-time purchase of USD 2.99 (in most regions) and is available on the Mac App Store.

If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to contact me by replying to this post or emailing me at contact@xuanhan.me. Thank you for your support!

I tried this syntax in the config file but it breaks Vimari :

{
  "excludedUrls": ["https://mail.google.com", "https://drive.google.com"],
…
}

Thanks!

I'm trying to determine if a python script I'm running is using multiple cpus. Running it on linux the process's CPU usage is 99% according to top. However on my mac top is saying the process is using 354% CPU. In both osx and linux, only a single python process appears in the process list. If I'm reading this correctly on osx that single python process is utilizing multiple CPUs but in linux it is not? Is that correct?

In the screenshot below from osx, you can see the numbers. Why isn't the CPU usage number on top over 100% as well given the process CPU usage is 354%?

https://preview.redd.it/2auyt4m3wbkb1.png?width=2896&format=png&auto=webp&s=3fc552cb0e71d350f2c5274db91aa735306c4d3d

hello all,

i'm not the most tech savvy, tried going online and diy-ing it but i feel like i just made it worse... my desktop isn't reading my passport and there are some important files i need to get from it. maybe it's bc its 10+ years old? i'm not sure...

ANYWAY, would love some help if possible. thank you!

Problem solved now

Hello,

I have a 2011 MacBook Pro with a dying AMD GPU, the computer still works since I have automatic graphics switching on but will die if I leave a GPU dependent app open for too long.

How would I be able to re enable the dGPU after using the dosdude1 patcher program? I am running OS X High Sierra on a single partition drive.

Thanks.

Hi all, I'm using a Samsung T7 drive on a MBP M1 Pro running Ventura 13.2 - the T7 had 300GB free space remaining, I deleted 400GB of data, but it is still showing only 300GB remaining. I definitely emptied the trash :P When I have run into issues like this in the past I have run Disk Utility first aid, and that has usually fixed the incorrect free space issue. This time I have done that and it is still showing the incorrect amount of space. Any tips?

Hi all, I've been using MakeMKV on my Mac and Im trying to organize the video files by their runtime and renaming them. However, Finder does not display the runtime for MKV files. Are there any file manager applications that show the duration for an MKV file? Or some type of Finder extension that enables this?

Thank you!

A lot of people didn’t know this, but when I went and looked for the OSX welcome music, I found out what it was, it was a remix of Sofa Rockers by Sofa Surfers, The Apple Wiki got it wrong as the original Sofa Rockers, but it has been found out, Take a listen for yourself.