Data transfer from 2009 imac with High Sierra to new imac with Sonoma big problems. Data won’t migrate. Senior tech says it won’t using any process! So are my emails and 16k photos gone forever?
I have used migrate assist and time machine. Still no photos or emails.
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
pahkolam wrote:
old imac on. plug in EHD formatted to MACs, system preferences - Go - Pictures - Photos Library, drag Photos library to EHD, reads it accepts it, starts transferring, gets to 39GB of 130GB downloaded and Error 36 pops up on screen and everything stops. Error box disappears, Photos Library in EHD (39GB worth of it) disappears. Happens every time at same spot in the process - about half hour into downloading. Nada!
Try this -- old iMac on, plug in EHD formatted for Macs, Go => Pictures. Find the Photos Library (or iPhoto Library), right-click (control-click) it, select Show Package Contents.
Look for a large folder called Originals or Masters.
Open it.
There will be a number of folders, many possibly. Try to copy a few folders at a time to the EHD. If there are dozens or hundreds, try selecting maybe a tenth of them at a time to copy to the EHD.
When you are all done, then connect the EHD to the new Mac and in Photos, try the Import function to import those folders that contain your images. You can import several at a time or even try all of them at once on the new Mac.
pahkolam wrote:
old imac on. plug in EHD formatted to MACs, system preferences - Go - Pictures - Photos Library, drag Photos library to EHD, reads it accepts it, starts transferring, gets to 39GB of 130GB downloaded and Error 36 pops up on screen and everything stops. Error box disappears, Photos Library in EHD (39GB worth of it) disappears. Happens every time at same spot in the process - about half hour into downloading. Nada!
Try this -- old iMac on, plug in EHD formatted for Macs, Go => Pictures. Find the Photos Library (or iPhoto Library), right-click (control-click) it, select Show Package Contents.
Look for a large folder called Originals or Masters.
Open it.
There will be a number of folders, many possibly. Try to copy a few folders at a time to the EHD. If there are dozens or hundreds, try selecting maybe a tenth of them at a time to copy to the EHD.
When you are all done, then connect the EHD to the new Mac and in Photos, try the Import function to import those folders that contain your images. You can import several at a time or even try all of them at once on the new Mac.
This link has instructions:
Transfer files between two Mac computers using target disk mode - Apple Support
For the Photos just copy your Photos library from the old Mac to the Pictures folder in the new Mac. Then you can import that library into a new Sonoma library and get the keywords, titles and actual file names on the original files.
If you have a lot of organization effort, i.e. albums, folders and metadata you might consider the paid version of PowerPhotos . This user tip show the difference between Photos and PowerPhotos as far as importing is concerned: Merging/Importing iPhoto/Photos library into Another Photos Library: PowerPhotos vs Photos.
"Photos library to open and convert it to the new version."
This won't work with newer versions of the OS. They will have to import the images into an existing library:
Import photos from another library in Photos on Mac - Apple Support
Do you have an external hard drive that you can copy the Photos library and the Users/Home/Library/Mail/V10 folder to from your 2009 iMac?
If you can then do so and copy them from the EHD to the same locations on the new iMac and open Mail. See if that won't repopulate your email. Also double click on the Photos library to open and convert it to the new version.
As for the emails try copying the Home/User/Mail folder from your old Mac
replacing the one in your new Mac. Then launch Mail. I'd not delete or replace the new Mac's Mail folder in case you have some emails in it you want to add to Mail.
Gone forever? Not if you have good recent backups ... all your data is there.
If you utilized iCloud all your data will also be there.
If you did neither, then all your data being utterly gone is a likely scenario.
Need more info, exactly how are you connecting them?
Are you trying Migration Assistant or Mail>I,port & such?
Does the older one have a Time Machine backup you can move over?
On the older one...
In Disk Utility>View, select Show all Devices, highlight the top left entry.
Run Disk First Aid on all items in the left panel, from top down.
Naw, when MacOS doesn't have enough RAM Memory it uses VM=Virtual Memory, which is Free Spce on the boot Drive... how much free space is on the boot drive?
Crazy thing is it could take 300 GB to transfer 130 GB.
pahkolam wrote:
Tried it, did several attempts of various sizes but everyone of them came up with error 36. Thanks, think it's a lost cause. I've been working on saving my photo library for 2 months now and tried probably 3 dozen different things. None worked. Always got Error 36. I'm wondering if I can't take the 55 GB SSD internal drive out of the old imac (I had it put in 3 years ago)and encase it and use it as my new external hard drive for my new imac. What do you all think of that approach/solution? Thanks
Can you connect the old Mac to the new Mac with the old Mac in Target Mode? That basically mounts the old Mac internal drive like it is an external drive as seen from the new Mac. Then copy from there (or import from there).
Well, in pure Apple File System talk... -36 ioErr I/O error (bummers)
Not very helpful, but generally means a Drive quit being Readable or Writable since starting the operation...
If the old Mac is still working, get another HD, format it on the new machine with MacOS Extended Journaled and try to simply copy the Photos Library to the new EHD from the old machine.
What Happens when you try... step by step please?
Are the USB drives Bus Powered? If so I think you'll need an AC powered USB Hub.
Can you try it with just the AC powered drive?
Unable to migrate photos and emails to new Mac
