Not enough space to Migrate to new Mac Mini

The old Mac Mini had 8GB of storage, and so does the new one. So why am I having this problem?

You have 8GB of RAM not storage. What size drive did you order (e.g. 128GB, 256GB, 1TB)? And what size drive was in your old 2012 Mac Mini?

You have a couple of options.

How new is your Mac Mini? Did you purchase it within the past 14 days? If so, you can return it for a full refund then purchase another with 512GB or more of drive storage.

The only other option is to do what you already mentioned. Bypass migrating from Time Machine. Copy/paste files/folders from your backup to your Mac Mini leaving at least 20% (~25-30GB) available free space. Then, copy the remainder of your files to an external drive.

Unfortunately, you will always have to be careful when adding files to your Mini so you don't run out of space. Always put large files on an external drive and manage your 128GB drive space by periodically deleting files you don't need anymore.

It's very easy to copy/paste files and folders from your TM backup to your internal and external drives. You just open FInder, select your TM drive and navigate to your user account to copy Music, Documents, Downloads, Desktop, Photos. Of course you have to be careful and not copy too much from those folders to your internal drive. Only files you use frequently - the rest would go onto an external drive. Then navigate to /Applications to copy apps. It's more time consuming than it is difficult. Sorry you have to deal with this, but you can do it.

I just checked and I fear the worst.

My 2012 Mac Mini had a 500GB drive, which was the smallest available at the time. My new one is 128GB SSD. So that’s 75% smaller. I really messed up.

So what to do? There are undoubtedly files on the old machine that I don’t need. And a ton of photos I can delete. But not 75% of everything.

I’m not sure how to cherry-pick which files I want to transfer from the backup to the new Mac Mini.

It’s at times like these when I wish I knew more about computers. :(

Unfortunately not only did I buy it more than 14 days ago, it was bought in another country.

I think I need a second external drive to back up the new 2018 Mac Mini. I can keep the first external drive with everything from the 2012 machine, just in case.

What a mess. I wonder if Apple has classes about managing storage at its stores.

Thank you for your encouragement. I’ll give it a go.

That’s a creative solution. I’m planning to visit the Apple store in the next couple of weeks to talk to them about my options.

Buy a 512GB external SSD (you could buy an HD, which would be cheaper, but so slow).

Install Mojave on the external SSD, then boot from it and migrate from the Time Machine backup. You can use the internal as additional storage.