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Level 1

12 points

Mac App Store Won't Download Updates

I have a Late 2015 iMac 27-inch Retina 5K with 32GB of Crucial RAM in it. It is running macOS Mojave 10.14.6 with all of the latest system updates to this very date of posting. The internal 1TB mechanical hard drive was so unbelievably and ridiculously slow (thanks to APFS) that I bought a Samsung T5 1T external SSD. I formatted the new SSD for APFS and used the latest version of Carbon Copy Cloner 5.1.21 to transfer the “clone” of my internal hard drive to the external SSD.

My iMac starts up perfectly with the new SSD, 3 to 4 times faster than it ever did before and everything works perfectly. I immediately unmount the old internal mechanical startup drive after my iMac boots up so that it is nowhere in sight and does not get in the way.

I've been using Macs for 25 years so I like to think that I know what I'm doing. But -- there is one annoying problem that I have that I just simply cannot solve on my own, even after looking at numerous websites and forums on the Internet.

The Mac App Store shows that I have six software updates, one of which is GarageBand 10.3.5 which I need. When I click the update button for any one of these six updates, the circular progress wheel spins for about three or four seconds and then just stops. Nothing downloads at all.

I have deleted the App Store preference files, cache files and also the following files as recommended on many sites:

sudo rm -R $TMPDIR../C/com.apple.appstore/*

I have logged in and out of my account, I have logged in and out of the Mac App Store. I have restarted my Mac numerous times. I have killed the softwareupdated process in Activity Monitor. I think I've tried absolutely everything that I could find on the Internet. Nothing I’ve done solves the problem.

What is happening?

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Sep 25, 2020 4:53 PM

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41 replies

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 27, 2020 9:37 PM in response to BDAqua

BDAqua wrote:

Do you have a Time Machine backup to Restore to/from?

Yes, Time Machine and two CCC backups but there has to be a simpler solution rather than reverting back to a previous system which is a pain in the --- (and sometimes ends up being more problematic than it was before you started).

I own a recording studio. I've got such a complex setup that I can't take any chances for something as trivial as the Mac App Store (as annoying as the problem is).

BTW, don't touch the 2020-005 security update, it is riddled with serious bugs:

https://macintouch.com/post/8533/mojave-2020-005-security-update-problems/

BDAqua

Level 10

239,375 points

Sep 27, 2020 9:48 PM in response to SmackAndToss

Yes, there are dangers, but I always clone before doing an update so I can boot from he clone & continue right along with doing biz... Apple has put a Monkey wrench in the works with Catalina & killed cloning altogether with Big Sur.

I normally do not even run off the Internal drive due to the failure rates & difficulty of replacing the drives lately.

DiZoE

Level 4

2,931 points

Sep 27, 2020 10:08 PM in response to SmackAndToss

Hey there! And forgive me if I missed something, but have read your thread.

I have seen this in Catalina. No matter what you do, including a clean install, (As you’ve done), those “Updates” will appear.

Its because they are linked to your Apple ID (New or old).

As I’m sure you know they used to come bundled separately, but are now stock with the OS, so even with all software updates done they will show.

If you open one of those apps, (Such as Garage Band, Numbers, Keynote, Pages, iMovie), from Finder > Applications, and check the version from App > About This App, is it current?

I’ve seen a dozen times this happen, the ones showing in the App Store are not the actual ones on your Mac.

You can either ignore what you see there, (Understand if you don’t want to). And continue to use the current version from Applications.

Or, as said before, permanently remove them, not from your Mac, but from your account.

If this is what’s happening, I know you don’t want to delete the apps from Finder then reinstall them, you may not have to.

Sign out of and quit the App Store.

Open Finder > Go > Computer > Macintosh HD (Usually) > Library > Application Support > App Store, and delete the adoption.plist from there.

(I might double check the User Library as well).

This one is the most important file to remove to forget the app association with the Apple ID.

I’d also delete from the user ~/Library (To be thorough if you won’t delete/reinstall the apps):

com.apple.storefront (Or AppStore) from the following folders if there:

Cache

Containers

Preferences

Preferences/ByHost

Saved Application State

If you were going to delete the current apps, now is the best time, if not, either way restart and either:

I’m not too familiar with Using Garage Band, (Tried it a few times, wasn’t too into it), but I’m fairly certain any large data files associated within it are not stored within the app contents, but elsewhere. And I could be wrong, but I believe deleting/reinstalling the app, only installs the size of the app and not any of the content, (As I believe you mentioned downloading a lot of data), so wouldn’t worry about the app data load too much.

But whether you decide to delete and reinstall or not, I’d try sign out/delete adoption.plist, (And the other files if stubborn), reboot and see if still there, otherwise doing the same steps but deleting then reinstalling will be the fix, hope this helps!

Sep 27, 2020 11:23 PM in response to SmackAndToss

I have the same issue with two updates in 10.14 Mojave that have been in my app store for 2 weeks now. Every time I click 'update' or 'update all' nothing happens. Tried restarting.

Here is a screen recording:

https://youtu.be/7b2xBOf68g4

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 28, 2020 9:39 AM in response to BDAqua

BDAqua wrote:

Apple has put a Monkey wrench in the works with Catalina & killed cloning altogether with Big Sur.

I normally do not even run off the Internal drive due to the failure rates & difficulty of replacing the drives lately.

We're trying to phase the Mac right out of our studio but people come in every week with stuff that is done in GarageBand so we don't have much choice. Pro Tools has always been very much PC-oriented software and that's our bread and butter. I have no desire to use a 27-inch iPhone with Big Sur.

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 28, 2020 9:42 AM in response to billtubbs

DiZoE wrote:

But whether you decide to delete and reinstall or not, I’d try sign out/delete adoption.plist, (And the other files if stubborn), reboot and see if still there, otherwise doing the same steps but deleting then reinstalling will be the fix, hope this helps!

Thanks, I'll give that a try.

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 28, 2020 9:44 AM in response to billtubbs

billtubbs wrote:

Here is a screen recording:

https://youtu.be/7b2xBOf68g4

Yes, that's our Mac App Store problem -- to a tee -- exactly as in your video, thanks for sharing. I think there are a lot more people out there who have this problem who just haven't noticed it yet.

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 28, 2020 1:07 PM in response to Nuke

Nuke wrote:

The YouTube video posted by @billtubbs is exactly what is happening to me on our Macs with SSD and hard drive.

Did this begin happening after you installed Security Update 2020-004 or Security Update 2020-005?

Nuke

Level 1

89 points

Sep 28, 2020 6:08 PM in response to SmackAndToss

@SmackAndToss,

I think it started about two to three weeks ago. I can't remember when Security Update 2020-004 was pushed out to everyone. If it was in the past 3 weeks, then "yes" after 2020-004.

I had hoped that 2020-005 would fix things but unfortunately not.

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Sep 29, 2020 5:53 PM in response to SmackAndToss

I don't know if any of you have seen this but I believe that Safari 14 is the culprit, causing updates on the Mac App Store to malfunction. I noticed that things went a little haywire after installing Safari 14 (I have not installed Security Updated 2020-005 and I will not do so until a fix is released):

https://mrmacintosh.com/mojave-2020-005-security-update-causing-major-problems-updated/

iEvan 3.0

Level 3

977 points

Oct 1, 2020 6:22 PM in response to SmackAndToss

I haven’t installed security update 5 or whatever everybody’s worried about, and now I have a 2nd app update in the Mac App Store which won’t download and install. Great.

Clearly it’s not just you, but this also doesn’t seem to be a widespread problem.

Nuke

Level 1

89 points

Oct 2, 2020 3:13 PM in response to SmackAndToss

Yesterday evening Apple pushed an update via System Software Updates that required a reboot. This might be the supplemental update you are talking about. It mentioned some Safari updates & some security updates.

I figured I'd give it a try.

Today I noticed that there were more updates in the App Store, so decided to check it out.

All the updates were downloaded and installed. Finally it's fixed for me.

I hope this update also works for everyone else.

Thanks Apple for fixing the bug.

SmackAndToss Author

Level 1

12 points

Oct 2, 2020 3:26 PM in response to Nuke

Nuke wrote:

This might be the supplemental update you are talking about...

Yes, I noted that supplemental update in my post directly above your last post, Nuke. Thanks for letting me know about the success you had, very good news.

But here's the strange part. I haven't installed anything at all since I started this thread on Sept. 25th -- no system software updates, no nothing. This afternoon, I opened the Mac App Store, saw five updates sitting there and decided to try again and download GarageBand 10.3.5.

It downloaded without a hitch. It worked perfectly. The Mac App Store now works perfectly for me and I haven't installed anything since I started this thread on Sept. 25th.

Go figure. This must've been some sort of server communication problem on Apple's end. Anyway, thanks Apple for doing whatever you did. I am a happy (recording) camper.

iEvan 3.0

Level 3

977 points

Oct 2, 2020 7:51 PM in response to SmackAndToss

Same here, the two app updates I spoke of previously downloaded tonight with no issues. My computer hadn't even been on, never mind installed any macOS software update, before retrying. I guess something was broken on the back-end, and Apple fixed it for us. Yay!

To whomever at Apple took notice of this thread, thank you very much for taking the time to get this working again! :D

BDAqua

Level 10

239,375 points

Sep 26, 2020 5:03 PM in response to SmackAndToss

Try the standalone in Safe Mode...

https://support.apple.com/kb/DL2054?locale=en_US

Safe Boot, (holding Shift key down at startup).

Mac App Store Won't Download Updates