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Old users deleted/not ported on upgrade from Catalina to Monterey

I upgraded my 2015 MacBook Pro from Catalina to Monterey using System Preferences > Software Update method. After upgrade, it asked me to create a new user (login). But the existing user accounts (logins) have just disappeared. The folders exists on the disk, but System Preferences > Users & Groups show only the newly created user. How do I get back to the older user account I had?

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 12.1

Posted on Jan 15, 2022 8:45 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jan 17, 2022 5:51 AM

Thanks for the reply.

I got help from Apple support (chat/phone) and they diagnosed the issue:

I had 2 volumes on disk. Say V1 and V2. existing macOS catalina was on V1. Somewhere during upgrade process I must have chosen to install Monterey on V2 (may be even create it and then install). So all I had to do was erase / delete V2 - which had no other data and it booted back to Catalina using v1.

I have subsequently upgraded to Monterey installing int on V1. No issues.

Now I think easier fix could be to set V1 as startup disk? (i could not try it, but I am guessing it would have worked).

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2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jan 17, 2022 5:51 AM in response to lllaass

Thanks for the reply.

I got help from Apple support (chat/phone) and they diagnosed the issue:

I had 2 volumes on disk. Say V1 and V2. existing macOS catalina was on V1. Somewhere during upgrade process I must have chosen to install Monterey on V2 (may be even create it and then install). So all I had to do was erase / delete V2 - which had no other data and it booted back to Catalina using v1.

I have subsequently upgraded to Monterey installing int on V1. No issues.

Now I think easier fix could be to set V1 as startup disk? (i could not try it, but I am guessing it would have worked).

Old users deleted/not ported on upgrade from Catalina to Monterey

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