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Trying to Download macOS Catalina Installer

I am in the process of setting up my late 2013 iMac to boot from an external SSD to improve performance. I am following instructions I found online but I can't get the Catalina installer to download. I click get, it asked if I am sure, I say yes, the progress bar shows that it is 8.25 GB of 8.25 downloaded but errors out before it's done and I don't have the installer in my Apps.


Installation Error: An error occurred while installing the selected updates


I think it is trying to update vs just download and sees that I already have that version?


Is there anything I can change to just get the Installer downloaded so I can install on my external drive?


Posted on Feb 13, 2023 5:58 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Feb 13, 2023 7:12 AM

Follow this help article: Reinstall macOS - Apple Support (i.e., Cmd+R for recovery mode)


The only change in the steps would be you should select your external SSD when prompted to choose "select a disk".


Hope it helps.

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2 replies

Feb 13, 2023 7:49 AM in response to Sharhari

I didn't know about, I did it and followed the prompts to restore from a time machine back-up with I made yesterday. Then it let me select the external SSD drive, so it appears to be doing it all in 1 step thank you! I will let you know in 17 hours if it worked :-) My back-up is also on an old hard drive, I can hear it chugging away.

Trying to Download macOS Catalina Installer

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