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How do you move files from non-booting MBP to external HDD?

Fishrrman said:
By "from another drive", I DO NOT mean "target disk mode".
Click to expand...

What advantage does the USB drive method have over Target Disk Mode?

I don't know what "internal drive mounted on desktop" means.
 
"I don't know what "internal drive mounted on desktop" means."

It means that you can see the icon representing the internal drive on the desktop.

You can keep messing around as you're doing now, or you can "try things my way".
It's up to you.
 
If I do Target Disk Mode, I wouldn't have to delete the files, I could just move them to iMac.

But problem is I'm not seeing it in Startup Disk even when I have the MBP connected to the iMac.
 
Fishrrman said:
OP:

Don't make things too hard on yourself.
If the drive won't boot because it's "too full", the simple solution is:
Boot from ANOTHER drive, then delete a lot of stuff.
Now, the internal drive should be "re-bootable" on its own.

The easiest way to create that bootable drive:
- Get an USB flashdrive 32gb or larger
- Boot to internet recovery on the iMac
- Use internet recovery to install a bootable OS to the flashdrive (NOT to the iMac!).
- Set it up with a basic account -- username and password is all you need.
- Use this to boot the MBP
- Once booted, you can now access the MBP's drive and delete files. You will need to select the icon of the internal SSD, then do "get info", and then put a checkmark into "ignore ownership on this volume". Now you can delete whatever you wish.
- BE CAREFUL what you delete. I would get rid of movie files first, because they're the largest and removing them will "clear up" space quickly.
- Once you have about 20gb of the SSD "free", now try rebooting the MBP on its own.

One more thing...
In the future, BE MINDFUL of "how much stuff" is on your internal drive. You probably want to keep around 15gb "free", so that the OS "has room" to do the things it needs to do (stuff that is "normally invisible" to the user).
Click to expand...

I'll give it a try.
Does this absolutely need to be 32GB? I have a 16GB one or alternatively I have a 5TB hard drive. Should I make a partition for this? What would be an appropriate size for the partition? Would 32GB be ok or a little more?
 
Fishrrman said:
OP:

- Use internet recovery to install a bootable OS to the flashdrive (NOT to the iMac!).
Click to expand...

Could you either explain or link to an article that shows how to do this?

"- Use this to boot the MBP"

When you boot to the MBP, do you have to press some kind of key to make sure you are booting the bootable flashdrive?
 
A bootable basic system should like "at least" a 25 GB partition, but more is better - I have a 240 GB external SSD with OS X 10.6, 10.8, 10.10, and 10.12
6 is installed on a 35 GB partition, 8 is on 45 GB, 10 and 12 are both on 80 GB partitions.
These are my troubleshooting systems, just a basic install with a few maintenance apps on each.
I can tell you that a 16 GB flash drive just won't be enough for a full bootable install - 32 GB is much better.

When you have a bootable partition, be it a full system, or just a bootable installer, you should be able to "pick" your system boot by having that bootable device plugged in, then restart holding your Option key. Your bootable drive should show up in that boot-picker screen, so you can, well, pick it (Click on drive icon to select it, then press Enter to boot.
 
You probably can't put a bootable version of the OS onto a 16gb flash drive.
It's just not large enough.

You need a 32gb or larger flashdrive for a basic OS install.

You could TRY a partition on a big external hard drive.
No promises that it will work.
But... it might.
Make the partition about 50gb in size. That should do.
 
If you have a partition, and want to make it bootable, install a supported operating system on that partition. You could also clone a bootable partition using a backup utility.
Which version of macOS do you want to use?
 
For bootable, Mojave.
I would like to keep the El Capitan though for the internal drive.
 
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That will be fine.
Boot to your Mojave bootable installer, choose Reinstall macOS from the menu, and direct the install to the external drive.
This link will help you make a bootable installer, if you don't already have that.
 
Those are mostly the same steps as the link I posted, so, yes, you will find that both methods give you the same result.
 
DeltaMac said:
That will be fine.
Boot to your Mojave bootable installer, choose Reinstall macOS from the menu, and direct the install to the external drive.
This link will help you make a bootable installer, if you don't already have that.
Click to expand...

I just tried this but it would not give me option to direct it to external drive (saying that it's locked or something) and so I chose the internal drive but it didn't have enough space to proceed (1GB left out of 256 GB).
 
What, exactly, is your external drive?

well, yes, your thread is about trying to make some space on your internal drive (because you know it is full), and it is still too full. A reinstall with a recent macOS would likely need at least 12 to 15 GB of space, and you don't have that space yet.
Your best choice is that external drive.
Sometimes, a simple restart of your Mac might fix that "locked" issue, and allow you to go ahead with a system install.
Do you have anything important on that external? If not, then a good choice would be to erase the drive now, making sure the drive is formatted Mac OS Extended (journaled)
 
Hmm when I tried again it seems like what I made on the external is actually an installer and not something already bootable?

In other words I would need to make another partition on the external to install Mojave to, and then boot from that partition, and then get access to the internal drive from there?
 
Fishrrman said:
"I don't know what "internal drive mounted on desktop" means."

It means that you can see the icon representing the internal drive on the desktop.
Click to expand...

I'm not seeing that icon.
Nevermind, I see it now.
 
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I deleted and freed 50GB of space, but it still crashes when I boot from the internal drive.
 
I suspect that you are now seeing that your SSD has an actual problem, or is failing.
(Make sure to keep a current backup, as an SSD can sometimes go to catastrophic failure (dead, no recovery) much quicker than a spinning hard drive.

I would try:
backup your internal drive.
erase the drive.
Reinstall/restore your system to that drive.
If you still have the same "crashing", you will likely need to replace the SSD.
 
How do you back up the internal drive with time machine?

Could the problem be because of the date settings like you said some time ago?

If I make an El Capitan installer with date correction, could I try re-installing it?
 
Back up with Time Machine: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201250

No, the only affect from that date issue is when installing El Capitan - fixed by changing the date in the terminal when you are booted to the El Capitan installer.
I actually just installed El Capitan through my own Mac this morning. The installer immediately reported that no files could be found. I changed the date to one in 2018, and the installer completed without further issues. That's really all that happens, just remember that El Capitan won't install without changing the date.
If you are getting other issues, such as crashing after the system has installed, that's not fixed by simply changing the date - it's some other issue
 
What I'm afraid is that if I run Time Machine, it will try to backup the currently running OS which would be the Mojave in the External Drive. Is there a way to direct the Time Machine so that it backs up the drive of your choosing (the internal drive)?

Since this problem started to happen right after installing El Capitan, could this mean that the El Capitan install wasn't done correctly possibly because of lack of enough space, and therefore the OS itself was corrupted in the process?
 
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levmc said:
My MBP isn't booting (or rather shutting off as soon as it boots) because the internal drive is almost full. So before attempting powering it on again, I would like to move access and move some of the files to my external HDD. How do I go about doing that?
Click to expand...

If you know how to copy files from the terminal, then I'd boot to Internet Recovery, attach your external drive, load up Terminal and then copy your files. If that's not comfortable for you and/or you want a graphical progress indicator of your files, then I'd do the following:

1. Get a second external drive with at least 60GB of free space
2. Boot to Internet Recovery with only that drive connected (you can probably do this with a single drive but it might get messy)
3. Install whatever macOS release Internet Recovery is offering onto that external drive (if your OS is High Sierra or newer, you want to make sure that's what you're able to install)
4. Connect the drive you are going to back up to, and boot holding down the Option key, select the external drive.

You should now be booted to a macOS installation that can read from your internal drive and copy to the external that you are wanting to back up to.
 
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