Delete the installer & go back into the Appstore & see if you can download HS.

You could also try to boot via Safe Mode:
https://support.apple.com/kb/PH25617?locale=en_US

Then try running the installer or delete the installer & go into the Appstore to download & install.

quote:

Originally posted by vthoky:

quote:

Originally posted by lkdr1989:
Check the "Applications" folder & see if the High Sierra installer is in there; it could be that the Appstore has detected that HS has already been downloaded. If this is the case, you just need to run the installer. Make sure you backup your files before you update your Mac

Aha! I did find "Install MacOS High Sierra" in the Applications folder.
Clicked it... waited... got a dialog box that says, "Downloading Installer Information to the target volume failed." I click "OK", the box goes away, and that's that. Grrr.

Okay, it took me a minute to figure out how to delete the installer file, but I finally figured out to drag it to the trash can. at myself..

I then downloaded it again and launched it. Now I've got a dialog box that says, "Downloading installer information to the target volume failed." OK button just makes it go away, but without any clue what to do about it.

Guess I'll try the safe mode boot next....

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

ETA: Booted to safe mode and tried again to upgrade the OS. Not happening.
Created a new user with admin rights and tried again. No dice.

Rats....

quote:

Originally posted by vthoky:
I then downloaded it again and launched it. Now I've got a dialog box that says, "Downloading installer information to the target volume failed." OK button just makes it go away, but without any clue what to do about it.

How are you downloading it from the App Store? Do you go to "Updates" and do it from there? If so, try downloading it from the main page ("Featured"). It should show as an icon/link but if not, search for High Sierra.
 

Are you anywhere close to an Apple Store?

You can go to one to upgrade - free. They’ll likely use a thumbdrive or external hard drive to do the install.

On mine, I download once, create an install thumbdrive and use that on all my various Macs, mine, my husband’s, my BILs, my goddaughter’s...

quote:

Originally posted by henryaz:
How are you downloading it from the App Store? Do you go to "Updates" and do it from there? If so, try downloading it from the main page ("Featured"). It should show as an icon/link but if not, search for High Sierra.

I've downloaded it through Updates, I've downloaded it straight from the App Store. I've been through about eight attempts now... still no luck.

quote:

Originally posted by Leeann:
Are you anywhere close to an Apple Store?

You can go to one to upgrade - free. They’ll likely use a thumbdrive or external hard drive to do the install.

On mine, I download once, create an install thumbdrive and use that on all my various Macs, mine, my husband’s, my BILs, my goddaughter’s...

The closest Apple Store is about two hours away. It's on the way (sort of) to my brother's place, so I could make it an excuse for a road trip. I'd like to get this done myself, though, as it will be a few weeks before I get to make the road trip again.

How do I download a file to a thumbdrive? I'm used to Windows, which offers me something like "save target as..." but I haven't yet seen such an option on the Mac.

The reason the installation fails is because there is something wrong with the target volume. Either the virus software is the problem, or there is an actual problem with the drive/volume.

Here’s what I’d do:

-Make a bootable partion on an external drive. Download the free utility “SuperDuper!” and duplicate the current startup volume to the external drive.
-After duplicating the startup volume to the external drive and while still booted up internally, make a Time Machine backup to the external drive.
-Reboot the machine from the external drive and download the OS from the App Store.
-Once the OS installation starts, bypass the default installation and use the included disk utility to reformat the internal volume.
-After reformatting the internal volume, do a clean install.
-Restart the Mac on the internal volume, and select the option to setup the Mac from a Time Machine backup, and select the backup that resides on the external hard drive.
-The Mac will restore all its user files, and you’re done.

I would also make a verified backup elsewhere before I did anything, and keep that backup sandboxed from everything.

Good luck. Most installation problems of this nature are traceable back to a failing drive or corrupt volume. You might first also try launching Disk Utility and use it to verify the volume. If this drive is a few years old, and especially if it’s a spinning HD, then it’s days are numbered. The reformat may help for awhile, but the failing drive’s issues will return as the corruption continues.

I sympathize with your lack of a close Apple Store. I’m originally from Roanoke, and my brother there is constantly annoyed at the lack of a close store. I would be too, but I decided to go to BYU at the last minute after planning my whole youth to go to VPI. Living in the lower Blue Ridge sometimes felt like the proverbial “two weeks from everywhere” from Oh Brother Where Art Thou?

Leeann, I owe you! Thank you so much for your help. I'm running on High Sierra now.

I think my next task is to do a Time Machine backup, and then back up the entire thing to another external drive as sigcrazy7 suggests. After that, I need to learn about Boot Camp.

My next quick question has to do with my [32GB] "EDC" jump drive. It's formatted for PC, and got lots of PC-style data. Will the MacBook read from it? I'm genuinely aiming to replace my Windows laptop with this MacBook, but I won't be Mac-only. This drive contains files I use at work, too. So... will it be "cross-compatible," so to speak? Or will I need to set up a Mac-specific jump drive? Similarly, what about my iTunes library (which currently resides on a Windows-format external hard drive)? It seems I would need to copy that all over to a Mac-format hard drive. Or is that something Boot Camp will help me solve easily?

Geeze, I've got SO much learning to do! But I am liking this MacBook!

quote:

Living in the lower Blue Ridge sometimes felt like the proverbial “two weeks from everywhere” from Oh Brother Where Art Thou?

No kidding, sir! I'm familiar with Roanoke, and I know what you're saying. The cool thing about this area is just that, though... want the beach? It's just a couple hours away. Want the big city? It's just a couple hours away. Want to be far enough out that there's no cell service? Just a few minutes (Ha!) away. It's a nice area here, mostly.

Anytime

Yep, it will read and write to the thumb drive with no trouble, assuming it's FAT32 or EXFAT. NTFS will work, but you need to add a driver for that.

I have an EXFAT 64 GB thumb drive I use for work and take files back and forth every day.

Perfect!
I just need to move the files off this drive, reformat, and move them back. Sounds like a job for the coming rainy Sunday afternoon.

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:
<snip>
The only caveat for AppCleaner is that you need to have it running if you want it to notice that you have dragged an app to the trash. Or, you can just open AppCleaner and drag an app directly onto the AppCleaner window.
<snip>

This is an older thread

An alternative to dragging the app to the AppCleaner panel:

In the upper right corner of the AppCleaner panel there’s a menu icon. Click it and a list your apps appears (and the version number of each). Select the app that you want to delete. Another panel opens displaying all of the files associated with that app, and the size of each. Initially all of its files are selected. Then click the Remove button.

It’s personal preference, but I like that method better.

Thank you for bringing back my thread, Pipe Smoker.

Now that you’ve done that, I’ll addd a couple of questions.

About a year ago, I upgraded and bought myself a new MacBook Air. The old 2012 MacBook Pro works just as hard as it ever has; this Air is way easier to slip into a backpack on the way out the door and its battery life is somewhat better.

Anyway… something I can’t figure out on this one is the moving of files to the trash bin icon. On the old Pro, I could simply drag the icon over to the bin and all would be well. With the new Air, if I hold on the file’s icon long enough to start dragging it, then the file gets opened. What I have to do instead is to hold down a Shift button, and then drag the icon to the bin. Is that simply something in the Settings that I’ve so far overlooked?

Next up: when I type in the reply box here at SIGforum, if I type a contraction or something that uses the apostrophe, or if I grab a corner and stretch the reply box, then the text in the reply box changes font and gets a lot smaller. I haven’t noticed this effect on the one other forum I frequent, though maybe the situation is different in that the other forum’s reply function doesn’t take place in a pop-up window.

Neither issue is crippling, but they’re both a little annoying.

vthoky-
For your first problem, I would suggest simply right-clicking on the icon/file. A pull down menu will then launch. Click on “move to trash”. Done.

Same to empty the trash - just right click on the trash, then click on “empty”.

quote:

You will use "Photos" (earlier app version was iphoto) to transfer photos in Mac OS. You should use the cable that came with your phone to connect to the USB port on your Mac.

Photos auto-sync between iPhone and macOS is seamless, but with one caveat. The devices must be running versions of their respective OS's without too much skew.

If they are compatible, simply connecting them via USB will launch Photos, and it will import the photos from the phone. This can take some time (hours). If you are more interested in copying photos from the Mac to the phone, the phones photo storage area will appear as a "Device" in Photos left panel. Then drag'n'drop as appropriate.

If one or the other OS is too old, you might be able to do this manually, or with a third-party app like ESFile Explorer.

Finally, if both devices are logged into the same Apple account, you can sync photos through it. Probably be able to do the same with other photo syncing sites (Google, Dropbox, Proton, etc.)

quote:

Originally posted by henryaz:
Long time Mac users will recall, before the Command key was the Command key, it was the Apple key. And the little ditty for copy-paste was "Apple-C, Apple-V".

I was helping my daughter with her new MacBook and she was telling me the Command key is like the Control key. I told her there was no command key on my last Apple computer, instead it had Open Apple and Closed Apple keys. That was pre-Mac though.

quote:

Originally posted by VictimNoMore:
vthoky-
For your first problem, I would suggest simply right-clicking on the icon/file. A pull down menu will then launch. Click on “move to trash”. Done.

Same to empty the trash - just right click on the trash, then click on “empty”.

Well, that’s a whole lot easier. Thank you!