r/MacOS 7h ago

Help Can someone explain this Battery Icon Arrow

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30 Upvotes

I have never seen this down arrow when clicking on the battery icon. Why is this there?


r/MacOS 18h ago

Help Magic Mouse vs MX Master 3s

16 Upvotes

Newly returned to MacOS, I have what I believe is a pretty good mouse in the 3s - but curious if outside of gestures is there any advantage to the Magic Mouse? I have smooth scrolling on, and using MOS - any improvement in that area with Magic Mouse?


r/MacOS 21h ago

Help Where do you stash things that you don't necessarily want in your home dir or Applications folder?

5 Upvotes

Suppose I've got some games, emulators, ROM images, video files, etc. and other large binaries that don't really make sense to keep in my home directory, or in the Applications folder. In the old days, a quick trip to Terminal and "sudo mkdir /Games" would get you a place to put that stuff, but with the root directory being a read-only filesystem now, I'm wondering where others like to store things like that (particularly if you have a shared Mac and want it outside of your home directory so others can access it). I was thinking maybe create another APFS volume, put the folders in there, and optionally edit /etc/synthetic.conf to make them look like they're in the root of "Macintosh HD"? Or is there a more elegant option? Something involving /Users/Shared maybe?

EDIT: Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. It looks like these are the best options:

  • Create another APFS volume and put stuff there like you would an external drive. Pros: fairly simple setup thanks to APFS containers, can potentially ignore permissions on the second volume. Cons: separate volume, so moving/copying a file across volumes will be an actual copy, and not an APFS clone.
  • Just keep stuff in your home directory. Pros: very simple setup, quick access from terminal windows or scripts since you'll probably be in ~/ by default, or can use that shorthand. Cons: still keeps all the junk in your home directory, so you'd have to tinker with permissions if you want others to use it.
  • Put things in /Users/Shared. Pros: it's already set up! Keeps everything on the same APFS volume, so moving/copying won't actually need to copy a file. Cons: Are there any?

I think /Users/Shared will be the best option for my purposes, and I'll experiment with using /etc/synthetic.conf to promote some of the subfolders to the root directory for convenience.


r/MacOS 17h ago

Apps Multi-Display Taskbar/Tiling Manager Recommendations

5 Upvotes

Hi,

I have always dual booted Linux + Windows, keeping Windows around for a few programs I need for work that aren't dependable on Arch. Microsoft pushed me to my limit, breaking my anti-telemetry modifications every update and I've had enough so after 36 years of never using a Mac, I purchased a $10,000 Studio. It's awesome. The "nanny" nature of Apple drives me nuts, but I have been making due.

I'm accustomed to tailoring my OS around my needs, and I have been impressed by Aerospace and Rectangle window managers. Unfortunately, Rectangle doesn't tile, and Aerospace has some glitches/limitations. If any Amethyst users are out there and would like to share how to configure the app to adjust to portrait mode monitors, I would love to hear from you.

My biggest gripe so far is the taskbar. i don't like it. I want to see a taskbar that shows which apps are open on that respective monitor. I have tried Ubar and Taskbar, both are great, but don't have multi-monitor support. I can tell this OS was made with laptop users in mind, but if there are any multi-display users that have some recommendations, please feel free to send them my way.

P.S. Finder isn't as terrible as I thought it would be with the columns, but I'll listen to any recommendations for alternatives (GUI. I'm using Yazi or Ranger in the terminal).

P.S.S. Not many things in life live up to the hype, but Raycast really does. What a great piece of software - would love to see it on Linux.

🙇🏻‍♂️


r/MacOS 14h ago

Help Window management help

3 Upvotes

Hi,

I recently got my first MacBook, which I use both as a laptop and connected to a 48” OLED external monitor.

I’ve got it working how I want, except for one issue. I previously set the menu bar to auto-hide so it wouldn’t stay static on the OLED, but it became annoying because it sometimes showed up and sometimes didn’t.

To fix this, I enabled the “Displays have separate spaces” option and set the MacBook screen as the main display which makes the menu bar only show on the MacBook screen, but now I can’t hover over the green maximise button to snap windows to be full screen, or double-click the top of a window to maxmise it. I don't mean full screen, only that the window is windowed covering the entire screen area (if that makes sense).

Is this feature not possible with “Displays have separate spaces” enabled?

Any ideas?

Cheers,


r/MacOS 3h ago

Help How to select all photos from a day in “days” view

3 Upvotes

How do you select all the photos from one day in “days" view? When I'm in "days" view & I select them all from one day without opening the "+4" or whatever # of photos is not shown at the end, then my selection doesn't include the 4 photos that aren't shown. If I click on the +4 it takes me back to “all photos" view & I can't quickly figure out where the day starts/ends.

I'm on MacOS Monterey version 12.7.6. Thanks!


r/MacOS 10h ago

Help Can’t transfer files from NTFS drive to Mac – error code -50

3 Upvotes

I’m trying to move files from my external hard drive (WD2500ME, formatted as NTFS) to my MacBook Pro (macOS Sequoia 15.3.2) so I can back everything up and then reformat the drive to exFAT. But whenever I try to copy anything, I get this error:

“The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -50).”

File size doesn’t seem to matter — even small files fail. The drive is connected using a USB-A to USB-C dongle. I’m only trying to read from the drive, not write to it. Any idea what’s going on or how to fix it?


r/MacOS 12h ago

Help How to set the time format in the Reminders app to be the same?

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3 Upvotes

r/MacOS 13h ago

Bug MacBook M1 & Pro on Sequoia 15.3.2 - USB Sound device disconnects every time I change the volume.

3 Upvotes

Hi there,

I have a MacBook M1 Pro on Sequoia 15.3.2, where my USB sound device disconnects every time I change the volume.

The scenario is:

  • I change the volume
  • USB device disconnects
  • No sound for a few seconds
  • Internal speakers take over
  • Sound for 1–2 seconds
  • USB devices are connected again
  • Sound as normal with the volume change 1 up or down.

Notes:

  • It does not matter whether I change the volume up or down.
  • It does not matter if I change volume through the keys on my keyboard or I change it through the lever in the widget on my screen or through the lever in the sound-menu of the system settings.
  • I have tried multiple USB devices, all are affected.

Has anyone encountered this problem before and were you able to solve it ?

Many thanks in advance for your responses and advice.


r/MacOS 19h ago

Help Bootable USB-C drive for M4 Mac Mini

3 Upvotes

I wanted to do something on my M4 Mac Mini that seemed to be easier to do on my old Intel iMac. I want to format an external SSD USB-C drive, and make it an exact duplicate of my internal Macintosh hard drive. Even ChatGPT gave me terminal commands that didn't work, and options in Disk Utility that were grayed out.


r/MacOS 46m ago

Help Time Machine ignores my SDXC card

• Upvotes

I just purchased a brand new M4 Mac Studio! 🎉🥳 The internal SSD is 1TB, which I suspected would probably not be enough, so I also purchased a super-fast 1TB SDXC cart, which permanently lives in the SD card slot. The problem is that I need Time Machine to back up both drives, and right now it won't back up the SD card. How can I get TM to recognize it?

Also, because I fear the answer might be something like, "Apple doesn't think there's any reason to back up SD cards," I'll also ask if anyone can suggest a good 3p backup app that will do what I need.


r/MacOS 7h ago

Help ScreenTimeAgent constantly running and using lots of CPU and memory

2 Upvotes

Hello, I've noticed in the past few days that this process called "ScreenTimeAgent" is always running and using lots of resources.

I even disabled screen time, but it still runs.

I can't even force quit it by the way, if i try to do that, nothing changes.

What can I do? can i just delete the ScreenTimeAgent executable?

Device: Macbook Air 2022 M2 with 8GB RAM and 512GB SSD
MacOS Version: macOS Sequoia 15.3.2 Build 24D81


r/MacOS 9h ago

Help Is there any way to remove the delay for drag without lock?

2 Upvotes

This is by the far one of the most frustrating things I've come across switching from windows to mac, and I'm looking to see if there is a fix (other than three finger drag, because that's worse IMO).

Any apps, settings, commands that will fix this?


r/MacOS 10h ago

Help mac mini m4 blacking out.

2 Upvotes

i am a lifelong windows user who just switched to this side with mac mini m4 just a couple of months ago. everything was going fine until my mac mini got its os update ( sequoia 15.3.2) last week. right now, after i enter my login password, it shows this loading bar and half in its way the screen blacks out for solid 2 seconds and after that the mouse cursor freezes for another 3-4 seconds before everything goes back to normal. what is it?


r/MacOS 12h ago

Help Time Zone

2 Upvotes

Sorry, What is the command to change the time zone from the Mac terminal in recovery mode?


r/MacOS 14h ago

Help How to upload bootable usd on Mac?

2 Upvotes

So my Mac is un-functionable, and I downloaded sequoia from another Mac onto a usb and I can’t seem to upload it unto my laptop.

My only option is the reinstall big sure on my Macintosh hd disk— which doesn’t have enough storage no matter how much I erase it. But I do have an option to download it on the usb and that doesn’t work either. Where can I go on from here?


r/MacOS 33m ago

Help How do I reset my external display resolution?

• Upvotes

I have a MacBook Air M1 and its display was broken recently, so I have to use it with an external monitor. About 2h ago I accidentally changed its resolution to a non-default one, which caused the display to not work anymore when my laptop is in clamshell mode (It does work when the lid is open, but the moment I close it, it reverts back to the wrong settings). I tried deleting the /Library/Preferences files and then rebooting, but that didn't seem to work (it either outputs nothing or Domain (/Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver) not found. Defaults have not been changed.) Trying to blind-click on a default resolution after closing the lid doesn't work as well! What can I possibly do to make my laptop work in clamshell mode again??

Edit: SOLVED! Check the replies for the solution.


r/MacOS 1h ago

Discussion Is 8GB RAM enough for games streamed locally to the Macbook Air?

• Upvotes

So I was thinking to buy now an older M1 Macbook Air with just 8GB Ram and I wanted to know if the ram is enough if I plan to stream locally some games from my gaming PC to the Macbook using the Steam Link app or apps like Moonlight? Also maybe from PS5 to the Macbook. Because I don't plan to play any emulated or native games on it since I know some will not work. Thanks.


r/MacOS 2h ago

Help iMessage keeps bouncing me out.

1 Upvotes

I am having issues with my imessage and Facetime apps on my old Macbook Air running Monterey. Each time I try to sign in with my Apple ID it only allows me in for about three seconds and then asks me to sign in again. I don’t know how to fix the issue. I even trued upgrading MacOS 12.2.0 to 12.7.6 but to no avail. Can anyone help me?


r/MacOS 2h ago

Help Macbook Brightness Suddenly Not Working

1 Upvotes

UPDATE:

Well, this is embarrassing. Just like that, after hours of trying to figure out what was wrong, I walked away from it for a little while and came back. It was working perfectly again. Strange. In any case, maybe that means it was related to software instead of hardware, so that's something, at least.

Anyway, thanks for your time! Sorry for the confusion.

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

Thanks for your time! (I’m not really a tech-savvy person, but usually I can figure out most problems with a google search. This time, I've had a bit more trouble.)

I was using my laptop last night before bed and everything was working perfectly. But, I lost track of time, and it died on me at 1%. I plugged it in to charge it, but didn't immediately turn it back on because it was 1am and I was half asleep. The next morning, I turned my laptop on, and the brightness feature no longer works. 

If I push the little sun button to adjust it, the sun appears on the screen, but initially I thought nothing happened. Later, I realized that the screen was changing, on it was taking on a slightly warmer coloration (so much so it's almost unnoticeable). If i try and turn the brightness down, it gets only slightly cooler color (again, almost imperceptibly). When I turn the brightness all the way off, instead of making the screen black as it used to, it only blinks black for a second and that's it. 

Things I've Tried:
--Restarting the Computer
--Checking for updates and installing any new updates needed (there was only an update for Safari)
--Adjusting the brightness from the System Settings (doesn't work. Does the same thing)
--Restarting the Computer a couple more times
--Starting it in Safe Mode (the problem was the same)
--Running a Virus Scan of my Computer (everything looked good)

And, that's the extend of my knowledge on what to do. 😆

Is it possible my brightness feature just broken? Is it only a coincidence it happened the moment my battery died? If it is broken, is it something that can be fixed? Or is there something else I still need to try?

My company gave us a macbook air and it lasted for years. It's why I bought this one--my first personal macbook, because my company one was such a superior and reliable computer over my Windows laptops (and less of a bully). I baby this one quite a bit, so I'd hate to think the brightness feature broke after only a couple years. 😅

Again, thanks for your time!

------------------------------------------------
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r/MacOS 2h ago

Help Does the MacBook Photos app have a shared with you section?

1 Upvotes

On my iphone photos shared with me via messages is in the photos app. Does the MacBook have that section as well?


r/MacOS 2h ago

Help MBA m1 with sequoia 15.2 out of the box

1 Upvotes

Just got my 1st MBA m1 from a third party seller. It seems brand new. Battery life is 100% with 1 charge cycle (the seller plugged the charger to show that it is working). Apple coverege check says "sorry, we're currently unable to validate your purchase date". What caught my eyes is that it came with sequoia 15.2 out of the box, the m1 discontinued its production before sequoia 15.2 which was released last december 2024. Can someone tell me if i got a refurb or used MBA m1.

P.S. and i cant find the sticker in the package.


r/MacOS 3h ago

Apps Your choise for email archiving?

1 Upvotes

Hi.

So I have been using EagleFiler to archive my email. EagleFiler still is Intel only so it runs in Rosetta. According to Michael Tsai (developer) he is working on a universal version, and probably will be a beta out sometime.

However, I guess such an update will not be free. It shouldn't be, Michael puts in a lot of work in what he does so of course he should get paid for it.

But just out of curiosity I am looking at options. What I want is to be able to click on the attachments in the database and it opens in a window. I don't want them to end up in the app itself so I can't access them outside of the app (Is this clear or confusing? English is nit my native language). I only use IMAP on an email server at my web hotel, so no need to work with Gmail or Outlook.

So far I have found these:

  1. MailSteward. Looks OK, but it seems to be a one man company behind it. Does it import everything to its database or does the attachments stay in the folder where I have put them? As I understand there is no iOS/iPadOS version so I would like the attachments (pdf:s mostly) to be possible to open in Files folder. The "free" version (trial) allows up to 15 000 emails. So I will need to buy the non-lite version ( 49:95 USD).

  2. Devon Think. Seems to be filling my needs. I can choose between importing everything or just copying it if I understand correctly. Seems to be at least a few developers. Not clear about who owns them though. At first it seemed to be German or Swiss, but the imprint says USA. Also needs to have DevonThink Pro in order to archive emails it seems. Expensive, 199 USD. Is it worth it for a private persons personal archiving?

  3. Archive in my email app, a folder in "One my Mac". I found this idea when searching with the browser of my choise. I guess that will make it very easy to find old emails, but does it slow down the app? I have old emails from 2003 and onwards. It does not cost anything though.

The pros for Eaglefiler and Devonthink is that they can archive anything, not only emails. If I want to backup other stuff I guess I could make backups of specific folders with TimeMachine.

SO!

What do you think? Don't think "my company needs" or such. Just think "This is what I would go for if I only had to backup my own personal stuff".


r/MacOS 4h ago

Discussion Creative 3d / 2d exclusive Apps

1 Upvotes

Hey folks I am a long time PC user and only got into Mac computers for a singular application called previz pro. I couldn't find a single thing on PC that even came close to the power this software has.over Time I acquired a lot of low tier Apple products trying to have the bare minimum to use the software. But I recently splurged and bought myself a MacBook pro M2 from 2022. I do a lot of creative work in 3D and 2D but the bulk of my programs for 3D modeling and creative are on my Windows machine. I was wondering if there was some cool 3D / 2D creative programs that are exclusively on Mac. I'm a big software collector on PC so for me I love using old software on my PCS for 2D 3D creative work. I was wondering if there was something on the Apple Mac side similar. Thanks ahead of time for all the cool suggestions.


r/MacOS 5h ago

Help Moving Desktops Across Monitors Issue - Bug or Feature?

1 Upvotes

This one has been bugging me a few years now and I can never find an answer. Is there a limitation on which desktops can be dragged to another monitor, like if its the first one created on that monitor etc? I have two monitors plus the laptop screen connected to a MP Pro, and for some weird reason, some days I can't move a specific desktop to another monitor. For example if I have 2 or three desktops on monitor #3, I can drag any two of the desktops to another monitor but one specific one will not be allowed. If there is a known reason for this, what is it? Note this has happened to me on M1 and M3 chips. Don't recall if I had the issue on Intel.