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[Shackeng]

I decided to replace my 15 year old Acer 5220 very slow laptop, with one of these, and it should be possible to copy files from my Win 10 PC using the Migration Assistant or Ethernet cable. With the latter, neither one apparently sees the other despite sounding as though they do. With the MA, having done what seemed to be required, switch off anti-virus and carry out chkdsk, the MA starts OK on both but freezes almost immediately and sticks. I have also tried USB to USB C connection with no luck. I think I can copy files from Windows to Mac via the cloud, but not sure how. Can anyone help?

[Shackeng]

That surprises me, I felt sure there would be a Mac expert on here.

[deviator]

How much data are you talking about?

I know my way around Mac's, but I still hate them.

[deviator]

Right you need to know the name of the Windows computer to do this.

Open Finder on the Mac. On the menu bar at the top, click go, click connect to server.

In the server address box type....
smb://computername/c$

Replace computername with the name of your computer. It will need a Windows administrator username and password.

[Varche]

How much data are you talking about?

I know my way around Mac's, but I still hate them.

Why do you hate them? We have a mix of apple and win10 products. Just about to replace two win10 desktops and aio Imacs are my hot contender rather than hp envy for example.

[deviator]

Why do you hate them? We have a mix of apple and win10 products. Just about to replace two win10 desktops and aio Imacs are my hot contender rather than hp envy for example.

Overrated, overpriced, overly complicated and less useful than a Windows PC of less than half the cost.

People buy the stuff to be trendy and cool, it's like brand name clothing - you pay a premium for a potentially inferior product.

I really, really could go on and on and on about it, but that's not the point of this thread.

EDIT - I am actually writing this on an iMac. I got an iMac at work to force me to learn the OS better. I find it so frustrating.

[Doctor Gollum]

Even Faceachebook have issues with Crapple.

https://www.wired.com/story/facebook-apple-feud-over-privacy-internet-future/

[STEMO]

Even Faceachebook have issues with Crapple.

Not in wifey's world it doesn't.

[TheBoy]

I fikin' hate my Mac with a passion.  I improved it dramatically by installing Windows on it.

You can do it over the network, but the Mac is particularly shite at talking SMB (which is what Windows uses), and pretty shite at sharing out NFS (which needs extra services installed on Windows).


The USB is easiest way, whats the issue?


You can use cloud by uploading from Windows and then downloading to Mac, but as Windows and MacOS are so dreadfully different, not sure its a great help.


How many files, and what sort are they?  And what sort of size?

[Shackeng]

Thanks guys, I only need to move my photos and document, letters etc. from Textmaker which is part of Softmaker Office suite. I don’t understand why I couldn’t do it via usb, obviously as a tech nerd I am missing something. I will try Deviators suggestion, is computer name the make? I just call it my PC.

[deviator]

To find the computer name....
Click on the Start button.
In the search box, type Computer.
Right click on This PC within the search results and select Properties.
Under Computer name, domain, and workgroup settings you will find the computer name listed.

[TheBoy]

To find the computer name....
Click on the Start button.
In the search box, type Computer.
Right click on This PC within the search results and select Properties.
Under Computer name, domain, and workgroup settings you will find the computer name listed.

By default on a modern Windows, the network announcement broadcasts are disabled.  So might not work that well

[TheBoy]

Thanks guys, I only need to move my photos and document, letters etc. from Textmaker which is part of Softmaker Office suite. I don’t understand why I couldn’t do it via usb, obviously as a tech nerd I am missing something. I will try Deviators suggestion, is computer name the make? I just call it my PC.

What was the issue with USB?

Was it the Mac couldn't see the USB?

Is the USB formatted as FAT32 rather than NTFS (Mac's NTFS driver is at best flakey)

Presumably your old laptop was USB-A given its age, and the M1 is USB-C, so you are using an adapter?  Apple hardware is fussy on adapters.


To use you new crApple device, you will have signed up to iCloud.  You can install iCloud for Windows on the old laptop.  Copy your docs to the iCloud folder on Windows, and they will slowly start to appear on the Mac.  The freebie iCloud is only 5Gb, so you probably wont be able to get them all over in one go, which means moving them once they have sync'd over, then doing the next lot  (though using cloud storage long term isn't a bad idea, and despite its horrible limitations, iCloud isn't that expensive for the 50Gb version)

**NOTE** cloud storage is NOT a viable form of backup, dont let anyone tell you otherwise, so you still need to backup important stuff locally to optical media or external drives etc.



Once you get documents over, there is no guarantee the Mac apps can understand them, though the photos show be fine.  Also, be aware, the M1 is ARM based, and not all applications from last year "work" under the Intel x86 emulator.  With the M1 being so new, and the first to use an overgrown iPhone CPU, much of the guff on the internet is irrelevent.  Beware of following instructions blindly

[Shackeng]

Thanks guys, I only need to move my photos and document, letters etc. from Textmaker which is part of Softmaker Office suite. I don’t understand why I couldn’t do it via usb, obviously as a tech nerd I am missing something. I will try Deviators suggestion, is computer name the make? I just call it my PC.

What was the issue with USB?

Was it the Mac couldn't see the USB?

Is the USB formatted as FAT32 rather than NTFS (Mac's NTFS driver is at best flakey)

Presumably your old laptop was USB-A given its age, and the M1 is USB-C, so you are using an adapter?  Apple hardware is fussy on adapters.


To use you new crApple device, you will have signed up to iCloud.  You can install iCloud for Windows on the old laptop.  Copy your docs to the iCloud folder on Windows, and they will slowly start to appear on the Mac.  The freebie iCloud is only 5Gb, so you probably wont be able to get them all over in one go, which means moving them once they have sync'd over, then doing the next lot  (though using cloud storage long term isn't a bad idea, and despite its horrible limitations, iCloud isn't that expensive for the 50Gb version)

**NOTE** cloud storage is NOT a viable form of backup, dont let anyone tell you otherwise, so you still need to backup important stuff locally to optical media or external drives etc.



Once you get documents over, there is no guarantee the Mac apps can understand them, though the photos show be fine.  Also, be aware, the M1 is ARM based, and not all applications from last year "work" under the Intel x86 emulator.  With the M1 being so new, and the first to use an overgrown iPhone CPU, much of the guff on the internet is irrelevent.  Beware of following instructions blindly

What was the issue with USB?
Although both machines 'dinged', I cant see the Mac on the PC under devices where all the drives are shown, and I'm not sure where the PC would show up on the MAC, it doesn't show under network.

Was it the Mac couldn't see the USB?
In Mac under network it shows a USB, but says it is either not connected or the other end is not responding.

Is the USB formatted as FAT32 rather than NTFS (Mac's NTFS driver is at best flakey)
Pass

Presumably your old laptop was USB-A given its age, and the M1 is USB-C, so you are using an adapter?  Apple hardware is fussy on adapters.
Cable with USB A PC end to USB C Mac end.


To use you new crApple device, you will have signed up to iCloud.  You can install iCloud for Windows on the old laptop.  Copy your docs to the iCloud folder on Windows, and they will slowly start to appear on the Mac.  The freebie iCloud is only 5Gb, so you probably wont be able to get them all over in one go, which means moving them once they have sync'd over, then doing the next lot  (though using cloud storage long term isn't a bad idea, and despite its horrible limitations, iCloud isn't that expensive for the 50Gb version)
 
I have installed iCloud on the PC, but haven't got a clue how to transfer files into it. In this instance Google has not been my friend.

**NOTE** cloud storage is NOT a viable form of backup, dont let anyone tell you otherwise, so you still need to backup important stuff locally to optical media or external drives etc.
I have always done that on my PC, and will be doing so with the MAC. I should also say that I only ever used the old laptop as a backup if my PC failed, as it did once 18 months ago, but I hope to use the MAC more generally, as I physically need to be able to use it in the living room, and not the study, as I am full time carer for my wife.

Once you get documents over, there is no guarantee the Mac apps can understand them, though the photos show be fine.  Also, be aware, the M1 is ARM based, and not all applications from last year "work" under the Intel x86 emulator.  With the M1 being so new, and the first to use an overgrown iPhone CPU, much of the guff on the internet is irrelevent.  Beware of following instructions blindly
Yes I have discovered that, while it 'may' be a brilliant concept, it is so new that it has not caught up with transfers etc. I am not alone in having operating difficulties.
Incidentally, I did research before I bought the Mac, and all the reviews were excellent, but of course the reviews don't cover this sort of issue. Also it was cheaper than a couple of equivalent MS laptops I looked at.
[/quote]

[deviator]

I miss target disc mode.

[Shackeng]

To find the computer name....
Click on the Start button.
In the search box, type Computer.
Right click on This PC within the search results and select Properties.
Under Computer name, domain, and workgroup settings you will find the computer name listed.

Does this sound reasonable? DESKTOP-R6QVQ17

[Shackeng]

I miss target disc mode.

Huh???

[deviator]

Does this sound reasonable? DESKTOP-R6QVQ17

Yes.

(Target Disc Mode - You used to be able to start a Mac up whilst holding down the the letter T. This made the internal HDD of the Mac act like an external HDD. You connected it to another device using Firewire not USB and the Mac would appear as an additional drive in My Computer.)

[Shackeng]

Does this sound reasonable? DESKTOP-R6QVQ17

Yes.

(Target Disc Mode - You used to be able to start a Mac up whilst holding down the the letter T. This made the internal HDD of the Mac act like an external HDD. You connected it to another device using Firewire not USB and the Mac would appear as an additional drive in My Computer.)

Thanks, for info, by magic I have found that the USB listed in my Mac network is the same ip as the PC so although it says it is disconnected, it can clearly see it somehow.

[Shackeng]

Another thing I have read is that the M1 Macs don't like 64bit Windows which my PC is.

[Shackeng]

Right you need to know the name of the Windows computer to do this.

Open Finder on the Mac. On the menu bar at the top, click go, click connect to server.

In the server address box type....
smb://computername/c$

Replace computername with the name of your computer. It will need a Windows administrator username and password.

Typed it in, and after some time I got this:
There was a problem connecting to the server “DESKTOP-R6QVQ17” The server may not exist or it is unavailable at this time. Check the server name or IP address, check your network connection and then try again.

[Shackeng]

Right you need to know the name of the Windows computer to do this.

Open Finder on the Mac. On the menu bar at the top, click go, click connect to server.

In the server address box type....
smb://computername/c$

Replace computername with the name of your computer. It will need a Windows administrator username and password.

I should have asked what the c stood for, my relevant drive is D, so it connected with D inserted vice C, still haven't managed to transfer anything, but at least I can now see the PC on the Mac.  Thanks very much for the help.

[Broomies Mate]

Lets go back to basics.

Have you got any anti-virus and/or firewall installed on the Windows machine?  If so, disable them.

Connect your network cable (I presume it is a 'crossover' cable)?

Find out what the IP address is of both machines.

Open a CMD prompt on the Windows machine and ping the IP address of the Mac.  If connected correctly, you should get a response.

Open Terminal on the Mac and ping the IP address of the Windows machine.

Once the above has been carried out (and successfully) it'll be a case of getting Nanny Windows to allow the Mac to access the drives.

Top-Tip:  Put everything you want to transfer into the 'Public' directory on the Windows machine.  There is a lot less Windows Red-Tape to overcome.

[Broomies Mate]

As an addition to the above, the Public directory, as the name suggests, doesn't require admin rights or passwords or any other bullcrap that you don't need on a private HOME network between two of YOUR machines.

The data is easily accessed by anyone on your network though, so be aware of that.

[Shackeng]

Thanks, I'll try that.

[TheBoy]

Sorry, I misunderstood the US it. I assumed it was a normal USB memory stick, not some linking cable (which are invariable troublesome).

Can you transfer the files to a USB memory stick, and then move the memory stick to the Mac, and copy them off?  A USB-A to USB-C adapter will be needed at one end, because your old PC won't have a USB-C and Apple stupidly removed all USB-A ports from all their laptops ages ago (as part of the standard Apple lock-in)


For iCloud (or Dropbox, or OneDrive) - Google should tell you where to put files on Windows for them to sync.  So long since I used iCloud on Windows I cant remember, as I managed to get a freebie 1TB OneDrive account so always use that now

[Shackeng]

Sorry, I misunderstood the US it. I assumed it was a normal USB memory stick, not some linking cable (which are invariable troublesome).

Can you transfer the files to a USB memory stick, and then move the memory stick to the Mac, a noi nd copy them off? A USB-A to USB-C adapter will be needed at one end, because your old PC won't have a USB-C and Apple stupidly removed all USB-A ports from all their laptops ages ago (as part of the standard Apple lock-in)


For iCloud (or Dropbox, or OneDrive) - Google should tell you where to put files on Windows for them to sync.  So long since I used iCloud on Windows I cant remember, as I managed to get a freebie 1TB OneDrive account so always use that now

Yes, I have just got an A to C adapter and was about to try. My concern is ‘Will the Mac be able to read files copied from Windows?’

[Shackeng]

Lets go back to basics.

Have you got any anti-virus and/or firewall installed on the Windows machine?  If so, disable them.

Connect your network cable (I presume it is a 'crossover' cable)?

Find out what the IP address is of both machines.

Open a CMD prompt on the Windows machine and ping the IP address of the Mac.  If connected correctly, you should get a response.

Open Terminal on the Mac and ping the IP address of the Windows machine.

Once the above has been carried out (and successfully) it'll be a case of getting Nanny Windows to allow the Mac to access the drives.

Top-Tip:  Put everything you want to transfer into the 'Public' directory on the Windows machine.  There is a lot less Windows Red-Tape to overcome.

Not sure, I connected with a usb A to usb C cable.

[Shackeng]

Quote from Apple forum:
Macbook Pro, M1, Big Sur. Attempted to transfer file from win10 pc to mac via flash drive. Flash drive mounted but files not visible, running properties indicated files were present. Inserted other flash drives from pc, the drive mounted but files not visible.

While I have a MacBook Air M1 Big Sur 11.2, I am having same sort of problems - I think,
given my limited knowledge of terms used.

[STEMO]

Wifey says she just put all of her files into Onedrive and downloaded from there. She has a MacBook Air.

[STEMO]

She also mentioned Share Point, whatever that is.

[Shackeng]

Wifey says she just put all of her files into Onedrive and downloaded from there. She has a MacBook Air.

I have a feeling Win 10 has pestered me with this in the past. I have no idea what it is but will look it up.

[Kevin Wood]

She also mentioned Share Point, whatever that is.

Run! Just run!

[STEMO]

She also mentioned Share Point, whatever that is.

Run! Just run!

And yet she seemed to have no problems at all. 

[TheBoy]

As long as the USB flash drive is FAT32, Mac Big Sur can read and write fine.  Big Sur can read NTFS (but not write), but its a bit flakey.

I do find sometimes my Macbook (Intel, not M1) can take several seconds to see bigger flash drives.


Windows will format bigger flash drives as either exFAT (which again my Mac can read and write without issue) or NTFS.

Mac I think by default formats them FAT32.


Hope that helps?

[TheBoy]

She also mentioned Share Point, whatever that is.

Run! Just run!

And yet she seemed to have no problems at all. 

Onedrive for Business (which I guess she uses, rather than Consumer Onedrive), is actually a frontend for a bastardised Sharepoint.

Sharepoint, once correctly set up, is a pretty powerful tool, though most people just use it as a (slow, clunky, slightly impractical) document storage system.  Its just a technically horrible product.

[STEMO]

I was informed by Samsung that their cloud service is ceasing for photos and files, all other stuff, phone settings, contacts, etc, would still be saved. I was advised to link my Samsung cloud account to OneDrive, which I just did, and everything moved across seamlessly.
Sorry, Chris, off topic but trying to work out if you could access OneDrive from your Mac.

[Shackeng]

Thanks for all the inputs. I have now copied all my documents onto a flash drive (formatted to exFAT as this was offered as compatible by PC and Mac Jaime). I can see the files on the Mac, but when I try to copy them into Textmaker on the Mac it says it doesn't recognise the Format. I can try again using FAT32 as there are mutterings about exFAT issues with the M1 Macs running Big Sur on Mac forums.
Steve, I can get Onedrive on the Mac and PC and may well try that next.

[TheBoy]

Thanks for all the inputs. I have now copied all my documents onto a flash drive (formatted to exFAT as this was offered as compatible by PC and Mac Jaime). I can see the files on the Mac, but when I try to copy them into Textmaker on the Mac it says it doesn't recognise the Format. I can try again using FAT32 as there are mutterings about exFAT issues with the M1 Macs running Big Sur on Mac forums.
Steve, I can get Onedrive on the Mac and PC and may well try that next.

So the files have copied over, but the application cant read them.  This was one of the things I mentioned earlier, that the Mac apps often use different file formats to the PC versions.

If the files were done in Textmaker on a PC, and don't open properly in Textmaker on the Mac, then you need to contact Textmaker for their fix to that.

If you are trying to use Textmaker to open MS Word docs, well, good luck.  When you get bored, install Microsoft Word for Mac.  Or on Windows, try to save them in a more open format like RTF or even TXT, but this will trash the formatting, and need a fair bit of work to reformat the documents on the Mac.


Switching between systems as fundamentally different as Windows and macOS is never painless I'm afraid.

[Shackeng]

I did contact Softmaker, but frankly don’t expect a reply. I have also accessed my Windows files via Onedrive (thanks Steve) but am still unable to read them.
Incidentally, Textmaker opens Word docs with no problem, and as it’s free, is the reason I’ve used it for years.
It seems possible, if not probable, that I will not be able to open Windows files in Mac. Not the end of the world more a pain in the butt as I had hoped not to have to use the PC so much.

[TheBoy]

Its not so much that the Mac can't read Windows files, or vice versa, its more some of the applications that have versions for both Windows and macOS can't read each other's files.  The paid apps do tend to be better than the free ones for this, but still no guarantee.

Incidentally, if you have MS Office compatible files on OneDrive, you can use the (free) online versions of Word/Excel/whatever to read them within the browser.  They have limited features, and can be clunky...   ...but work OK for simple stuff.  This is available even on the freebie OneDrive (obviously if you have the paid OneDrive variants, called Microsoft 365 now, you have access to the full Office package to download and install on Windows and Mac.


Also, if they are MS compatible-ish word/excel/ppt docs, have you tried the built in macOS applications like Pages and Keynote to open them? They open some of the simpler ones without issue.

[Shackeng]

I haven’t tried them, no, but will do so.