Mid 2015 Macbook Pro Question Mark Folder & Target Disk Mode Question

[Fishrrman]

"if I was able to get in with an external drive, as I am right now, that would give me more options to try to get that RTF or TXT TextEdit file, that is where I am at now, does anyone know how I can pull it from the original hard drive?"

Just grab the file and drag it to your external boot drive.
Does it "copy over"?

 

[MacGekko]

"if I was able to get in with an external drive, as I am right now, that would give me more options to try to get that RTF or TXT TextEdit file, that is where I am at now, does anyone know how I can pull it from the original hard drive?"

Just grab the file and drag it to your external boot drive.
Does it "copy over"?

I don't know yet because both Finder and Disk Utility are acting strange, sometimes refusing to fully load, whenever I shut down and restart, it asks me for my original 2015 hard drive password, I enter it, hangs, then rejects it, that was my admin user, but when I enter the password for the standard user on the old account, it accepts it.

And then when Disk Utility does load, I see my old hard drive there, but when I go into the top menu and try to create a disk image, I got the beach ball and it stops responding.

 

[MacGekko]

"if I was able to get in with an external drive, as I am right now, that would give me more options to try to get that RTF or TXT TextEdit file, that is where I am at now, does anyone know how I can pull it from the original hard drive?"

Just grab the file and drag it to your external boot drive.
Does it "copy over"?

Now that I am having some success in getting the Finder to work properly, I am close but I feel like there is something basic I am missing in order to get this file, at one point, I saw the documents folder but it had the red mark on it and reported that I did not have permission to view it, when I click info on the original Macintosh HD, I tried checking, "ignore ownership of this volume" and changing "everyone" to read and write from just read, are there any tricks you are aware of to allow me to make moves with the original Hard Drive?

I think the original Hard Drive, whatever the problem is causing the boot drive's Finder and Disk Utility to go whacky, I just want to find my file and then erase the entire original drive and start fresh.

But without the help from this thread, I would probably not have made it this far.

 

[Fishrrman]

"there is something basic I am missing in order to get this file, at one point, I saw the documents folder but it had the red mark on it and reported that I did not have permission to view it"

1. boot from the external drive

2. get to the finder. You should also see the icon for the INTERNAL drive on the desktop (even though you're not booted from it)

3. Click ONE TIME on the icon for the internal drive icon to select it

4. Bring up the "get info" box for the drive (you can just type "command-i")

5. At the bottom of get info, click the lock and enter the password you are using for the EXTERNAL drive.

6. Put a checkmark into "ignore ownership on this volume" (in the sharing and permissions area)

7. Close get info.

NOW try to access the problem file again.
Just copy it to your external drive.
Stuff like this isn't hard -- even I can do it.

 

[MacGekko]

"there is something basic I am missing in order to get this file, at one point, I saw the documents folder but it had the red mark on it and reported that I did not have permission to view it"

1. boot from the external drive

2. get to the finder. You should also see the icon for the INTERNAL drive on the desktop (even though you're not booted from it)

3. Click ONE TIME on the icon for the internal drive icon to select it

4. Bring up the "get info" box for the drive (you can just type "command-i")

5. At the bottom of get info, click the lock and enter the password you are using for the EXTERNAL drive.

6. Put a checkmark into "ignore ownership on this volume" (in the sharing and permissions area)

7. Close get info.

NOW try to access the problem file again.
Just copy it to your external drive.
Stuff like this isn't hard -- even I can do it.

The reason it is difficult is that whenever I try to do anything with my old hard drive, Finder will give me a beachball and stop responding, I was able to check ignore ownership, let me ask you this, because Finder is acting so crazy, sometimes it works, sometimes it does not load, frequently I have to restart the computer to get it to respond again, once I am able to open it, is the "copy" command in the top menu or can I just right click it, is there a key command, because sometimes I have to use key commands to do things with Finder, obviously I can find this out on Google, but the reason I put this all out here was to see if someone recognized a glitch or a side method to help me out.

Thanks.

 

[Fishrrman]

I'm done trying to help you.
I post suggestions, and you just give more excuses instead of actually TRYING the advice offered.
Good luck on fixing the problem...

 

[MacGekko]

I'm done trying to help you.
I post suggestions, and you just give more excuses instead of actually TRYING the advice offered.
Good luck on fixing the problem...

Thank you, there is a difference between an excuse and a barrier to trying out your advice, any single time I engage the Finder to get info or try to copy the original Hard Drive, Finder locks up.

But that is OK, if anybody else has experienced this, please let me know the method you used to correct it.