Problem : local SSD drive filled up ! How to use external drive for my photos that are also in iCloud and other files?

[1brajesh]

Hi everyone,

I have about 250G of photos in the iCloud and on my old Mac.

I got a new iMac 2020 with a 256 GB SSD internal drive and I also purchased an external 1TB drive.
I enabled iCloud sharing for my photos and it's filled up my local 256GB SSD drive with the photos from the cloud!
Without me even opening the photos app!

I would prefer these photos to be stored on the external drive.
How do I move the photos to the external drive???

The iMac also seems to be downloading my old desktop files onto the new Mac.
So related, how do I tell the Mac to use the external drive for storage instead of filling up the onboard 256GB one?

 

[LuisN]

Hi everyone,

I have about 250G of photos in the iCloud and on my old Mac.

I got a new iMac 2020 with a 256 GB SSD internal drive and I also purchased an external 1TB drive.
I enabled iCloud sharing for my photos and it's filled up my local 256GB SSD drive with the photos from the cloud!
Without me even opening the photos app!

I would prefer these photos to be stored on the external drive.
How do I move the photos to the external drive???

The iMac also seems to be downloading my old desktop files onto the new Mac.
So related, how do I tell the Mac to use the external drive for storage instead of filling up the onboard 256GB one?

Copy your photos library to your external drive and start photos with the alt key pressed. Navigate to new photo library location and select. Check if everything is working and delete the original library

 

[1brajesh]

I changed my user folder to the external drive following this process:

Want to Move Your Mac's Home Folder to a New Location? Here's How

Moving your Mac's home folder to a drive other than the startup drive can free up valuable space. Here's how to make the move safely.

www.lifewire.com

Unfortunately it didn't work, the copying stops 1/2 way with an error (I forgot to write down the error).
So I did a factory reset on my Mac, and them immediately followed the steps in the link above, and this time it worked.

I think Apple should warm people that this user folder change should be done at the install phase, because it becomes complicated later.

 

[haralds]

I changed my user folder to the external drive following this process:

Want to Move Your Mac's Home Folder to a New Location? Here's How

Moving your Mac's home folder to a drive other than the startup drive can free up valuable space. Here's how to make the move safely.

www.lifewire.com

Unfortunately it didn't work, the copying stops 1/2 way with an error (I forgot to write down the error).
So I did a factory reset on my Mac, and them immediately followed the steps in the link above, and this time it worked.

I think Apple should warm people that this user folder change should be done at the install phase, because it becomes complicated later.

You need to turn off iCloud sync of Photos first.