Resolved So Confuse! Older OS HD's not mounting due to new APFS?

[haaalp]

Anyone have this kind of problem?

TLDR below...

I have a newer MBP that is running the latest software, and a 2009 MP with outdated software (10.9.5).

I just recently did a big trip to Antarctica, Falkland Islands, Patagonia, etc. and have 200GB files to transfer over. The trip was bloody expen$$$ive, so I kind of want to be sure my files are backed up.

I have my laptop SSD cloned to an external mSATA SSD for backups. Usually I would just plug the backup drive into my older system which has 6 HD bays and makes it easy to store redundant files internally. I love it for that. I also have an offsite backup in case of fire or theft or whatever.

But when I plugged in my backup mSATA SSD, it wouldn't mount! I would show up in Disk Utility though. Previously, I would just mount my SSD and copy the file folders over and that was easy, but this is no longer the case, assuming it's because of the new APFS. Ok, confused, I thought, better just find another way to get my files backed up and secured in the system. I used file sharing and just copied them over through the network. Simple!

Then, after making changes in finder, every time I'd change a folder name or move something (on the MP tower), it asked me to enter my password for permission. Kind of confused as to why it would do this, it was almost like as if it was treating my alterations as coming from the laptop. Weird. So I turned off sharing and reset both systems.

Now, after the reset, my backup drives are failing to mount!! They are behaving just like the backup did. Showing up as ghost partitions in Disk Utility.

My guess is that file sharing from the laptop and APFS somehow corrupted the partitions on the older system. Does that sound plausible? Is there anything I can do to get the system to look "normal"?

I've been considering upgrading the 2009 machine to a 2012 equivalent for a while now, hoping to get a better video card and less outdated OS software, but it looks like that won't be easy to do with current lockdowns and being quarantined. Still that's a process I'm not looking forward to because I'm afraid I'll screw it up.

On top of that, something like this makes me think that my files are longer secure in the Apple ecosystem.

TLDR: The APFS system from my current OS (laptop) seems to have corrupted my older 10.9.5 OS (desktop) HD system and now my HD's (where file folders were added) won't mount. They do show up as ghost drives (greyed out) in Disk Utility. Other HD's are mounting, and don't appear to be 'infected' by the problem.

• Is there any way to get them to mount?
• Or will I have to reformat and copy from a backup (which will take ages and make me feel very exposed to data loss)?
• Will copying new file folders from the newer OS cause the same issue moving forward?
• Am I missing the mark here, and it's because of something else?
• Can anyone explain in simple terms why they messed with something so basic?
• Are there going to be future changes that will continue to put my files at risk?

 

[casperes1996]

Unless you manually approved a conversion to APFS, I don't see how that would have anything to do with this. If you plug the drives into the newer machinewhat does Disk Utility say about the unreadable drives? What messages do you get when you try and mount them?

 

[DeltaMac]

hmm...
Mavericks (OS X 10.9.5) cannot read APFS partitions.
It appears that all those external drives are not readable from 10.9.5 - likely because you have changed the format to APFS on those external drives.
If you want THOSE drives to be readable on your MacPro, then you have to upgrade to a system that will read the drives, macOS 10.13.6 as a minimum. Yes, you have some challenges coming.

 

[Fishrrman]

Even if you are using Catalina on your newer Mac, you should set EXTERNAL drives as such:
- HFS+ (Mac OS extended with journaling enabled, GUID partition format).

This way they are recognizable on both Catalina AND on older Macs as well.

The ONLY external drive I would use APFS on is for a bootable cloned backup of Catalina created with CarbonCopyCloner. This MUST be in APFS, no way around it.

 

[haaalp]

Solved.

First thing I usually do is restart the system for a fix, and often things clear up. But it didn't this time. But just to be sure, a few days later, I tried powering down one more time before giving up and reformatting the drives.

Low and behold the drives now mounted. So that's nice. I turns out the other finder authentication weirdness (make any changes requires password each time) was caused by creating a new folder from the other system. Lightroom also wouldn't allow me to create a new catalog in the externally created, yet local folder. I would have never guessed that would happen.

Finally, my MBP drive is formatted in APFS by way of cloning in it SuperDuper! and so that simply won't mount on my older system. Which is too bad because that was the easiest way of transferring files.

Thanks for all your help or attempt to help. Here's a cute penguin pic for ya!
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Unless you manually approved a conversion to APFS, I don't see how that would have anything to do with this. If you plug the drives into the newer machinewhat does Disk Utility say about the unreadable drives? What messages do you get when you try and mount them?

Nothing would happen. I would click mount, there would be a slight buzzing coming from the drives (I think), and then stop. I explained how it was solved above, where three little problems seemed to compound into one.

As of right now, the APFS formatted drive can't be recognized on my older OS because it's a bootable clone of the newer MBP drive.
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hmm...
Mavericks (OS X 10.9.5) cannot read APFS partitions.
It appears that all those external drives are not readable from 10.9.5 - likely because you have changed the format to APFS on those external drives.
If you want THOSE drives to be readable on your MacPro, then you have to upgrade to a system that will read the drives, macOS 10.13.6 as a minimum. Yes, you have some challenges coming.

BLAH. I don't like challenges! Haha! Well, my internal MP drives did finally mount after the second try of shutting down and powering on the system, so all is good there. The APFS drive still won't show up on the older OS, of course. I suppose there's nothing that can be done about that unless I get the OS updated... Thanks for the recomendation.
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Even if you are using Catalina on your newer Mac, you should set EXTERNAL drives as such:
- HFS+ (Mac OS extended with journaling enabled, GUID partition format).

This way they are recognizable on both Catalina AND on older Macs as well.

The ONLY external drive I would use APFS on is for a bootable cloned backup of Catalina created with CarbonCopyCloner. This MUST be in APFS, no way around it.

Yes, that was the case with the MBP drive. It was cloned in SuperDuper! So that isn't mountable. Which sucks but isn't the end of the world. The main issue I had was that I was adding files from the newer system to the older system, and things got wonky. The Newer cloned APFS backup wasn't mounting, but either were the internal media drives in the older MP. Caused a lot of concern that somehow the newer OS corrupted the older HD format.