Running your Sims 4 folder from an external drive

This is for those running out of space on their Macs and wanting to save their user data – Saves/Tray/Mods etc. – to an external drive. By following this workaround your entire Electronic Arts folder will be stored and updated on the external drive although your game will think it is being stored locally on your Mac internal storage (for the equivalent instructions for Windows, head to Crinrict’s site here). This is because you will be creating a symbolic link, also known as a symlink, to reference the file path of your user data stored in another location. To create the symlink you will be using Terminal which can be found in Applications > Utilities.

(If you’re a Windows user, head over to Crin’s site for instructions)

Please be aware that entering erroneous commands into Terminal can have severe consequences  both for the stability of your operating system and your data. You should only follow these instructions if you are comfortable using Terminal and have a solid backup of your system. If anything goes catastrophically wrong you can always wipe and reinstall your macOS through Internet Recovery or bootable installer but you WILL lose all your data.

Ok, happy to continue? I’ll start off by explaining my setup so you can familiarise yourself with my Mac user account and computer name which appear in the screenshots:

  • My Mac user account/Home directory has full Administrator rights and is called test
  • My computer name is TouchBarMBP
  • The external drive I am using is a 128GB USB-C thumb drive. It MUST be formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) or APFS. It is named USB
  • At the time of writing, I am running macOS 10.15.3 Catalina

These instructions move your whole Electronic Arts folder to the external drive and assume that your Electronic Arts folder is currently stored locally on your Mac. As such, all games you have installed which store their user data in the Electronic Arts folder will need to have the external drive plugged in to access the data. This includes Sims 3, Sims Medieval, Sims 4, Sims 4 Legacy Edition and any other game folders in your Electronic Arts folder. In these instructions I am using my Sims 4 user data.

  • Backup your Electronic Arts folder to a separate external drive or cloud storage in case you inadvertently wipe it.
  • Plug in your external storage device and check it is properly mounted in Finder or on your Desktop, depending on your Finder View settings. If needed, use Disk Utility to reformat the drive to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) or APFS:
  • I would recommend reading through these instructions at least once in full before applying the workaround so you are familiar with Terminal and any error and warning messages that pop up during the process.

Step 1 – Moving the Electronic Arts folder to the external drive:

  1. The first thing we are going to tell our Mac to do is move the Electronic Arts folder from the Documents folder to the external drive. Open a Word or any text document and copy and paste the following command (where mv means move and the tilde ~ indicates your home directory) into the document. This is purely for editing purposes:
    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/USB/
  2. Replace USB with the name of your external drive. For example, if your external is called EXTERNAL the command would be:
    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL/
    However, if your external is called EXTERNAL DRIVE you have to introduce backslashes before the spaces in the name (like Electronic Arts in the Documents folder):
    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/
    To show you where the spaces are, I have entered a black X in the command below (for illustrative purposes only):
    mvX~/Documents/Electronic\XArtsX/Volumes/EXTERNAL\XDRIVE/
    Note that the directory file paths are separated with forward slashes / and file and folder names with multiple words are separated with backslashes \
    If your Electronic Arts folder is to be nested within another folder on the external you must state this clearly in the command. For example, if your EXTERNAL DRIVE has a folder called  Game User Data and you would like the Electronic Arts folder to be within this folder the command would look like this:
    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/Game\ User\ Data/
    and with the black X denoting the spaces:
    mvX~/Documents/Electronic\XArtsX/Volumes/EXTERNAL\XDRIVE/Game\XUser\XData/
  3. Once you are happy with the command, open Terminal and copy and paste it from the Word/Text document into the Terminal window so it looks like this but with your own information. If it is highlighted black just press the right arrow on your keyboard to move the cursor to the end of the line:
  4. Hit enter/return to execute the command. Your Electronic Arts folder should have moved from your Documents folder to your external drive. Open the Documents folder to check and open a second Finder window showing the external drive.

Step 2 – Creating the symlink for the Electronic Arts folder:

  1. Copy the following command into your Word/Text document:
    ln -s /Volumes/USB/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    replacing USB with your external drive name and paying attention to the forward and back slashes and spaces. If we use the same example as before with the EXTERNAL DRIVE > Game User Data file paths and names this would be the result:
    ln -s /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/Game\ User\ Data/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    and with the black X denoting the spaces:
    lnX-sX/Volumes/EXTERNAL\XDRIVE/Game\XUser\XData/Electronic\XArtsX~/Documents/
  2. Once you are happy with the command, open Terminal and copy and paste it from the Word/Text document into the Terminal window so it looks like this but with your own information. If it is highlighted black just press the right arrow on your keyboard to move the cursor to the end of the line:
  3. Hit enter to execute the command. An Electronic Arts folder will appear in your local Documents folder as an alias with a little arrow in the bottom left corner:whilst the actual Electronic Arts folder is still safe on the external drive (I also have the game installed on the external, ignore the app in the image below):

Step 3 – Launch your game:

  1. Launch the game as you would normally. You should notice no difference at all, you should be able to pick up where you last saved the game.

Common error messages:

  1. If you get the following error message saying the game is already running:
    • Your external hard drive is not plugged in or not plugged in properly
    • You have not granted Sims 4 or Origin access to either your Documents folder or the external drive during the symlink creation process
  2. If you use CC/Mods and get this message:
    • Your external drive is formatted as ExFAT. You need to start again and format as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) or APFS.
  3. If everything is working but your Mods aren’t loading:
  4. Terminal tells me Directory not empty in Step 1– Is there already a folder on the external with the same name as the folder you’re moving? i.e. have you already copied over the Electronic Arts folder? If there is already a folder with the same name as the folder you’re moving, Terminal will return this result.
  5. Terminal tells me File already exists in Step 2 of the guide – Did you correctly complete step 1 or is there still an Electronic Arts or Sims 4 folder in your Documents folder? If the folder is still there you have not correctly moved it in Step 1.
  6. Terminal tells me No such file or directory – did you copy and paste the command from the guide and correctly substitute the name of your external drive? If you didn’t copy and paste you may have used the wrong letters in the command. Copy and paste from the guide.

Security warning windows you may encounter during this process if you are running macOS Catalina or later:

Make sure you click ok on all these windows to grant your Mac the access it needs to execute the Symlink.

Reversing the symlink:

If you want to start storing your Electronic Arts folder back in the default location in your Documents folder on your Mac, you must use Terminal commands to do so. Just unplugging the external drive will not force the game to recreate an Electronic Arts folder in the default location, it will result in the The Sims 4 is already running dialogue box (see above). To return the folder back to your Mac:

    1. Copy the following command into Terminal and hit Enter/Return:
      mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts_bkp
      This will relocate the current symlink/folder to a new name in your Documents folder:
    2. Copy the following command into your Word/Text file so you can edit the external storage part:
      cp -a /Volumes/USB/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents
      If we use the same examples from Steps 1 & 2 above where your external storage is called EXTERNAL DRIVE and the Electronic Arts folder is within a folder called Game User Data on the external drive, it would look like this:
      cp -a /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/Game\ User\ Data/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents
      and with a black X denoting where the spaces are:
      cpX-aX/Volumes/EXTERNAL\XDRIVE/Game\XUser\XData/Electronic\XArtsX~/Documents
    3. Once you are happy with the command, open Terminal and copy and paste it from the Word/Text document into the Terminal window so it looks like this but with your own information. If it is highlighted black just press the right arrow on your keyboard to move the cursor to the end of the line. Hit enter/return to execute the command:
    4. In your Documents folder you should now see your Electronic Arts folder back where it used to be before creating the symlink:
      The folder should still be on the external drive too as we have just copied it, not moved it.
    5. Launch your game, nothing should have changed and all your saves should still load perfectly. You can safely trash the Electronic Arts_bkp alias now, no need for the external drive to be plugged in.
    6. You may encounter system security dialogue boxes again, make sure to click Ok.

Whilst your user data is stored on the external drive, usual troubleshooting methods will be slightly different. You cannot now move your Sims 4 to the desktop to force the game to create a clean folder as this will only copy it. You must rename the Sims 4 folder on the external drive, this will force the game to create a new one on the external.

If you have any questions feel free to ask below. Please make sure you clearly reference the part you do not understand so I understand which step you are stuck on 🙂

Update 17.03.23 – I won’t be responding to comments going forward due to the repetitive errors people are experiencing which are covered above and answered god knows how many times below. The instructions are very clear, if you cannot get the commands to work it is user error in the command line or access permissions not being granted. This is a complicated process and a little research will help understanding rather than expect an answer here. This isn’t just a Sims thing, it is a macOS/Unix process. If in doubt read the guide multiple times to gain a proper understanding.

I fully test any guides myself before posting them here and also have fellow Mac users who are wonderful and test for me on a variety of different Macs running various versions of macOS. We check them regularly and troubleshoot any issues, updating if we need to. This symlink process works if followed correctly. If you can’t make it work the problem is your end. Follow the steps carefully and, if necessary, do your own further research into why it’s not working for you.

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431 thoughts on “Running your Sims 4 folder from an external drive”

          1. My drive is formatted properly, but I am having a similar issue. When I place a mod into the mods folder it does not show up in-game even though I have mods and cc enabled in the game settings. I also have a resource.cfg file

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          3. Hi! I formatted my drive properly per your instructions and I’m still running into the same issue. I even bought a new flash drive and made sure to use the disk utility to format it, and I’m still having problems. Alias worked, everything good except none of my custom content is showing up in-game, that’s the only problem. Any advice?

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          4. Super simple and quick thanks for taking the time to write up this instructional guide.

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          5. I have tried multiple times to do the alias code and it doesn’t work, I formatted the drive to the mac os journal listed and copy and pasted as you said and my cc or saved games dont show up

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      2. I’m having the same issue as the person above. I copied and pasted everything and changed it to my drive name. I think it worked, but none of my saves or cc is popping up. I’m not really sure how to fix that.

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          4. My Alia’s folder wasn’t showing up either. I asked ChatGPT to fix the code and it turns out the code has an error in the direction: It seems there is a typo in the command you entered. The correct command is “ln” (lowercase L) and not “In” (capital I followed by lowercase n). Here’s the correct command: ln -s /Volumes/USB/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

            After I entered this command it WORKED! Electric Arts folder (Alia’s folder) shows up and my CC’s work again.

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          5. Yep, which is why I recommend to copy and paste. The command is LN (all lowercase). You can test my command yourself by copying it into a word doc and capitalising all the letters. There is no typo, you didn’t execute the command as directed in the guide.

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          6. Hi, i am not sure how to leave my own comment but i changed my hard drive to extended journal and its still saying my cc is corrupted error message. pls help!

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      3. Hi there, I formatted the usb and followed the steps. My USB is actually named USB (so didn’t have to change anything) however it didn’t create an alias. The folder is still in documents and in still a folder. Please can you help?

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          1. okay so I have a MacBook m1 and have a hard drive because I wanted to have the whole sims game on there so I can save storage on my Mac. I need a lot of help, I don’t have the games downloaded just yet, I first tried changing origin location to the drive but it did not work. So should I download the games first and then do symlink ?

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          2. I’m also having this issue, followed the steps to the T but the alias didn’t show up. Any ideas as to what could have happened and how to fix it? I’m stuck here. Thanks!

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          3. I to followed all steps and I don’t get an alias folder in my documents folder. the game however transfers over to the drive but is still in documents with no arrow at the bottom left. The command didn’t work for that part. please help

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        2. I had the same problem and when I format An External Drive like in this video and then do what’s in this article then alias show up

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      5. So go the Sims4 working but randomly it will stop opening and will keep loading not fully opening sims 4 before going back to origin and then it will start to say Sims 4 is running already. I don’t know how to fix it besides deleting everything and restarting from the start which is kinda pointless. only being able to play with a sim family for like 3 days and then starting over. :/ really need help!

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          1. im having a similar issue. Every time I open sims it has an error saying sims is already running. I read that I need to allow origin access to my files and folders in security and privacy. But it won’t even allow me to check the box. I have origin checked in the full disk access file. but it won’t allow me to check both full disk access and files and folders at the same time. am I doing this incorrectly?

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        1. Hi! Firstly, sorry for commenting on a comment with a different issue..I wasn’t sure how to create my own brand new comment, as I have an account on here….but I am having trouble with the very first step. My harddrive is properly formatted but when I put the command in the terminal is brings up a “permission denied” inside the terminal, even though I originally allowed permissions and the EA folder is able to be Read and Written.. I’m sure sure how to love coward bc the folder just isn’t moving at all.

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        2. Hey my game is saying that the sims 4 is already running. what do you mean when you said that the external drive might not be plugged in correctly, because I think it is. and when I re downloaded origin on my external drive, everything went to my external drive, so idk what you mean by, “You have not granted Sims 4 or Origin access to either your Documents folder or the external drive during the symlink creation process.” so could you please explain what might be wrong with my computer. and i know i did the simlink thing right because the Alias thing popped up.

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          1. Step 3, No. 2 then follow the link to Apple’s help page. It explains about System Preferences/Settings and what you need to do to allow access. The screenshot I provided also shows where you should have allowed access.

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          2. Miine has the same exact problem.When I first tried to start my sims as soon as I finished doing the symlink process it worked with my previous cc but then when I tried to add new cc and download it to the mods folder it said sims 4 is already running. I tired to do the preferences/settings thing but I have a later Mac which isn’t up to date with the current MacOS .what do I do ? because my settings is set up different and doesn’t offer the “allow access”

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          4. I followed everything, I even checked the access allowed, it’s still not working. And if you didn’t show a picture of it being allowed do I leave it unchecked? I tried different variables but to no avail.

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          6. Hello I am having this same issue but I’m on Windows. I didn’t see anything on Crinrict’s page about the “sims already running” error and was wondering if you could help me at all. Sorry for commenting on something unrelated, I don’t know how to create a new one.

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      2. I had to go back into the game options and re-select for custom mods to show because they didn’t pop up on my start-up screen.

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  3. also, if I unplug and then replug the external hard would it still tell me to download again because I just completed all these steps and it’s continuing having be redownload all my expansions again.

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  4. Hi there, I did everything you had listed and I ran the command to move my EA folder to my HD and the whole folder disappeared! It’s not on my external HD or my computer.. everything has vanished. What do I do? Please help 😦

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  5. hello I have done all the steps and have done the symlink, the alias shows up, the message popped so I granted access to the external drive but when I launch the game it keeps creating a new EA folder on my laptop in documents and won’t read the EA folder that I originally moved to my external hard drive

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  6. I am not tech savy at all but I wanted to know how to install the game to my external hard drive instead of my macbook air like you showed in the pictures. I didnt want to move my files over yet because I want to install everything onto my external hard drive.

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    1. also before I uninstall the game should i move my mods folder onto my desktop so that I can still have my cc and then just replace that folder once it’s installed onto the harddrive

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  7. I followed all the steps and am still seeing the “Sims is already running” alert. Is there anything else it could be.

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  8. Hi.
    I have 2 questions here.
    1. Why do we need to format the drive to FAT32? You said the external drive should be formatted as Mac OS journaled.
    2. Why is there a space after Arts? this is in the command for terminal. There’s only a space between Electronic and Arts but there isn’t a space after Arts. I just want to make sure we’re not messing with terminal command.
    Thanks in advance for clarifying.

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    1. 1. Thank you! Wow, 2 proofreaders didn’t pick that up and no one else thought to mention it if they noticed. You’re right and I have changed to Mac OS Extended (Journaled). THANK YOU 🙂
      2. You mean here? mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/USB/? because Volumes is a different directory. Documents is user specific~, Volumes is System

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  9. Hi Again,
    I’ve started playing sims 4 yesterday on my mac and been launching and downloading Origin and Sims 4 on my external hard drive. I noticed I have a folder named EA (on my external hard drive) and a folder named Electronic Arts (in the local Documents folder). Mac has recommended me to move Origin to my local Application folder but I chose “Don’t move”.
    Is EA the new folder name? or Origin has been naming EA as opposed to Electronic Arts? I’m not sure what’s the difference between the two folders.
    Also, I notice there’s a folder named “The Sims 4 Packs” in my local Application folder. If I want to play Sims 4 from my external drive, does this folder need to be directed to my external drive using Terminal?
    It seems there are a number of folders that need to be redirected if I want to play Sims 4 on a external hard drive and my mac is running out of disk space.
    You’re article has provided hope and I just want to clarify the steps.
    Thank you very much.

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  10. Hi again!
    I figured that when I’m trying to install the game with insufficient disk space on my mac, origin asks me to choose a location for the file to be located. I chose a folder on my external drive.
    Not sure if anyone’s encountered this before but hopefully this will allow me to play the game on my external drive without using Terminal to redirect the folder.
    I’m still downloading the game. fingers crossed this works.
    Thanks!

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      1. Haven’t tried the cloud option but that will surely work magic.
        Currently experiencing a few bugs with the 1.62 version of Sims 4 e.g. unable to change language despite multiple attempts, etc. i’ll figure it out somehow. your blog is amazing and i’m super appreciative of all your swift responses, as sims 4 makes the isolation mandate a lot easier to cope with.
        really like the iMac stand (from ikea?) on your cover page as well!
        all the best!

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  11. I am trying the cloud version but am not very hopeful as I am experiencing the same issue as I was with the external hard drive….the computer is creating a new folder on the actual computer’s drive every time! when I tried it with the external drive it said I didn’t have permissions to create the symbolic link even though this is the only user I have on this computer with full permissions.

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  12. I have successfully moved my Sims 4 application to my external hard drive and I will be saving the sims 4 user data/saves folder via your (very helpful) symlink.

    I haven’t used any cc or mods yet but I plan to. I was just wondering if you knew how I would go about adding the cc and mods. My question is: Where would I download mods/cc to if the data is *actually* on my external drive but has tricked the game into thinking it is on Documents > Electronic Arts via the symlink?

    Would I just download directly into my external drive folder?

    Thank you in advance x

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  13. I’m really struggling here. My external drive is named USB so I just copy and pasted all of the commands into Terminal but whenever I hit enter it says “mv: fchflags: /Volumes/USB/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4/GameVersion.txt: Invalid argument
    mv: fchflags: /Volumes/USB/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4/localthumbcache.package: Invalid argument” and continues to do that for everything in the folder. It moves the folder on to my external drive, but the original one stays in my documents folder as well. I’m so confused I don’t know how to fix this.

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    1. Ok sorry it’s me again but I see I’m supposed to change the format on my USB. Right now it is formatted as MS-DOS (FAT32). How do I change it to the Mac OS

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  14. Hello, I followed all of your steps, but in the first step, my electronic arts folder is both in my documents folder and my external hardrive. I followed the steps after and it doesn’t show up as Alias. Any help is appreciated.

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        1. Because there is an Electronic Arts folder in your Documents folder. You need to make sure the Electronic Arts (or Sims 4 folder if you are just moving it) is on the external drive. Did you launch the game after moving the EA folder to the external and before trying to create the symlink?

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          1. Yes! I still don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Should I reverse the symlink and try again? Or is that going to be a big mess? lol

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  15. Firstly, thank you for this! I’m not tech savvy by any means and this was very easy to follow successfully. I was hoping to accomplish this in order to open up more storage on my Mac; however Sims4 is still taking up 16GB on my hard drive. Is there a way to install Sims4 on my external hard drive (where I’ve just moved my files with this tutorial) without erasing everything I’ve just moved? Thank you!

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    1. Hello! I am having the same issue with my laptop not showing any changes to the storage. Did you ever find a solution? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

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  16. I did this and then reversed it because I was still getting the Sims 4 is already running error…The folder for Electronic Arts is still in my external hard drive but my Sims 4 still opens as if it’s a new game. Any thoughts or help? T.T Thank you for this helpful article btw!

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      1. Yes it was showing as an Alias file in the original location but…it said it couldn’t find the original folder. Despite it being in my external hard drive /:

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  17. Hello,

    My symlink isn’t working. It doesn’t show as an alias in Documents, it shows as a folder instead. Then when I start the game, all my data is gone and none of my saves or mods show up. Please help!

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    1. No alias means the command has not been entered correctly. Do you want to c/p it here so I can see? No saves or mods means it is creating a new Sims 4 folder because you have moved the original to the external.

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      1. I entered “ln -s /Volumes/Seagate/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/” but underneath after I hit enter it says, “ln: /Users/MacUser/Documents//Electronic Arts: File exists”

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        1. ah ok. So you still have an Electronic Arts folder in your Documents folder. It needs to not be there for it to work. There is nothing to reverse as you haven’t yet successfully created the symlink 🙂

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          1. I think you should add that to the steps since it isn’t made clear that you have to delete the EA folder in order for the symlink to create.

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          2. No. You seem to misunderstand the purpose of the mv command. You shouldn’t be deleting anything. If you delete the EA folder you delete all your TS4 user data. The Terminal command MOVES the EA folder to the external, it doesn’t copy it. If successfully executed there will be no EA folder in the Documents folder.

            Step 1 – use the mv command to move the EA or TS4 folder to the external drive

            Step 2 – create the symlink

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      2. I have this same issue and I’ve been trying to resolve it all day with no success. I completed step 1 but step 2 keeps giving me trouble. My hard drive is called “Gaming Hard” and this is what I typed to create the symlink: In -s /Volumes/Gaming\ Hard/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

        What am I doing wrong???

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        1. Just change the name of your harddrive to USB to make the steps easier. Change the name once everything is created.

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  18. Hello!
    Will doing this influence gameplay in any way? ie. slowing the game down?
    Thank you so much for this post, it was very understandable and thoroughly explained.

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    1. Thanks! No, it shouldn’t do. At least it made no difference when I did it. It does depend on the external so if you have a USB-C flash or Thunderbolt drive of some sort that’s preferable.

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  19. Would moving the game to my external make the loading time faster? It takes about 45 minutes to load now that I put it on my external drive.

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  20. I got to the first step before I confused myself… The folder is still in documents as well as on the external hard drive, and when I type in the command, it says “mv: fchflags: /Volumes/SOFTWARE/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4/GameVersion.txt: Invalid argument”. It goes through every file in every sub-folder and they all still get copied. Do you have any idea why it might be doing this?

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    2. Hi. If you don’t mind me asking. What did you do to fix this? I am having the same issue with the folder still being in documents as well as on the external hard drive.

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  21. Hi. I have gotten through the first part (moving the EA folder). I completed the command but now have two folders. One is still in documents and the other is in my hard drive. The terminal is also still running and won’t let me close it as it is still running the command.

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  22. Hi. I’m planning to buy an SSD external drive for my Macbook today. I will factory reset my macbook tonight because I want to start fresh and I’ve been planning to re download origin and sims 4. Do I have to follow the steps above since I will be starting new? I mean, I will download origin to my external drive and sims 4 games
    + game packs. Are the steps above just for moving the game from documents to external drive to play or just downloading straight to external drive to play.

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    1. just for storing the Electronic Arts or Sims 4 folder on the external. If you just move it there then game will recreate a new one in the Documents folder when it is launched so you have to create the symlink.

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  23. I am not sure where I’m going wrong..I can’t even seem to get past the first step. My external drive is set up as a Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and when I hit enter after copy & pasting mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/USB It says “mv: /Users/(my name)/Documents/Electronic Arts: No such file or directory
    I have named my drive USB for ease of use for myself and I’m pretty new to this kind of thing so I’m just not sure why it’s not finding the file?

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      1. Thanks for the reply! I figured it out shortly after I posted this. This site is a great resource, thanks so much!

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  24. hi there!
    i recently got a hard drive and followed everything you said – it worked!

    my only issue is that i also downloaded my sims 4 game onto my external hard drive, it downloaded and it works, however when i open the sims 4 it freezes on the loading screen where it says maxis and ‘the sims 4’. there is music playing, but the screen is just frozen.

    is there any way i can fix that? i’ve tried taking the game out of my external, putting it back into applications, but it’s the same outcome so i’m not so sure what to do anymore.

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  26. Hi I followed your steps exactly and my game will run, but only if my mods aren’t in the game. Every time I try to run the game with mods an error message pops up saying a file is corrupted. I remove the file when mentioned in the message, yet it keeps popping up with an another file in question. Is there any way I can fix this? I don’t want to have to start my mods folder over again. Thanks for the guide. I appreciate your help.

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    1. I’m literally going through the SAME exact thing. Of course its upsetting that its not working, but i’m glad i have someone else whose relating. I at first thought it was just a problem with broken cc because i hadn’t played in awhile, but now i think its because of all this. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASEEE let me know if theres anything i can do cause i’m really upset that i just spent all this time taking files out and that obviously wasn’t what was causing the corruption.

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      1. this happened to me! when i downloaded my cc and would try to start up the sims 4, i would get an error message to delete my cc as there was an issue or to repair/reinstall the sims 4. ⬇️

        how i fixed it, it took me quite awhile, but hopefully the things i did will help out because i did quite a lot and it was a bit of trial and error.

        this is what i did, and what seemed to work for me:
        i deleted all my cc; then reversed the sym link and started up the sims 4 to make sure it was working. then i downloaded one cc file and dragged it to the mods folder, then restarted up the game to make sure the cc would should up. once it showed up at the start up, i then redid the sym link and everything in step 1 + 2 (your cc should still be in there! mine was, at least).

        then here’s what i did different that worked:
        instead of copying the cc files into the mods folder, i had the EA mods folder opened and then i went to downloads from another folder, so both the mods folder and the other folder were on the screen at the same time. through the other folder, i went to downloads and dragged my cc into the mods folder. once i downloaded a few of my cc, i went into the sims 4 to check if the game was working and my cc would show up. fortunately, it did and that’s what i’ve been doing for my cc to show up + work.

        please let me know if this helps you or not. i also spoke about what happened to me on the ea forum, i can definitely link it if what i said does not work out. hopefully it does!

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        1. so basically you had the sims 4 generate a new mods folder and then you put your cc in from that? because based on your response what i did differently was i moved the cc folder that i had in “sims 4” folder and then started the game. once it worked without the cc, i exited the game, saw the new “Mods” folder and just dragge d my cc in from there. sadly that didn’t work. so can you link the ea thread please? but in any case, thank you SO much for taking the time out of your day to write a response to try to help. it’s really appreciated. just a little confused on your process that’s all 🙂 oh and also did you actually DELTE all your cc or just stored it elsewhere? thanks in advance

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          1. when i got the error message, that’s when i had a looooottttt of cc downloaded. i deleted all that cc and restarted from new.

            i had reversed the sym link, downloaded two cc files, then dragged them into the sims 4 mods folder. when i would copy my cc, for some reason, it stopped working. after i went into the game and saw my cc at the start up, then i redid the sym link and started downloading more cc, but dragging them into the file. hopefully that makes sense.

            i didn’t conclude what i said on the forum, but what she replied to me essentially worked. i deleted the localthumbcache file, but it ended up returning. she was very helpful! hopefully her replies to me on the answers can help you as well

            https://answers.ea.com/t5/Technical-Issues-Mac/recently-put-sims-4-onto-hard-drive-screen-not-loading/td-p/9220096

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          2. I know the creator isn’t necessarily answering comments but I’m truly at a loss here and I’m not sure what to do or if anyone has had this problem.

            I followed the instructions step by step, changed my drive to the apfs type or whatever it’s called, I created the symlink which works the folder in origin is changed to the drive. I open the game and the mods pop up shows BUT it doesn’t have all of my mods, it only has some of the mods I put it in after I moved sims to the drive. I tried to copy them to the drive again but it’s still doing the same thing. My save was still there but it’s pretty useless without the cc. Does anyone have any suggestions?

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  27. im having the same exact problem that everyone in June has been having. it seems that if you already have mods in your documents folder, and then use the original method to change it into your external drive, your mods should still work. However, any “new” mods you put in, it show us as everything being corrupted. And i recently read Lai’s response from below, but i don’t understand the process still… I’m not glad but glad that i’m not the only one experiencing these things. i thought i broke my game.

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  28. How do I install the game directly on my USB? When I try to change the location in Origin I cannot even see the USB and when I just try to drag it from my applications folder sims isn’t there. But I can find the application on the computer.

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  29. I’m having the same exact problem as everyone in June is having. I did the symlink and it worked and my game loaded up and I was happy. But when I exited the game to go on a CC shopping haul and moved everything I downloaded into my Mods folder, when I tried to load up the game it’s stuck on the Sims 4 loading screen with the music playing till the song runs out. If anyone knows what I should do now please please let me know!!

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  31. Thank you so much! This worked extremely well. It was really easy to follow and thanks for tip about copying it to MS-Word. I won’t have even thought about it.
    I might have missed this but adding a link to your post that talks about how to change the storage location of the sims 4 to the external drive, might help someone. I knew you had a post on it so I just searched, but for like a second I was like why isn’t this working.
    Have a great day!

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    2. Yes, I really need to get that uploaded. I have a half written draft from about 6 months ago with those exact instructions I posted at AHQ. I was hoping, stupidly it would seem, that EA would update Origin accordingly so it wouldn’t be such a chore to install the game on an external, especially in Catalina. Origin is so horrific – thanks for the kick! 🙂

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  32. Hi! In advance, sorry for my english, I’m from Chile so I speak spanish. I’m receiving my MBP 2019 one of these days and want to buy an External Hard Drive to install my Sims 4 (already own the game in Windows). Do I have to install it on the computer and afterwards follow all this steps? Thank you for this tutorial, I’ll be trying it, hope it works (or said differently, hope I can make it work XD)!! Have a nice day 🙂

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    1. These steps are to store your Sims 4 user data folder on the external, not the actual installed game. To install the game on the external make sure the external drive is selected as the install location in Origin.

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  33. Can I delete it from my macbook after its been on my drive? It worked perfectly but now i want to free up space lol!

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  34. Hello,

    I did everything as you told. I also got the alias folder in my documents, but when I download mods and put them on my external drive ea folder > sims 4 > mods, they still show up in my ea alias folder in my documents. Is there any way the mods will not be in the alias folder, because the reason why I did this was to not have my mods on my laptop itself because it’s taking to much space. I also formatted my external hard drive in Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

    thank you

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  35. Hi, I was hoping you could help.. When trying to move the Electronic Arts folder to the external drive I get this honeyb[email protected] ~ % mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/USB/
    mv: rename /Users/honeybee/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/USB/Electronic Arts: Directory not empty

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      1. I used these steps before to move the game to my external drive but it suddenly stop working recently. I deleted and re-downloaded sims and followed the same steps thats when I get the message above in terminal. I didn’t delete my mods or tray files when I deleted the sims from my external (because who’s trying to download all that over lol). Is there a way to overwrite and move the files to my external drive without having to trash my mods.

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  36. Any idea why I get “permission denied” in terminal when I attempt the first step? I’ve checked all my permissions and I’m logged on as the administrator.

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  37. I did the symlink successfully but how do I go about adding new mods? The last time I did the symlink it would read all the new mods I put in as corrupted and the game wouldn’t go past the first loading screen.

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  38. I did everything correctly according to the steps but when I try to download new sims packs it says my disk has ran out of space, I also noticed it’s saving the game onto my computer instead of the external hard drvie. My disk is mac journaled and 4TB

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  40. Hey! Everytime i move the EA folder to my external drive, it pops back up in my documents folder when i try to create the sym link, im super confused.

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  41. ive tested all my mods, and they are all good, but when i try to go into game, it says my mods are corrupted and that i cannot play with them. This was after i placed everything into my external drive using the right steps and terminal.

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  42. Hi, I am about to attempt to do this, so thank you in advance!!!
    I just downloaded Sims 4 itself onto my SSD and wanted to make sure everything looked right before i began your process. When I opened up my terminal this is what it said ” The default interactive shell is now zsh.
    To update your account to use zsh, please run `chsh -s /bin/zsh`.
    For more details, please visit https://support.apple.com/kb/HT208050.
    Angels-MacBook-Pro:~ ThugNastyy$” I just wanted to make sure that I am still good to go with your guide even though it doesn’t look exactly like your terminal.

    Thank you agin

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    1. **Update**
      I would like to thank you for this post. I can’t tell you how many times it took me to do this. Because I DID NOT fully digest what you said. I read it twice thinking okay I got this and just started coping and pasting. I thought “it couldn’t be me” because I saw others saying the same thing. But when I stopped and read about 5 more times and took the time to understand what you were saying I was able to figure out my mistake. Lost my saves in the process but idc, I have soooo much room on my SSD now for new games to come. Thank you for this post!!!!!!

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  44. I’ve been having the same issue others have noted with my mods folder. I believe I did the symlink method correctly, but everything in my mods folder is being called corrupted and I can’t open my game. I tried the method of re-doing the symlink but that did not work for me either, my mods are still being labeled as corrupted. Is there any way to fix this? I have a WD_Black 2TB P10 Game Drive if that helps.

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  45. hello! so before I do all of those steps, I have to move all of my game files to my external drive first? I’m sorry I have to ask this, because english isn’t my first language and I’m still clueless 🙂

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  46. Hello, this tutorial was so helpful! Unfortunately, my external hard drive died and I cannot create a new electronic arts folder. I tried to follow the steps to reverse it which didnt work, assumably because I would need the hard drive to be plugged in while I enter the command. Any advice?

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  47. Hello,

    Do you have any tips for solving why my saves are not showing up. My CC and mods are present in the game. I have undone and retried the symlink multiple times butt continue to not have my saves. My hard drive is formatted correctly but my sims 4 continues to open up as a “new game”

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        1. Hmm. Do you want to send me a save and I can test in my game? I’ll try in the default location and the external drive. Upload to a file sharing site and share the link (I can remove the link after I’ve downloaded it).

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  48. Hi this is great! I’m getting an error because of mods:

    Unable to start:

    Cannot start because the below file appears to be corrupted. If this file is a Mod please remove it and try again. If not, please repair or reinstall the game via Origin.

    /Users/me/Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4/Mods/._PC-TS4-GG-CurvedArch-S-1T.package

    [60c399f9:29f00e76:00000000:4b0d852b]

    I keep deleting them individually as they pop up, but I’m afraid it’ll never end 😦

    Any ideas?

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  51. Update on my last reply. I’m still having the same problem that “I cannot create the symlink, it says the file already exists.” I have deleted the folder in documents after I got the folder into my external hard drive, but the game created a new folder. When i launch the game, it reads the folder in my documents and not in my external drive. The folder in my documents does not read as “alias,” but reads as “folder.”

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  52. Hi!
    So I did everything, but I’m still getting the sims not running message when I try to run the game. I’ve allowed the game and origin access to my computer in the privacy settings. I’m getting a bit exhausted with the process. When I was running the game, I also have a script call failure with my mods on and off. Is there anything I can do about any of this?

    Thank you in advance!

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  54. Hey there. In short, I didn’t succeed in all of this, I had to factory restory my Mac. Now, when I try to download the game with Origin to my external drive, the Origin won’t recognize it as possible location. Do you know what should I do? Help pls.

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    1. 1. In Origin > Installs & Saves > Game Library Location click on Change Folder
      2. On the left menu click on Computer then double click on the ‘/‘ that appears next to a picture of your hard drive. You should see four folders – Applications, Library, System, Users
      3. In the field at the bottom, where it says Directory, type in /Volumes/[the name of your external] then hit Enter/Return or click Choose.For example, my external is called Backup so the file path is /Volumes/Backup
      4. The window will disappear and reappear again but you may not see your external. That’s ok, quit Origin then reopen it. You should get a Gatekeeper message popping up asking for permission to access files on a removable volume. Just click Ok.
      5. Now repeat steps 1 to 3 and you should see the contents of your external in the window.

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  55. Let me preface this question with an apology for my ignorance and an explanation: I am a mom who has an iMac used for personal and work. I was quite happy with my 256G storage and then the pandemic stay-at-home thing happened. My 16 yr old asked to purchase Sims 4 and a bunch of other games and I am now running out of space and trying to move all games to external storage. I have never used Terminal.
    In Step 1, #4 I noticed that the EA folder was still in Documents and size was 1.62G, the folder that copied to flash drive was much less in size and missing quite a few folders. A few minutes later the EA folder on flash drive had more files in it and was bigger. The EA folder was still in Documents. I thought it was making a copy rather than moving the folder. But is it possible that it is taking longer than 10 min to move the folder from Documents to flash drive? Is there anywhere I can see progress the way I can see it for downloads? I don’t think it should take this long but when I tried to close Terminal window it said that there are 2 processes running still.

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      1. Ah, thank you, thank you. Maybe it’s obvious to most, but a mention of this might help the newbies like me know what to expect? I almost messed everything up thinking it wasn’t working…

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    2. To answer my own question…yes, it took close to an hour to move that folder. It now only exists on the flash drive. Sigh. Onto Step 2…
      Btw I hope I don’t sound ungrateful, it is just the opposite—this post is my saving grace. Thank you for taking time to help others.

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      1. You don’t sound ungrateful 🙂 If it took an hour to transfer just over 1Gb data the chances are your load times will be horrifically long too. Which specific model Mac do you have and what is the exact external drive you’re using?

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        1. Thanks!
          I have:
          iMac late 2015 251 GB Flash Storage
          3.1 GHz Quad-Corr Intel Core i5
          8 GB 1867 MHz DDR3
          Intel Iris Pro Graphics 6200 1536 MB
          I’m transferring game to an old 64 GB flash drive, maybe that’s the problem. I’ve got a SanDisk 1TB Extreme Portable SSD USB-C Gen 2 in my Amazon cart that seems to have much faster read write speeds. Would that be the best thing to buy for the games to run off of?

          While I’m here with you who knows so much more about this 😉…if I get a new iMac, what minimum requirements should I be looking for so that I can have enough speed and storage for my frequent daily Zoom meetings and document storage for Numbers and Pages and for my daughter’s games? (The Sims 4, House Flipper, Minecraft, Roblox are the main ones)

          When I chose my current computer is was to be for my personal use only, with no games, and I had it in my bedroom so I wanted it to be quiet. Now it’s in our LR and being used by 3 family members all day long so it’s a good time to upgrade.

          Back to The Sims 4 and the reason I am on her in the first place, I have successfully followed your directions. Unfortunately it didn’t solve my problem-lack of storage. I think I should have uninstalled The Sims 4 first and reinstalled it to the flash drive, I saw a post that others were doing that somewhere so I’m going to try to find that and do it. That will free up almost 20 GB of storage and I’m right at 224 GB used right now, so that will almost double my available space.

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  56. Hey, thanks for the help! I followed your instructions and it worked. My question is: after moving my Sims 4 game to my external hard drive, should I see space free up on my actual computer.. because I don’t. I still have the same amount of storage I had before hand

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  57. Okay So I followed the steps and I can launch the game however my saves are nowhere to be found and it launches as a new game, please tell me I can get those saves back?
    They are in the same folder on my external drive

    i tried to re-do the steps and this is the lines of code I recieved in the terminal
    { n -s /Volumes/ArmorATD\ DRIVE/SIM-IN/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    -bash: n: command not found } + { mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/ArmorATD\ DRIVE/SIM-IN/
    mv: rename /Users/Danielle/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/ArmorATD DRIVE/SIM-IN/: No such file or directory }
    please halp (:
    thank you

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    1. It can’t find the file path you’ve given it so is still creating the Sims 4 folder locally in Documents > Electronic Arts. From the command you’ve written it looks like your external drive is called ArmorATD Drive is that right? There is then a folder on the drive called SIM-IN where you want the Electronic Arts folder to go?

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      1. yes that is correct, also when I just logged in to origin I got a ‘Origin is unable to install games here. please choose another folder’ message (/Volumes/ArmorATD/SIM-IN) is the locations i have in the installs/saves folder location, not sure if this is its own issue or related

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        1. the game being installed on the external and your Sims 4 folder alias being created through the external should be treated as two completely different workings. However if you are getting an error for both then the problem is the Mac reading the external drive, whether there be something wrong with the drive, or a permissions issue. Maybe start again?

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          1. I had this same issue and figured it even though i could see the electronic arts folder in my documents terminal could not find it. Turns out I hadn’t updated my MAC Os to the newest software update. The moment I updated and put in the code exactly as stated above (used the harddrive name EXTERNAL and made a folder of Game User Data) everything worked immediately! Hopefully this tip works for everyone else.

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          2. Interesting. The commands are not macOS version specific, they are Unix based, the foundation of macOS. Updating the OS would iron out and fix any corrupted files including any kinks in Permissions which can then be allowed during the subsequent symlink process.

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  58. Hello! so I managed to format my disk and then I went in to type the command mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/Backup\Plus/ (because my hard drive is called Backup Plus) but when i hit enter the EA has not been moved and the terminal pops up mv: rename /Users/ameliabrown/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/BackupPlus/: Permission denied
    any advice on what to do next?

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  59. Im very much in need of help. I followed all the instructions and the game opens but all my saves and CC aren’t there. when it made the alias it came up as Electronic Arts 2 and I still had the original in my documents folder and one in the drive. Its also freed up all the space on my computer. Im assuming I did the link wrong but I dont know how to redo it. do I just do it again after the step of moving it ? or do I have to reverse anything

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  60. My computer is saying that my game is running even though it is not. Everything has transferred to my hard drive. I have given Origin and the game full access to my computer. I do not know what to do and this has been going on for months. I finally updated my Mac to Catalina.

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  62. Hi So im sure I did everything that was listed. But I was unsure abt a lot of things.
    1. My hard drive is called “Tais Hard Drive” would I put the \ before the drive or leave it out.
    2. After I did Everything.. The message popped up saying the sims 4 was already running. I looked to see if my hard drive was plugged in and also everything have permission or access, so what can I do abt that.
    3. What if my CC and saves don’t show up what can I do abt that.

    Thank You so muchhhh.

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  64. Hi, i plan on doing this tomorrow & have a couple questions on the best way to go about it.
    1. will i need a completely clean external drive to do so or can i do it on an external hard drive used for time machine back ups?
    2. if i move the entirety of my internal drive to an external drive in order to factory reset my computer will i be able to run my game as usual after i put it all back on to the internal drive or will the transfer mess my game up?

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    1. 1. I would always keep backups on a completely separate drive
      2. It may mess it up, so long as you have a backup there’s nothing wrong with trying. Wiping your Mac will of course remove the symlink so you will have to redo it.

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  65. ive been trying to do this over and over with no luck . first I didn’t have any CC show up. now the game crashes before it even opens. really hoping someone can help me! ive followed the instructions exactly. my drive is called WD so It was easy to change.

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      1. Yes I managed to get to the point that my cc and saves don’t show up. Ive copied the commands exactly as my drive is simply called WD.

        mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/WD/

        ln -s /Volumes/WD/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

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  66. HI!, i have just done this and it is working fine, can i delete the sims 4 out of my original documents folder as it is taking up too much space? thanks

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  67. Hi, i have followed all steps but for some reason my game is following from its original location on my mac, on your pics your sims has no storage on your mac but its like mine has copied itself? but the game is still playing from my original documents on my mac

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  68. Hi ignore my previous messages to sum it up:
    My electronic arts folder on my mac (not my drive) is still labeled as folder and not alias, I tried to change it to alias, and it looked to exact same as yours but when i go to play my saved households are gone! can you help? 🙂

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  69. I am stuck on creating the symlink. I moved the folder to my external drive, but I can’t create an alias in my documents. I think I’m entering the command correctly.

    In ~s/Volumes/Seagate\ Exp/ Electronic\ Arts~ / Documents/

    If someone could help me that would be great

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    1. Please don’t repost the same comment multiple times, it’s spamming.

      Your command is incorrect, check your spaces again.

      There should be a space after ~s
      There shouldn’t be a space before Electronic
      There should be a space after Arts
      There shouldn’t be a space after the second ~
      There shouldn’t be a space before Documents

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  70. Hello, I’ve followed all the steps and I was able to successfully move my game user data to my 1TB Seagate external drive which has been properly formatted. However, when I try to play the game I keep getting
    Unable to start:
    The Sims™ 4 is already running.
    [ed35e0ea:29f00e76:00000000:18a1dd51]

    I’ve made sure my drive is connected to my mac and I’ve also made sure to check if origin and sims 4 have access to documents and removable volumes through my system preferences.
    I don’t know what else to do and I would truly appreciate your help. Thanks in advance.

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    1. Hi, I’m back again. I was able to fix my problem. Rather than focusing on moving Electronic Arts, I was focusing on Game user data. I will be posting this so future people can notice my mistake and learn from it. Thank you so much for your help.
      Much appreciated

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  71. Hello, I did this to my game last night and it was working perfectly until my game randomly closed itself out. Today when I started my game, I got an error code, “game already running”. I check system preferences and everything is grant access. The only issue I see, is the the Electric arts file downloaded on my documents is not a file but a white document when the arrow at the bottom. I don’t know what to do next. My hard drive is connected and working properly

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    1. That was exactly what happens to me- it turns out I was using the wrong code.
      Since my external drive doesn’t have a folder called “Game user data” in step 1, i had to use the command

      “mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/whatever your USB name is/”

      Rather than:
      mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/Game\ User\ Data/

      Therefore the commands I used for mine to work :

      mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL\ DRIVE/

      ln -s /Volumes/USB/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

      Before I did the new command after realizing my mistake, I undid the symlink

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      1. My hard drive is called “SIMS” so when I put Im “ mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/SIMS/ “ I get a message back saying “ mv : rename /Users/kat/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/SIMS/Electronic Arts : Directory not empty

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  72. Hello, I did this last night to my game and it was working great until it randomly closed it self out. This morning when I tried to restart the game, I got an “already running” error. My hard drive is working fine and all files are grant access via system preferences. The only issue is see is that the Electric arts file with the link is No longer a blue file but instead a white document with the arrow at the corner and when I try to click the document it says that the original file cannot be found

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  74. My CC and Mods won’t work after doing this. When I press play an error message comes up saying that the file appears to be corrupted but it’s not. I followed the instructions so I’m not sure what I’ve done wrong. I’ve reinstalled the game and repaired it but nothing has worked.

    Liked by 1 person

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  76. Would this work with the newer APFS format? It’s supposed to allow faster read/write speeds for SSD so I’m hoping it would. Not sure if you’ve had a chance to try it. Thanks!

    Liked by 1 person

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  78. I tried this forever, even got to the symlink but couldn’t get around the Sims is already running issue. Tried everything I Could think of, the drive was plugged in correctly, Origin had full disk access, repaired and reinstalled Origin to no effect. Ended up having to give up. 😦

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    1. I figured it out! I know that the instructions say make sure both Origin and the Sims 4 have permissions, but I didn’t really realize that I need to go all the way to the actual Sims 4 game to grant permissions. I thought it was covered through granting Origin- I was wrong! So if anyone is having trouble with that, hopefully that helps.

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  80. I can’t even get past the first step because when I enter the first command into terminal, it tells me I don’t have permission, when in fact my username is registered as ADMIN of my computer…

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  81. Hi, I was able to successfully move my EA folder to the HD using the first step. However I can’t move past the second because it’s not creating an alias. My Original document is also empty. Terminal says command not found

    My input is
    In -s /Volumes/EXTERNAL/Origin\ Games/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

    I also tried it with (In ~s) but that’s didn’t work too
    Is this correct ?

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    Reply

      1. My HD is called EXTERNAL and my sims 4 game is saved into a folder I created in the HD called Origin Games. The electronic arts folder has successfully moved into that folder
        But no alias
        My HD is also formatted to Mac OS extended (journaled)

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        1. I’m not sure. I’ve just remade the symlink to test. Could you show the command in Terminal in a screenshot? It’s most likely spaces in the incorrect place that’s causing it

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          3. Thank you so much!! That fixed it but now I’m getting the Unable to start:
            The Sims™ 4 is already running.
            [ed35e0ea:29f00e76:00000000:18a1dd51]

            My HD drive is connected properly and origin / sims 4 has access to documents and removable volumes through my system preferences. I did however notice that the electronic arts file alias is not a folder but a white document with an arrow. Is this what may be affecting it ?
            I have also restarted my laptop twice and Origin.

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          4. white doc doesn’t sound good and means it doesn’t know what it is. You shouldn’t get that error if Sims 4 has full access to removable volumes in Sys Prefs > Files & Folders

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          5. Thanks for your help! I had to reverse the symlink anyways and maybe I’ll have to redo the steps later again. I might not be inserting the right commands into terminal.

            Like

  82. Hi, I followed all the steps and had no issues until I launched Sims 4 and my original saved games were no longer available I was asked to start a new game. All the steps went smoothly and each of the security warning popped up asking to give permission to use removable volume except for Sims 4. Any idea on what to do now? I have tried from the beginning twice now.

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  83. hi, im following the steps but when i do everything it doesnt create the alias folder. the folder is there but it isnt alias

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  84. Hello! I’m noticing that you’re deliberately not answering the questions involving CC, Mods, and Saves not showing up at all in the game after following the steps? Is there a specific reason as to why that is? I’m having that same issue as well and I’m still looking for the solution. I followed the instructions, even created the Alias folder and every time I run the game it starts as a fresh new one. None of my CC, Mods or Saves show up in the game. I’m confused as to how the mods folder works if I’m trying to run it on my hard drive vs my computer because now either way it’s not working.

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    1. Yes, I am deliberately avoiding questions about the CC error because it is clearly addressed in the article. This however is not your issue.

      If a new folder is being created locally on your machine every time you load the game , it means you haven’t correctly created the symlink.

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      1. My computer is not creating a new file when I load my game. None of my files are in the cloud and I still have no saves or cc.

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        1. Hi Sarah! I know this is from awhile back, but did you ever find a resolution? I’m in the exact same situation, with no new file being created when I load a game, but I can’t access Saves/Mods from game.

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  85. Hi! The method worked perfectly in my Mac! Thank you so much for sharing it. 😀 And there’s one thing I would like to ask, can I get your permission to repost this in https://www.sglynp.com ? It is a website for Chinese simmers. I’ll translate your post into Chinese and will indicate your blog and link. Looking forward to your reply! And sorry for my poor English.

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    1. Is it a free site? The guide wouldn’t be hidden behind a paywall or any subscription required to view it? Thanks for asking, I have no problem if it helps others and is freely available to all.

      Liked by 1 person

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      1. Yes, it is! There are no requirements and charges for the post. I’ll send you the link after I finished it, thank you so much for letting me repost it !!

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  86. Hi! I am stuck on the first step. When I enter my command, mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/Personal\ HD/ , I get this error: Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/Personal HD/Electronic Arts: Directory not empty. Have you ever had this happen? Thanks in advance!

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  87. Hi this worked for me! It didn’t work at first I had named my external drive SIMS and wrote the command mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/SIMS/. The file successfully moved from the document folder, however it did not go to the External dr. I then searched my files to find where it went and it had instead created a SIMS folder on my mac internal drive. So I dragged it and moved it back to documents and tried again. The same problem occurred. So I then renamed my External dr to USB and tried the command again and it worked!!! I definitely recommend anyone using this to be patient and cautious when moving the folders and trying again.

    Thank you so much!!!!!

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  88. Hi, I followed your directions correctly, and my drive is formatted to MAC OS Extended (Journaled) but I keep getting the “unable to launch because of whatever cc” pop-up. I reversed to symlink and tried again several times but it still won’t load once I add the folder with the mods.

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  89. Hello! I’m having some issues with Terminal: I insert the text “mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/SIMS4/”, SIMS4 being the name of my drive, and upon pressing enter, I get an error from Terminal saying “permission denied”. Did I do something wrong? Thanks in advance!

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    1. Ignore this comment— I must’ve fucked something up and now all of my CC files are gone from both my flash drive and my Mac! Thank god I have them saved on Drive, so this wasn’t a huge tragedy and really just the kick I needed to only do Sims on my desktop and not burden my MacBook any longer. Thanks anyway! 🙂

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  91. Hi! I followed all the steps you posted, formatted my external drive to macOS extended (journaled) and everything seems to be working properly. When I open the game it says none of the expansion packs or stuff packs are downloaded. I already rerouted the downloads from origin to the external drive long before I found this beautiful guide and installed sims on it as well, including all the expansions and stuff packs. Did I do something wrong or just need to delete the folder in the drive and redownload all the packs?
    Thanks so much for this extremely helpful guide btw!

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  92. You can completely ignore me 😂 I apparently didn’t give origin enough time to recognize the files were already there. Thank you for this guide, you saved my wife’s computer storage!

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  93. I’m worried I severely screwed my game up 😦 I created the symlink fine, played my game fine on it for months, then my hard drive became corrupt or something and reformatted itself while the symlink was still in place. Now my hard drive is empty and I have no electronic arts folders anywhere on my macbook. Tried following the steps to reverse after this happened, so there is now an electronic arts.bkp folder in my documents that is shown as an alias but that is as far as I can get without errors happening since my hard drive is blank.
    Is there any way to fix this??

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    1. The external drive that stored the Sims 4 folder has been reformatted? Did you have a backup of the Sims 4 folder on another drive? If not then you will have lost all the data int hat folder.

      If you launch your game now, is there a new Electronic Arts > The Sims 4 folder created in the Documents folder?

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      1. So, initially it was popping up that the game was already running error no matter what I did… I went on to Origin and changed the game library location, was able to get the game to open and new Electronic Arts folder appeared in My Documents. My external hard drive is completely empty (I did backup mods and CC fortunately). But now starting back at step one I am getting Permission Denied notification in Terminal. As far as I know my apps have permission to do whatever… unless I am missing something there.. But I didn’t have any issue the first time I went through your steps.
        Any help??

        By the way… THANK YOU so much for taking time to reply to everyone on here. You’re amazing!

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        1. I keep seeing you reply to similar comments that we need to allow permission is system preferences… Can you explain that a little further ? I just updated my macbook to High Sierra version.

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        2. SORRY FOR SO MANY COMMENTS!

          Apparently all I had to do was rename my external hard drive and everything worked just fine!
          Again, , thank you for all that you do. And renaming it may be a fix for others that keep getting “permission denied” errors in terminal 🙂

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          1. What did you rename it to, the original name before reformatting?

            Permission denied is just that, the OS is denying permission so you as the user need to grant it, normally through System Preferences but this can also be done through Terminal using various commands 🙂

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  94. Hi, I followed your directions correctly, and my drive is formatted to MAC OS Extended (Journaled) but I keep getting the “unable to launch because of whatever cc” pop-up. I reversed to symlink and tried again several times but it still won’t load once I add the folder with the mods.

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    1. have you tried adding the mods individually, maybe it’s a mod issue? If the drive is correctly formatted, and the symlink has been correctly setup, and the CC/Mods are 100% compatible with the current patch level of the game, you shouldn’t get the error.

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  95. Hi! I used your guide over a month ago and successfully did everything, I just played the sims a couple days ago with no issues. Today I updated the game and ran into the notorious “sims 4 is already running” error code when trying to launch the game. The hd is plugged in properly, still formatted correctly, symlink is still in place. However I noticed something odd, the hd had renamed itself and I’m thinking that’s probably the reason for the sudden error message, it’s displaying the original name when I look on the desktop but when I go to “get info” for the hd it’s displaying a different name in “name & extension”. It lets me change it but reverts back each time I close the window.

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    1. Sorry for commenting again lol, I went to the symlink just to see and it looks like it’s broken now. It says “the operation can’t be completed because the original item for ‘Electronic Arts’ can’t be found”. So does this mean I need to remove and retry the symlink?

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  96. Oh boy 🤦🏼‍♀️ So I’m guessing I need to take the symlink off and redo it with the new name for the drive? Just trying to be sure before I do it so I don’t mess anything up

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        1. so, im trying to reverse the symlink, successfully completed step one of the reversing the symlink part of your tutorial. step 2 is giving me trouble, my external drive was named “external” and the immediate folder is “electronic arts” so the command i used in terminal was “cp -a /Volumes/EXTERNAL/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents” and the output is “cp: /Volumes/EXTERNAL/Electronic Arts: No such file or directory”
          i’m trying to use a guide to finding and deleting broken symlinks you referenced to someone else in the comments (https://linuxize.com/post/how-to-remove-symbolic-links-in-linux/#find-and-delete-broken-symbolic-links), but to no avail. i used the command ls -l to try to find the symlink name but its just a little too complicated to grasp

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          1. how about just renaming the drive to what it was when you set up the symlink? That would be the easiest option as the file path would be complete and accessible.

            Like

          2. For some reason it won’t work, the mount path is always different than the original name and the symlink is still broken when I try that. I’m really not sure what to do at this point

            Like

  97. Hi, I just successfully moved everything onto an external drive (mods, etc.) but my saved games are missing when I launch to play. What can I do?

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  98. I followed all the steps correctly and my drive is formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) but when I try to load my game its coming up that X package file is corrupted so I remove that and then it’s a new one. What can I do? I’m using a Macbook Air 2020

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  100. Hello,
    I am stuck on Step 2 – Creating the symlink for the Electronic Arts folder: I typed in the command and it did not change my EA folder on my hard drive into an Alias. I am wondering how I can switch it over? Also, I noticed there were no changes to my storage space on my mac. Is there a way to completely remove the Sims 4 from my mac and have it all saved on the USB, where I can just plug in and play? I have no space on my mac and intend on removing all of my Sims 4 data from my mac if possible (and onto the USB). Could I un-install and re-install both Origin and my Sims 4 game, packs, etc. onto the USB? I want as little saved on my mac as possible as it is currently taking up almost 100gb of storage.

    Thank you!

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    1. [Update] I determined my issue with creating the Alias folder is because I my documents were saved on iCloud and not the internal hard drive… I noticed you have you application stored on your external drive as well. How did you go about doing so?

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  102. Hi , I followed all of the directions as stated, but when I go to open my game it still gives the “already running error”. I did give everything permission to access files, may have missed one but I do not know how to double check to make sure. Any tips please?

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  103. Hello, I did the steps properly. I made sure that the format is correct (Mac OS Extended (Journal)). I made sure that before installing that I made the direction of installation for origins to be to the hard drive (the name is EXTERNAL, and I made the location /Volumes/EXTERNAL). So the game does open for me but the issue is that I cannot do the symbolic link without the “permission denied” message in the terminal. I made sure that the origin application AND the sims 4 application has access to all discs. So im not sure why the permission is denied. Also I am an admin of the computer. I just cannot get past that first step. Here is the code I inputed: mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/EXTERNAL/

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  104. Hello,
    I followed all of the steps above but when I launch my Sims 4 game from Origin, a new Electronic Arts folder is created in my original Documents folder under the Electronic Arts alias folder and my cc is not transferred. I appreciate any help, thanks!

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  105. Hi! Hoping someone can help me with this issue. I completed steps 1 and 2 however the alias creates a file in my documents (icon is a white page) instead of a folder. I have tried everything but the alias only ever creates this and not the folder which is why I suspect it keeps telling me that sims is already running.

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  106. Hello!
    Your article is extremely helpful, thank you so much!
    I am having an issue, the whole process went smoothly until I tried to open the sims game.
    At this stage, the loading arrow just appears and it says application not responding.

    Do you know how to solve this

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  107. OMG you are a life saver!!! I managed to move the EA folder to my SSD and now i can play the sims without worrying about running out of space! ILY a lot! thanks BlueBellFlora!!💚

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      1. Delete what folder? If you have correctly created the symlink, the Sims 4 or Electronic Arts folder has been moved to the external drive and an alias created in the default location.

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  109. Hi, I’ve successfully done this before however i just had to reinstall and do the process over again. I keep getting an error message in terminal saying “directory not empty”. I did everything the same as before, not sure how to correct this issue. Thanks in advance

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      1. Hey! I’ve been having the same problem but I have my computer on an administrator account and origin drive has full access.

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  112. Hi,
    This was working before but after I updated, now my Sims 4 keeps thinking its missing or has corrupt files.

    This is the error it gives:
    “Unable to start:

    Cannot start because game data is missing or damaged. If you have Mods installed please remove them and try again. If not, please repair or reinstall the game via Origin.

    [de4ee14f:29f00e76:00000000:4b0d852b]”

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  113. Hi I’m having trouble with my mods. I finished all of the steps & everything looks exactly like the examples but my mods/cc still aren’t showing up in the game. I’ve reversed the steps because the first time it wasn’t working for a different reason then I thought I fixed it, now when I launch the game my mods don’t show up. Any idea why?

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  114. Hello,
    I hope you’re still replying cause I’m desperate lol.

    I have previously used the symlink before and it worked perfectly. I had taken a break from sims and recently got back on. Played for like a day or two and then sims started randomly acting slow and then my finder’s folder and kind of my entire laptop started acting slow. I thought it was maybe because I needed to update my laptop. I updated it, macOS Monterey 12.3.1. That didn’t change anything so I reversed the symlink and did it again and then I got the error: file is corrupt message. My drive was formatted correctly (Mac OS Extended (Journaled). I have also tried to reformat to APFS and had the same problem. I did try going though my cc one by one and removed whatever was causing a problem, but still ran into issues. I also did get another drive and tried that. Could it possibly be the specific brand of the drive that I’m using? (LaCie) Hopefully you have some advice.

    Thinking about getting a Gaming PC, but I know they’re quite expensive.
    Thank you.

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  116. I originally did a successful simlink but ended up deleting origin completely as I had corrupt CC and wanted a fresh start for the external drive game. But when I attempted to try setting it all up again I’m able to successfully get through the first step and even can create an “alias” in my documents folder – but the alias is not a folder itself and when I try to click it it states “The operation can’t be completed because the original item for “Electronic Arts” can’t be found.” Any idea what went wrong/how to fix?

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  117. hi, I manage to get my script mods to appear but not my cc or my saves. I followed everything to the t. my external drive is formated Mac OS extended (journal), I put the command and I’m not sure if the response should look like this

    Last login: Mon Jul 25 01:14:58 on ttys000
    **********@Kristens-MacBook-Air ~ % mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/games/
    mv: rename /Users/**********/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/games/Electronic Arts: Directory not empty
    **********@Kristens-MacBook-Air ~ % ln -s /Volumes/games/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    ln: /Users/**********/Documents//Electronic Arts: File exists
    ***********@Kristens-MacBook-Air ~ %

    I did not get the “alias” kind next to my EA folder. I tried starting over and got the same results. what should I do?

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    1. Looks like there is already a folder on your external drive called Electronic Arts. If you’ve deleted stuff from the external you should empty the trash and unmount then mount the drive again.

      There’s no point in trying to create the symlink until the folder has been successfully moved.

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      1. So I finally got the EA folder in to my had driver , yay!. However my saves, custom content and nods are not showing up. All of the files are in the EA folder under sims but the only thing that appears in the games when is start is the script files. Any suggestions?

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  118. hi there, first of all i want to thank you for making this easy to follow post as i was struggling to find a coherent thread for mac users. I followed all of your steps, formatted my drive, created the symlink (the electronic arts folder in my documents on my mac is listed as “alias” and the one on my external drive is listed as the folder). then i followed your guide on changing the path for the installs and saves on origin and granted origin and the sims 4 access to my full disk/files and documents. all seems well as i’ve gotten the right prompts that you displayed…HOWEVER, when I go to launch my game, it just gives me the rainbow pinwheel and I eventually have to force quit because it says that the sims 4 is not responding. so my question is, is this a problem on my end on following the rules of your process or is my flash drive the problem? I have the “Sandisk 256G Cruzer USB 2.0 Flash Drive.” Please let me know if this makes sense or if I need to elaborate more, thank you so much!

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  119. don’t hate mee I am unworthy of your help but gonna ask for it anyways 😦

    I followed these instructions extremely carefully, made sure the drive was formatted correctly and everything, but the EA folder didn’t move out of my local documents during the first step, just made a copy of it in the external drive, and there was no guidance on what to do if step one failed so I just moved on to the next step in which no “alias” folder was created in local documents, it was just the original EA folder in there and an additional copy of it in the external drive. After completing the steps, I started the game to see if I would get any of the alerts you mentioned and I didn’t- just took twice as long to load than before and then when I got into the game my sim was just a floating, body-less bald head. Read through some comments to see if this was mentioned/remedied, it wasn’t, so then I decided (probably dumb of me) to follow the symlink reversal instructions thinking I was just undoing whatever I did. Though clearly I could improve in the decision-making department, I will say again that I did follow those instructions *very* precisely, if that’s worth anything trouble shooting-wise. Ejected the hard drive and started the game and now I’m getting that alert that says “unable to start because below file is corrupted.” Referred back to here, which says it’s the formatting of the external drive, but I’m not using the external drive and thought by doing the reversal that I had redirected the game to run locally as it was originally. I removed the mod folder and game started up perfectly, but just won’t load when I put the mods back in the folder. I’m guessing it still wants to run cc through the external drive? Hoping you might know what I should type into terminal or what you think I should do

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    1. Try moving the folder again and if it doesn’t work reply with the exact command you’re trying. Or did you drag and drop the folder on to the external?

      If you didn’t get the alias on the newly created folder, as per the screenshot, then the symlink didn’t work so reversing it would have been completely unneccesary.

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  120. hi, so I had successfully got my sims 4 folder on to my external hard drive. after trying for a month I got my EA folder to be an alias. now all of a sudden I guess it did connected because when I started playing all my saves and mods were not connect so I try to process all over. and it didn’t work. I got the Directory not empty messages. So I did the let me reverse symlink, and it seemed successful because the back up folder popped up in mu documents. So I deleted the folder and tried to the process over again, and again got the Directory not empty message. What should I do ?

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    1. for everyone who sees the I got the ” Directory not empty messages.”⚠️ GUYS IVE LEARNED AFTER YOU DELETED THE FOLDERS, IT HELPS TO RESTART YOUR COMPUTER ⚠️ also , I was once again successful however the folder is not appearing in my external driver, how ever when I searched the folder it says it there. I started to game to see if it would be visible and it did not work. but I was still able to locate the folder through search and I deleted the local thumb thingy file. Any suggestions?

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  121. Hello! Any idea why it says operation not permitted in the terminal when attempting to move the folder to the external drive?

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  122. Hello!

    I’m having an ongoing issue that the codes work and I’ve followed the steps but the folder that’s supposed to transfer to my external folder doesn’t show up and stays in my documents folder r

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  123. hello! THANK YOU SO MUCH for this guide, i created a symlink on my old mac and played the sims 4 no problem for a very long time! but now i just got a new mac and i have more space, so i want to put the game files back into the computer. so i’m trying to reverse the symlink, but in all honesty i may have done this wrong (i first migrated my entire mac contents on the new mac, and then reinstalled the game, and then now im trying to reverse symlink). terminal gives me the error message: “Operation not permitted.” could you recommend any way around this problem? i really hope i don’t have to migrate the whole mac system all over again!! thank you so much, and have a great day!

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  124. Hello everything was working perfectly until I accidentally updated and repaired my game and all my packs without having my hard drive plugged in. Now The Sims 4 Packs is installed on my actual computer and is taking up a lot of space. How do I fix this without having to reverse the whole symlink process and starting over?

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    1. This symlink has nothing to do with your game installation location. The game installation location is determined in Origin > Preferences > Installs & Saves > Game Library Location

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  126. Hey I followed on the steps and believe I was successful but I keep getting error unable to start the sims 4 is already running. I made sure everything was plugged in and made sure to give permission in files and folders can you help me with what I might have done wrong ?

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  127. Okay so I did everything right and everything is successful but idk if my game updated my game now keeps creating a new electronic arts folder and in turn now I can’t play with my saves because the the new folder in the way do I revert and then create the link again ?

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  128. Hello Dear!

    I have throughly read all of your instructions and you have not mentioned about future new downloads of mods + tray.

    After we have move the Electronic Arts folder to an external drive, what do I need to do if I want to download new mods and trays? Do I need to reverse the symlink back to the document for putting in new cc?

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    1. Because there is no need to mention new mods or tray downloads. Just add them to the Mods folder as normal. Think of it logically. When you save the game where is that game saving the file to? It thinks it’s saving it in Docs > Electronic Arts > The Sims 4 > saves and if you look in that alias folder you will see the new save. But actually that new save is on the external drive because you created a symlink to fool the game. There is still only one Sims 4 folder and it is stored on the external drive, you’ve just created a shortcut to it in the location the game loads data from using a symlink.

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  131. Hi!! I have been doing this all day and ive decided to add a comment, and ive seen a few posted however they have no solution.everything for me goes so smooth, ive read the instructions very slowly and carefully. however when I go to load my game, suddenly it takes so long to even start and when it does I get stuck on the main sims screen with music playing.when I unlink the symlink it starts fast and normal. my hardrive is WD for Mac, its already formatted for Mac, I get 0 errors what so ever when I create the symlink and start the game. it just has insanely slow load time. also it took about 10 minutes to load 96gb worth of cc on. to the hardrive which isn’t bad. im so lost and confused and tired I would be so happy if I could get a solution. thank you

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  132. thank you so much, I have used this method and played my game without any problems for a long time! but yesterday, I decided to carry my game into the external drive through origins as well. i deleted the electronic arts folder with the black arrow in my documents, I uninstalled the game and reinstalled it in my external drive. it created an electronic arts folder in my documents again. i tried doing the symlink, but this time it doesn’t work for some reason. nothing happens. i tried reverse symlink and symlink again, still nothing happens. I would really appracia if you can help me! thank you very much

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  133. Hi, you are amazing for sharing this information with us all! I just am stuck on creating the symlink.. I thought I did it correctly, the electronic arts folder is there on my drive but it does not show up in my game.. am I doing something wrong?

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  134. I am back sooner than I expected, I got it figured out. The only problem I have now is that VERY little of my CC is showing up. I have a ton of it but only like 10 things are showing up, how can I fix this?

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  135. Hi, I’ve been using your tutorial for about 6 months now and it’s been working flawlessly. I do have one question though. I play mainly on my computer, even though I hooked it up to my desktop as well and just change the name of the electronic arts folder when I want to play on a certain device. I plan on getting a new MacBook next year and will back up my information on the new device by transferring it directly from my current device using the ‘Transfer from Mac’ option. Will I have to create a new link or should it automatically register as the same since it will essentially be the same named files and all? Thanks!

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    1. sorry for the late reply! I should imagine the symlink may transfer over but I never use Migration Assistant when setting up a replacement Mac because I hate that it copies over all the gunk from the previous Mac. A new clean Mac is much more preferable with cleanly installed Apps. You can then copy over any files you want such as the Photos Library, Music Library, documents manually.

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  136. Hi! thank you for uploading these instructions, I was just wondering if you would recommend downloading The sims game onto the usb too and if so how to do that? Thank you!

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  137. The CC error message keeps popping up, however my drive is formatted correctly [Mac OS Extended (Journaled)]. How can I fix this?

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  138. i swear i did everything right. ok so i downloaded the sims 4 onto a new hard drive which worked fine, i could open the sims game and everything was good. I followed all your instructions, i formatted my hard drive to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and everything worked fine like my electronic arts folder is in the external drive and the alias is in my documents folder, but it still says “sims 4 is still running” and idk what to do like origin has access to everything and im just panicking cause i really want this to work. Pls help, thank you

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    1. hi, i also just realised that when i created the alias, the alias shows up as a file not a folder. Like it says electronic arts and the little arrow but its a white page instead of a blue folder, and im assuming that’s the issue. how can i fix this?

      Also i meant that the error says “sims 4 is already running”
      any help would be appreciated

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  139. OMG I FIXED IT I JUST MADE AN ERROR IN THE CODE IM DUMB BUT TYSM FOR THIS FORUM I WOULDNT HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT UR HELP UR AMAZING.

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  141. When ever I paste in “ln -s /Volumes/USB/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/” (replaced USB with usb name) I get “[email protected] ~ % ln -s /Volumes/SIMSMC/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    ln: /Users/NAME/Documents//Electronic Arts: File exists” what should I do?

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  142. Every time I paste both commands, I get a response in terminal that says

    mv: rename /Users/myname/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/EXTERNAL/Electronic Arts: Directory not empty

    what does this mean and how can i fix it?

    thank you!

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      1. I reformat it and it still comes up with the command. I have googled it and gotten nothing. I followed your steps closely and nothing works.

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  143. I am trying to do this process over again because my symlink was broken for some reason. I keep getting mv: rename /Users/zoniekealston-betts/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/Sims4HD/Electronic Arts: No such file or directory
    and I know its having trouble finding my electronic arts folder but it is in my documents so i am lost.

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      1. Hi! I have store in iCloud off and my storage is optimized. I bought a 500gb drive and only had about 80gb that was being used.

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  144. Hi, this may be a silly question just want to ask before I mess things up but do I have to keep the drive in at all times or am I able to disconnect it and plug it in when im ready to play?

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  145. I keep following every step and when I put in the first command to terminal its says its invalid and the electronic arts folder is still in documents but is also on my external hard drive. Idk what I am doing wrong, I followed each step over and over and its still not working. Please help!!!

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  147. Hi, my drive’s format is Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and I’ve renamed it USB for ease. However, I keep getting this message: “Macbook-pro:~ Business$ mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/USB/
    mv: rename /Users/Business/Documents/Electronic Arts to /Volumes/USB/Electronic Arts: Permission denied”. Could you please help?

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    1. Is your Mac user account an Administrator account with full rights to approve permission requests? Or maybe Terminal doesn’t have permission to access the external drive as per the screenshot?

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  148. Hi BLUEBELLFLORA,

    I am having a hard time with the first step. I have my hard drive format correctly, however, when I did the steps either it wouldn’t do anything at all or it would disappear from documents. I can add the alias perfectly it is just step one that is driving me insane. Here is my code that I have been inputting into terminal:

    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/Sims\ 4/
    ln -s /Volumes/TOSHIBA\ EXT/Game\ ksearcy\ Data/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

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      1. Yes, my hard drive is Sims 4. I noticed what I had typed after the fact. I just can’t get the first step to work and I reset everything on terminal.

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  149. I’ve done this method several times and each time it i was done with all the steps a pop up would come up saying “the sims 4 is already running”. i have followed each instructions, step-by-step and it leads me back to the message. at this point i don’t think this method works anymore ://

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      1. I’ve followed each of those steps and it still doesn’t work. My external hard drive is plugged in and I’ve given full access to the app. I already changed the directions of my game so it can be placed on my hard drive. Is it possible please for myself to email you with this issue and figure it out together??

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          1. No.

            I had changed my direction by deleting the game and reinstalling it on my external hard drive. I followed another post that you had made regarding that.

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          2. Well, I have no idea but the issue is with your setup, not the commands posted here which are accurate for macOS. Sometimes people get that error because they are trying to create the symlink with the game running (no idea why), or they have already moved the Electronic Arts folder to the external drive and then, for reasons known only to themselves, have launched the game after moving it so another folder is created which they then try to move using the mv command. Or the DS_Store is bugged.

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    2. I’m having the same problem.
      -Made sure external HD was formatted correctly
      -Downloaded The Sims 4 from Origin with the destination in Origin set to the location of my external HD. I granted Origin permission to access documents on a removable drive. Launched the game once to confirm it was working.
      -Followed the instructions here to create symlink for the Electronic Arts folder; it appeared to work, EA folder was transferred to external HD and alias was created in my Documents folder.
      -I get the error message “The Sims 4 is already running” when I attempt to launch the game.
      -I consulted the instructions here and went into my privacy settings to confirm that Origin has permission to access both Documents Folder and Removable Volumes. The Sims 4 has permission to access Removable Volumes (there is no option listed to grant it access to the Documents Folder).

      Still receiving the error message – not sure where I’ve gone wrong?

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  150. Hi I followed the intructions and I use a macbook pro and i own a “LaCie 2TB Rugged USB-C Portable Hard Drive”. I followed all of the instructions but it doesn’t mark my folder as an alias. I had put in:mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/SIMS4DRIVE/
    ln -s /Volumes/SIMS4DRIVE/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
    Btw my folder is called SIMS4DRIVE but anyways even though I had not see alias I had launched the game. When I launched it there was only three mods working and it was showing new game. So I quickly exit my game and look at the folders and just do the redo process that was shown, when I had followed the steps and I now see the “Electronic Arts_bkp” I opened it to see the same three mods that were shown were the only ones in the mods folder even though I had way much more. Please Help 😦

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  152. Hello bluebellflora,
    I followed everything and my mods didn’t show up from my external drive, but the mods did show up from my computer. I’m not sure what I need to do to switch it to my drive.

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    1. The game does not look in multiple locations (external and internal drives) it only looks in the local Documents > Electronic Arts > The Sims 4 folder. Sounds like the symlink wasn’t created.

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  153. Everything worked when I followed all of the steps. However, now when I attempt to open the game , my expansion packs re-download in origin. Did I store my Sims 4 Packs in the wrong place?

    Can you show the file extension for where they should be?

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  154. Hey I think I messed up. I did everything correctly but said Sims 4 is already open or something and I seen you put the system preferences part but it still didn’t work not when I go to restart it won’t let me.

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  155. Hey! Quick question, if you’re still answering! I used this tutorial and everything worked fine, i played for a few days. But then i updated my game and i dont think the update went into the hard drive, i checked the download location on origin and i hadn’t changed it. Now my game isn’t responding, is there any way i can fix this?

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  156. Hi! im sorry I tried to read through the comments to figure out what I did wrong. Before finding out there is a process to achieve this I dragged and dropped the EA folder to my external drive. For context, my game was already on the external drive and works fine but I am trying to move my mods to free up space. Once I learned of the symlink process, I deleted the initially copied file and followed your steps precisely.

    mv ~/Documents/Electronic\ Arts /Volumes/Backup\ Plus/

    ln -s /Volumes/Backup\ Plus/Game\ User\ Data/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/

    these my two codes and my external hard drive is called “Backup Plus”

    it didn’t move my EA folder but copied it with a command of “invalid argument” seeing that it copied I assumed it worked ad went on to step two but the “file exists” command showed up in terminal. I am not sure how to resolve further.

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      2. But for step one its saying invalid argument once it type it in. Im not sure why but is that why it won’t properly move?

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  157. I played my game fine yesterday after transferring everything over to the external hard drive, but this morning it said “sims 4 already running”. Origin has full disk access and sims 4 has access to documents and volumes. I noticed the alias folder turned into a document but it fine yesterday. So now im confused on what to do.

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  158. Everything worked and I followed the directions very closely. However, I tried to play the game today and it loaded without my CC, saves and tray files. The alias folder basically created a whole new sims 4 folder and wiped out all of my CC, saves, and tray files. My USB still has the old Sims 4 file with my saves, tray, cc. For some reason, my laptop keeps creating files on my computer with the name of my USB and that’s confusing the symlink. I have no idea how to stop this and it’s frustrating having to wait and copy over all of my cc, tray files, and saves over just for this issue to keep reoccuring.

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  159. Hi ! So I follow all steps as instructed but now I’ve come to a point where when I am loading the game from my external drive it does not open. Please note origin is in the applications folder of my computer so I am only given the option to successfully play from my computer. Now when it does finally open it creates a whole new EA folder and I have mods and saves I want to play with what should I do ?

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  160. Do you know if this process has changed for people on the latest
    MacBook update because I literally followed the first two steps carefully and the “Alias” folder will not work. It moves the Electronic Arts folder into my external drive, but it will not create the symlink/alias

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  161. hi! did everything correctly but the ea file in the external drive doesn’t show up as alias, do you know how to fix that?

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    1. This kept happening to me, so I found a different way to create the symlink and this is what finally worked: (I used the name “Sims” for my hard-drive/ssd so make sure you change it to your hard drive name)

      1 First, create a folder called “Electronic Arts” on your Sims hard drive. You can do this by opening the Sims hard drive in Finder, right-clicking and selecting “New Folder”, then renaming the folder to “Electronic Arts”.
      2 Move the contents of your current “Electronic Arts” folder in your Documents folder to the new “Electronic Arts” folder on your Sims hard drive. You can do this by dragging and dropping the contents from one folder to the other.
      3 Delete the old “Electronic Arts” folder in your Documents folder.
      4 Open Terminal.
      5 Enter the following command to create a symbolic link between the new “Electronic Arts” folder on your Sims hard drive and your Documents folder:
      Copy code
      ln -sfn /Volumes/Sims/Electronic\ Arts ~/Documents/
      6 Press Enter.
      7 You should now have a symlink that links your “Electronic Arts” folder on your Sims hard drive to your Documents folder.

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  162. Hi! I have followed these instructions and the arrow pops up on my electronic arts folder! Game is running. The only issue I’m having is my cc and mods are not showing up. I have made sure they are turned on in the game settings. The weird thing I am running into is if they are in my documents folder they work but we soon as I put one in the external hard drive it doesn’t work. Please help 😭

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  165. Hi! I followed every steps, but when I try to run the games all my saves are gone. There is something that I could do?

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  166. Hi Bluebellflora,
    NEW question sooo if you see this please answer. I’m getting a new MacBook. Is there a way to copy the link I have on my old MacBook onto the new one or do I have to reverse the link and create a brand new one. I just want to work smarter not harder! I’ve created the symlink a few times always using your post and it’s really easy to follow. TIA!

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    1. Good question! Are you using migration assistant? In theory it should copy over the symlink as part of the migration. Would be good to know if this works. The drive wouldn’t be plugged in if you’re setting up the new Mac using migration assistant although this shouldn’t matter, it won’t be looking for it during the process.

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      1. I actually just reversed it and created a new one on the new MacBook. Thank you for your help!

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  167. I dont know if its just me but my game isnt responding at all. Everything ran smoothly but my game doesn’t respond. It launches just fine, then I get the pinwheel and it says sims 4 not responding.

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  168. Hi! I had successfully transferred and installed my Sims 4 game to an external drive. I was able to play for several weeks, but the external drive broke. I tried a couple of options to fix/recover it, but wasn’t able to.

    I’ve ordered a new drive and am trying to set it up. Am I able to download the game directly to the new drive, or do I need to setup a new symlink? The game isn’t installed on my computer anymore.

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