File sharing permissions problem

Thank you: I will try your physical suggestion later tonight when I get home.

Are you saying you differentiate your admin user name with a "1" and "2" after it?

Unfortunately both my admin user names are exactly the same and I am not sure it is safe to try to change one of them.

Remember I can file share and I can screen share now.

But when I file share, I get the normal expected locked folders due to permissions.

When I try the normal method to change permissions to allow my new admin name, it already sees it and won't let me change anything.

I still have not had time to reconnect the display, but I think we may be using different terminology:

There is something like macmini.local which became macmini.local (2) on my new M1 Mac mini, so I changed it to macmini.local (2020).

But for file sharing, in the Users & Groups subtopic in System Preferences, both Macs have a User with Administrator privileges that consists of my first name, middle initial and last name (as one word with no spaces) and these do not have a "1" or "2" added to them.

This is the Administrator that I want to add to Privileges in a Get Info and unlocked padlock for File Sharing, but it won't let me; perhaps because it already exists on the new Mac.

That was it indeed! Thank you.

I used Screen Sharing to go back to my Mac Mini 2011 permissions, and from the main folder holding my important data:

I removed the User of my full name (luckily that is not my main User on the 2011); and

I added "admin" with read/write privileges; and

I selected "Apply to enclosed items..." which took some time to make all the changes.

Now I can access all of my important data from the Mac Mini 2011 using File Sharing, but...

It is extremely slow sharing data with both using the same WiFi; but that's a problem for a different topic, if I cannot figure it out.

Thanks again!

Thanks for these tips:

I realized that since both Mac Minis are next to each other (can they be stacked safely?), I turned on Internet Sharing on the Mac Mini 2020 which is connected to WiFi and used an ethernet cable to connect the Mac Mini 2011, and File Sharing is much faster now.

I also have the Thunderbolt 1 dongle on my 2011 that allows USB3, but admittedly my two main external hard drives are USB2. I do however have a USB3 drive that I use to backup these two and the drive has two additional USB ports on it.