Games are not fully installing on external SSD

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Level 1

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Games are not fully installing on external SSD

Using base m4 Mac mini (15.3) with OWC express 1m2 1TB SSD connected to the thunderbolt port with tb4 cable.

I'm VERY new to Mac and primarily use it for gaming. As the Mac mini only has 250ish gb of storage I'm trying to store and play my games off the SSD.

However, when installing the games there appears to be partial storage of the internal HD used. For instance I installed World of Warcraft on the external drive and the install location reads as: /Volumes/OWC Express 1M2/World of Warcraft/

(I created a new folder specifically for the game - in the external ssd)

The odd thing is that when I go into system settings it reads that about 90gbs of the internal storage is being used by about 85 random documents each taking up about 1gb

same thing with steam games. I can open up and find them inside the SSD, but when I check storage they're being listed as applications taking up space in the internal storage.

im so confused as to how this is happening. and have spent hours trying to look for a fix to no avail.

the goal is to just have the OS on the internal drive and have everything else install and run from the external SSD.s

Posted on Feb 1, 2025 12:01 PM

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Answer 1

Feb 2, 2025 05:41 AM in response to EverIvy

Installing apps on an external drive will not solve space issues on an insufficiently sized internal drive for the purpose being used.

Every app will create some sort of application support folder in your user Library folder on your internal drive which is normally hidden from view. Some apps may not even put a megabyte of info in that directory. Others can put 10's of gigabytes of session data, caches, settings, their own libraries, databases, etc. which can chew up disk space really fast.

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Answer 2

EverIvy Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 1, 2025 12:52 PM in response to padams35

Thank you for the reply!

Your advice makes sense. I'll have to give it a shot.

I should mention the process I used when setting up my external SSD maybe it would explain some things.

from factory setup I created an initial admin account (not signing into Apple ID yet, intended for this account o be an emergency backup/recovery account)
created new user, also set as admin (intended to be the primary)
I then copied all folders from the primary account into the external SSD
Changed the home directory of the primary account to the external SSD
restarted the Mac mini
logged into new primary account and setup Apple ID

then installed games

You say you've had 60/40 success of a game installing on your external drive. I'm still learning, but if a game is located within the external drive.. am I to understand that doesn't necessarily mean it's installed in the external drive? I'm still very confused by this how is the game settings showing me that the install location is on the external ssd but not running from the external ssd?

The documents showed up after world of warcraft was installed when I go into System Settings and look at storage, they're specifically listed under "documents"

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Answer 3

padams35

Level 4

3,613 points

Feb 1, 2025 12:27 PM in response to EverIvy

Apple Security is locked down tight enough that applications will usually not run from external drives by default. There is supposed to be a prompt for the user to confirm an external drive application is trusted to run, but the prompt doesn't always appear/work if the application/game has to be opened from a developer's launcher utility.

I've had roughly 60/40 success if a Steam game can be installed onto an external drive or if it has to be on the internal drive to work correctly.

Try installing World of Warcraft to the Internal drive's Applications folder, running it once, and then moving it to the external drive. Sometimes once an application has been run once from the preferred location MacOS will remember it is trusted and allow it to be run from an external drive in the future.

If you know the name/location of the seemingly random 85 1GB files we may be able to tell you where they came from and if they can be safely deleted.

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Games are not fully installing on external SSD

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