Forum Discussion
14 Replies
@Bluebellflora No, I’m not sure what that is. I’m new to simming. How would I go about creating that?
- @Chan_Chan2597
I’m not saying you should but whether you have or not is relevant to your question (more info about the symlink here - https://bluebellflora.com/saving-your-sims-4-folder-to-an-external-drive/ )
If your Sims 4 folder is currently stored externally on a hard drive the game will not be loading that data unless you have created the symlink. It will only load your saves, mods etc. from the Sims 4 folder in your Documents > Electronic Arts folder. ok, I’ll do that then since it seems like it’ll be the best way to access all my things in the hard drive. Thank you for sharing that link! Do you have any suggestions as to how I can update my game if everything is stored on the hard drive? I moved the origin app to the hard drive as well. I’m thinking once I delete all my game files from the MacBook it’ll allow me to place my mods folder on my desktop every time I need to update, but I’m not sure. I do plan to download more cc and mods and I know my hard drive can hold more info than my Mac…
- @Chan_Chan2597
You just update the game as normal through Origin. The location of the installed game is set in Origin > Preferences > Installs & Saves. If this is set to your external drive, and that is where your base game plus Sims 4 Packs folder is, that's where Origin will look to update. ok, and just so I understand, I shouldn’t have to worry about removing my mods first before updating since everything will be stored on the hard drive?
- @Chan_Chan2597
The game is on the hard drive right? And your saves, mods etc. are in Documents > Electronic Arts > The Sims 4? It’s always a good idea to remove your Mods before updating because they may not be compatible with the new version of the game. No, everything is on the hard drive. My Mac was running out of space from downloading so much cc and mods, so I transferred everything to the hard drive. I haven’t deleted my saves, mods, and etc from my Mac yet because I want to make sure everything is transferred over properly, but once I do that I plan to delete all of that from my computer and have it stored on the hard drive. So when I need to update my mods folder and the Origin game will be on the hard drive. So I’d move my mods folder out of the hard drive onto my desktop, update TS4, and then put it back on the hard drive. But I don’t know if I even need to do that if everything is on the hard drive anyway.
I hope that makes sense. LoL!
@Chan_Chan2597
Yeah, I really don't understand why you're removing files from a Mods folder on the external hard drive when the game is ignoring that Mods folder and loading what it in your Documents folder stored internally on your Mac. Which is using space on the internal drive.My goal is to have everything related to sims 4 stored on the external hard drive and not my Mac, in order to save space on my Mac. I know there’s a way to have the game load from the hard drive instead of the electronic arts folder by going into Origin, I just haven’t done it yet because I’m still in the process of putting everything on the hard drive. Does that make sense? I don’t want the game to read from what’s being stored internally, instead I want it to read from the hard drive. That way I have the more space on my Mac and more space to download items onto the hard drive since it’s 2TB worth of space.
- @Chan_Chan2597
Yes, I understand but I'm not sure you do. Let me try and simplify it.
Game installation:
When you install the game it automatically installs in your Mac user account Applications folder - Users/[your user account]/Applications. This is the default file path set up in Origin. You can change this by going into Origin > Preferences > Installs & Saves and changing the Game Library location to wherever you like, in your case this is the external hard drive.
Game User data:
This is the Sims 4 folder that contains your saves, mods and all other settings for your game. This is always located in Users/[your user account]/Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4. If you move that Sims 4 folder, or even the Electronic Arts folder, to any other location on your Mac or on an external drive, the game will not find it so will load a brand new game and create a new Electronic Arts/The Sims 4 folder in the Documents folder. The only way to change the location of the Sims 4 folder is to create the symlink. There is nothing you can do in Origin to change this. yes, I understand, that’s why I plan to create the symlink. My concern is that after all of that is complete (meaning everything is on the hard drive and the symlink is created) would I then be able to update the game as usual by taking my mods folder out of the hard drive, placing on desktop, and then replacing after update.. or do I not have to worry about taking my mods folder out before updating since it’s on the hard drive now. Do you see what I mean?
- @Chan_Chan2597
You can just rename the Mods folder to Mods Backup or something else in the Sims 4 folder, the game will only load mods if they are in a folder called "Mods". You can't place it on the desktop because then you will be moving it back onto your internal drive.
You should always take your Mods out before updating, as explained in my previous reply.
I would recommend reading the symlink guide through a couple of times before even attempting to do it so you fully understand what you're doing and how normal troubleshooting steps may not work the same way 🙂 ok got it, that helps me out so much. Thank you for your quick responses, I really appreciate your help!
i am trying to create the symlink, read it through a couple times but I’m getting stuck. I completed step one of moving the electronic arts folder to the external drive… but it won’t allow me to do the symlink part. It keeps saying “zsh: command not found” this what I’m putting in terminal:
In -s /Volumes/Gaming\ Hard/Drive/Electronic \ Arts ~/Documents/
(my hard drive is named Gaming Hard Drive)
Is this wrong?
Yes. Check your spaces and slashes. Your command indicates the name of the external drive is "Gaming Hard" and the Electronic Arts folder is within another folder called "Drive". You also have an erroneous space after Electronic.
