0

For a year now Photos goes berserk when I connect my iPhone to my Macbook. It launches automatically and goes into an infinite loop of "Preparing to import from ...".

Normally I'd be able to stop Photos from auto-launching if I could get ImageCapture to have the focus, but Photos continuously steals the focus and it's not possible to disable auto-launch from ImageCapture.

Image Capture doesn't get focus

Luckily, a nice defaults line on the command line will solve this issue, but now Finder goes into an infinite loop of seeing/not seeing the iPhone, whenever the iPhone is connected via Lightning.

How do I stop Finder from auto-launching when I connect (via Lightning) iPhone to macOS?

More importantly, how can I sync or copy iPhone photos to macOS, still via Lightning, from the command line (or any other way than through Photos and ImageCapture)?

Is there, for example, a "target disk mode" for the iPhone?

nohillside
  • 100,768
Calaf
  • 4,359
  • I'd be more inclined to look for the root of the problem than try to band-aid it. Try another cable, another port, another dock. There's something obviously wrong with the existing connection. – Tetsujin May 27 '22 at 05:16
  • This still asks several things at once ("How do I stop Finder from auto-launching", "how can I sync or copy iPhone photos to macOS, still via Thunderbolt, from the command line", "Is there, for example, a "target disk mode" for the iPhone"). Also, focusing on the actual syncing issue might yield better results than trying to work around them. – nohillside May 27 '22 at 05:18
  • PS: AFAIK you can't connect iPhones via Thunderbolt, but maybe we are missing some detail here. – nohillside May 27 '22 at 05:19
  • If you want to start looking at the core problem: Besides the hardware-related ideas from Tetsujin, did you try to create a new user account on your Mac and sync the photos to that one? – nohillside May 27 '22 at 05:20
  • Duh.. confused Lightning with Thunderbolt... Fixed.. Thanks, Tetsujin & nohillside, experimenting some more. Using another account is particularly useful and I somehow completely missed it. Syncing should work so long as I login with the same AppleID on the new user account (?). – Calaf May 27 '22 at 17:36
  • Indeed a blank install of the OS followed by moving my (music + photos) files is unnecessary. I can create a new account and gradually move all files. – Calaf May 27 '22 at 17:37
  • If it works with a new account, you could also try to remove all relevant preferences etc. in your existing one. – nohillside May 27 '22 at 18:20

0 Answers0