Download Failed error; Can't 'relocate' libraries - what worked for me

j2cuba

Hi. If you are experiencing a download failed error in MacOS Sequoia and/or can't successfully 'relocate' libraries copied from an old systems, this worked for me. It has taken me 10 days to resolve so I'm sharing in case this helps others.

My context was trying to set up a new Mac, having copied across Applications using Time Machine in Migration Assistant and manually copying Libraries from my old Mac to my new. I was left with a Mac where Native Access couldn't download anything (Download failed error) and "relocating" libraries within Native Access or resolving missing files in Kontakt didn't work.

If I were doing this again, I wouldn't manually copy or use Migration Assistant, I would try installing Native Access and freshly download all my libraries through there. However, I don't have great internet (several days to download all my libraries) and didn't have complete confidence that everything would be restored that way, particularly as I have collected a lot of niche, small, free libraries.

But, if you find yourself in my situation, this is what worked for me:

1. I reinstalled MacOS over the top of my existing applications and data.

2. This didn't make a difference: still got the same download failed errors and relocating libraries wasn't working.

3. I checked permissions on all the various download and Kontakt library master folders, to ensure that System. Administrators and my own user account had read + write access and applied this also to all subfolders. I don't know why these permissions weren't appropriate given that it was a fresh installation of MacOS, but this seems to have been key. I don't know which change mattered - System, Administrators or my own individual account, but at least one of these seems to have been the block. 

4. Downloads of new libraries and updates then started working.

5. Kontakt still wasn't seeing my existing libraries however, so to resolve that I uninstalled and reinstalled all libraries installed through Native Access (third party libraries that sit outside of Native Access were already fine). This involved NA redownloading all these libraries again, which took a couple of days, but seems to have worked. 

6. There were some libraries that didn't have an option to redownload in Native Access (e.g. some freebies like The Orchestra Elements and LOVE Piano and Vivace Legacy). Also, in Native Access "uninstalling" and then relocating them by pointing NA back to the folder they lived in didn't work. So for them, I deleted their folder in Finder, recopied it from my old system into the same place and then "relocated" them in Native Access, pointing them to the fresh copy (actually in the same place as the old copy). That has now worked. 

Hopefully this helps someone having the same problems I was.