I like to save things to my regular desktop. Now that I have iCloud enabled I can't do it. When I try to disable iCloud Drive, it says all documents and desktop items will be removed. I've decided I don't like iCloud all that much and have lived without it before. I want to get rid of it or disable it. Have any of you tried this and had it work? Click here

If there's not so much of it that it's unwieldy, why don't you just park your data on either your other MBP or your external, disable iCloud, and move it back afterwards?

More: If you empty the synced folders and then sync again, will that clear all of your data out of iCloud? (A similar procedure works on my iPhone 4.)

(Still working on a response to "Cables..." )

Hi Artie, again! I thought I was gone for longer than this. Anyway, I just want to make sure what this article says works. I don't want to lose everything b/c of iCloud Driver's scary warning and not be able to park it back. Yes, I only want stuff on my external drive and my MBP. This is the first time I've forayed into iCloud land and I don't like it. That's why I asked if anyone had already done this and it worked.

Artie's suggestion is a bit more terse than Apple's, but it is essentially the same as their's.

This is a general heads-up: if you ever need to park data on your external you should park it on your Mavericks partition, because you'll never update it.

If you park it on either of your Sierra partitions Super Duper! will ERASE it the next time you update your clone.

I hadn't thought of that (about parking data.).

Also, since I am gun shy about getting rid of iCloud Drive b/c I might lose stuff, I will back my computer up with the external drive first and then try getting rid of iCloud Drive.

I'm not sure what you mean by synced folders. And why would I want to sync them again and to what? Syncing has caused me nothing but grief. I don't want to sync.


More: If you empty the synced folders and then sync again, will that clear all of your data out of iCloud? (A similar procedure works on my iPhone 4.)

(Still working on a response to "Cables..." ) [/quote]

Good idea!

I'll suggest a step by step:

1. Back up your MBP to your external.
2. Also, back up just the data that's in the cloud to your Mavericks partition and maybe even your backup MBP for double or triple security.
3. Turn off iCloud Drive on your MBP.
4. Restore your data to your MBP.
5. Back up your MBP to your external, again.

As you've read, turning off iCloud Drive doesn't remove your previously synced data from the cloud, so if you don't mind its remaining there, there's no need for you to sync.

But if you don't want to leave your data in the cloud, add these steps between #2 and #3:

1. Delete all the data on your MBP that's in the cloud. (Don't forget that it's been securely backed up in two or three different locations.)
2. Empty the trash.
3. Sync your MBP with the cloud.

That final sync will delete your data from the cloud and you'll be back to square one, as if you'd never used it in the first place. (That's assuming that iCloud Drive works logically. )

Well, I did it. I got so caught up in trying to do it correctly per the article that I forgot to back up what was in iCloud as you suggested. But, it IS on my computer anyway and I backed up my MBP.

Also, just so we're clear, the names of my partitions on my external drive are Mavericks which has Mavericks on it, MBP Sierra 2012 which has the latest Sierra on it for my old MBP, MBP 2015 Sierra (latest Sierra) which is for my new MBP and a blank, un-named partition with nothing in it.

Thanks for your help, Artie. I was here so long before that I started to miss everyone.

Always happy to try.