Why cant I download anything?

Hello.....first post

I don't own a Mac....yet, but I have a friend who does and I'm helping her try to figure out why she cannot download anything. She had tried Firefox, Safari, and Chrome. Nothing will download. I found some old threads about Speed Downloader and i GETTER that caused problems like this, but she says she cant find anything like that on her laptop.

Is there some settings that need to be changed to allow downloading?

Thanks ahead of time.

G'day and welcome to the forums.

Well the default to store downloads is in the Downloads folder which can be found at Go (Menu Bar) > Downloads under Lion, or in the Home folder under Downloads in earlier operating systems. This is unless she has inadvertently selected somewhere else to store the downloads. Download something, say Onyx which is the best utility about, and if it does not appear in the Downloads folder, user Spotlight to find it. If the gf uses Safari, go into Preferences > General and see where downloads are saved to.

Avoid Speed Downloader like the plague.

Thank you for replying.....I have her checking it now but I think the problem is way before 'where'........no download window ever pops up. It does nothing.

What version of OSX is she running? 10.5? 10.6? 10.7?

Download windows don't pop up on mac browsers. They just go into the downloads folder (by default) fairly silently (you can open a "downloads windows" to actually watch it happening if you like, but it's off by default).

In Safari 5.1, the latest version, a tiny window appears in the upper-right corner of Safari as the download is progressing (preceded by a "jumping off" animation) so the visual cues there are more obvious.

My guess would be she has 10,000 items in her download folder and just never new where they were going.

What Chas says is quite possible. Only thing is Firefox for sure does pop up a Download window. Safari does not though and does what Chas said.

When you click on a download url what happens in Safari? Firefox? Any error at all?

The OP said that they tried Chrome, Safari and Firefox. Firefox does have a download window which you can get to through cmd-j or tools -> downloads

Chrome has a download bar at the bottom or you could get to a downloads tab with shift-cmd-j or window -> downloads

chas_m already said where the downloads show up in Safari.

Also have you tried ctrl-click -> save link as
and what happens when you do that?

NotPC said:

Thank you for replying.....I have her checking it now but I think the problem is way before 'where'........no download window ever pops up. It does nothing.

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It would help if you gave us an example and told us exactly what she/you are doing.

chas_m said:

Download windows don't pop up on mac browsers. They just go into the downloads folder (by default) fairly silently (you can open a "downloads windows" to actually watch it happening if you like, but it's off by default).

Click to expand...

...in Safari only. As noted, Firefox has one, Chrome has the bar at the bottom and Opera has a tab for downloads.

@NotPC - This is a common problem with improperly uninstalled download managers (as you know - thanks for searching!). She may not see it installed but it lingers if it's removed incorrectly. Ask her if she has ever installed one and if she has, get her to reinstall it and remove it following the proper instructions.

Macbook pro2 laptop OSX 10.6.8 Using Firefox by default.........Purchased brand new...

She is not computer literate and I don't think she has ever messed with anything that wasn't on the computer to begin with except Google Chrome which I suggested for a certain site. Which BTW downloaded no problem for her..

If there is a native download manager for this LT and OSX could it be the problem? And if so what is it called and how do I get rid of it?

Why this issue has cropped up is I tried to send her a file that was too large for email so I uploaded it to Mediafire and Sendspace so she could download it. Neither site works for her but is no problem for me. Possibly popup blockers at work?

If you would all like to hear an hour of thunder and rain here is the mp3 file I made for her.....tell me if you have any problem with it.

rain.mp3

Nice mp3 - the wife just woke up, walked in and asked if it was raining.

So nope, no problem downloading it here.

It's downloading just fine on this end also in both Firefox and Safari.

Has she installed a Download manager? I never use then as they cause issues.

Hi,

Downloaded your file and played no problem, I`m running Safari 5.1 and as chas_m said I always get a small popup download window appear top right of screen as snap shot of your file downloading.

dtravis7 said:

It's downloading just fine on this end also in both Firefox and Safari.

Has she installed a Download manager? I never use then as they cause issues.

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Just as a matter of interest, then, how do you download from Firefox - I use Download Helper addon - is there a native way?

Sawday said:

Just as a matter of interest, then, how do you download from Firefox - I use Download Helper addon - is there a native way?

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Download helper to me is not a Download manager. It's only for doing Videos from places like You Tube and does not take over the browser. Download managers take over the whole download process of a browser and in general cause more problems than they are worth.