Can't download Affinity Photo 2 on Mac Mini M1 Sequoia 15.2 OS

[Pmartel]

Hi there;

I am trying to download the free trial of Affinity Photo 2.

Getting all kinds of headaches and it's incredibly frustrating as Sequoia 15.2 seems to think it's malware

I have a Mac Mini M1 with the maximum memory I can have and a 1 TB internal drive.

This is just so tedious and any help would be hugely appreciated 

[GaryLearnTech]

Hi @Pmartel and welcome to the forums!

Was this the official download from Serif themselves?  It certainly shouldn't behave like that (obviously) and, importantly, I don't recall seeing other similar reports.  If it was from a site you got from a Google search, please try either of the links below.  (Two different starting points, though they both end up in the same place…)

• https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/trial/
• https://store.serif.com/get/universal-licence-2/trial/ 

If there is a problem with the official download, then hopefully one of Serif's own support staff will pick up on this in the next day or two.

[Pmartel]

Hi there;

I'm attaching screen shots of what happens 

 

[GaryLearnTech]

Hi @Pmartel Thanks for clarifying what you're doing.  Yes, that definitely looks like the official download.

Note that macOS is saying that the file is damaged.  It's not saying that it's malware.

I might be thinking of another forum/context where I've heard this in the dim and distant past, but what happens if you try the same download in another browser, such as Firefox instead of Safari?

Finally, just double-checking to at least hopefully rule it out - how much free disk space do you have left?  You mentioned that you had 1TB of storage, but not how much free space remained.  According to your screenshot, the AP2 DMG file is almost 800MB.  The app itself, when you copy it to the Applications folder is going to want another 2.8GB.  If you've anything less than, say, about 5GB free, then you're running pretty low on space and that might be related to this problem.  If you're not in a habit of shutting down overnight (or at least occasionally rebooting your Mac), then you could potentially free up some space by doing a reboot.  If that makes a notable difference to the free space, try the download again.

[Pmartel]

Hi there;

I have tried other browsers and still same

I have quite a bit of disk space so no problem there

This whole thing is very strange

[MikeTO]

This means macOS is quarantining the file as a security measure. You should try restarting macOS. If that doesn't solve it, contact Apple for support. This is a common issue and if you Google the error you'll find many reports of this for applications from many developers, including Microsoft.

There is a way to remove the file from quarantine but it involves using the command line and means you have to trust the developer. I think that's something you should do only if you're experienced at doing this sort of thing, or if directed by Apple.

Good luck.

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, MikeTO said:

This means macOS is quarantining the file as a security measure.

Are you sure about that? The message just says the file is damaged & can't be opened. Typically, I would expect a considerably different message if it was openable but quarantined because the developer could not be verified or the file was otherwise suspicious.

[MikeTO]

7 minutes ago, R C-R said:

Are you sure about that? The message just says the file is damaged & can't be opened. Typically, I would expect a considerably different message if it was openable but quarantined because the developer could not be verified or the file was otherwise suspicious.

1. Open Terminal and change to the directory containing the file
2. Type xattr <filename>
3. If it reports com.apple.quarantine then the file is quarantined.

But it could be something else. Regardless, if the OP isn't comfortable poking around in Terminal, then it's best to contact Apple for support when this happens.

[Oufti]

 @Pmartel Before trying to open "Affinity Photo 2.app", the file must be copied inside the Applications folder of the Mac (as indicated by the 2nd screenshot). Then, eject the DMG and try to open Affinity Photo from your Applications folder. 

(Sorry if you already did all of this.)

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, Oufti said:

Before trying to open "Affinity Photo 2.app", the file must be copied inside the Applications folder of the Mac (as indicated by the 2nd screenshot).

The second screenshot (the one with the arrow pointing to the Applications folder alias) seems to indicate that the DMG has been mounted & the "Affinity Photo 2.app" it shows should be able to be installed into the Applications folder simply by dragging the app into the alias.

But apparently (?) when the OP does that, the 'damaged' message appears. That seems very unusual ... but what do I know?

[Oufti]

52 minutes ago, R C-R said:

[…] the "Affinity Photo 2.app" it shows should be […] installed into the Applications folder simply by dragging the app into the alias. 

But apparently (?) when the OP does that, the 'damaged' message appears.

I thought (even if it sounds very very basic, I know it happens) that the OP could have simply tried to double-click on the app on the dmg instead of dragging it first in the Applications folder and open it from there. This can, sometimes!, trigger a translocation error when checking if it's genuine or not. 

It's this part of the alert above that suggested to me it was the dmg app file that was opened: "This item is on the disk image "affinity-photo-2.5.7-3.dmg". Safari downloaded this disk image today at 5:38 PM." (For the rest of the alert: "Affinity Photo 2.app" is damaged and can't be opened. You should eject the disk image", Apple is known for not always having appropriate error messages, so I didn't considered it at first.)

This (error) message, after checking by Gatekeeper, normally appears when double-clicking on an app file, not dragging. 

Here (Monterey) I double-clicked the icon in the DMG window:

Then dragging APub icon from the DMG to my app folder alias:

 

And now double-clicking the app installed in the Applications folder:

But at the end, we could well find that there was also some trouble in the download, or whatever, and the file is effectively corrupted. 

Just worth to examine first the most evident questions… (You know: is the wire plugged? and so on…)

[Fred Farkle]

Just dl Affinity Photo 2 for Mac mini with 8gb memory.  I did was go to the App Store, and Apple ID and bingo, installed Affinity Photo 2 on the computer.  It's not hard to do.