Booted from External HDD and can't see Internal HDD to copy files from

Question

Booted from External HDD and can't see Internal HDD to copy files from

I have a mid 2010 MBP with High Sierra OS that was turned off for a year. I went back to start it and it would not boot up anymore (gets to the end of the progress bar and just sits there). I have tried all the recovery key options, diagnostics, verbose, etc... and to no success. I then tried making a USB installation stick but that comes back saying that it can't find Apple servers. Anything that attempted to connect tot he internet basically would not work (even connecting to my wifi would not accept the password that I know was correct). Note that in all the Recovery attempts where I go to the MacOS Utilities interface the Internal Hard drive and the Recovery drive would be displayed.

I then created a boot disk with Apple Hardware Test (AHT) to test all the hardware. Running the test (the full test) returned no hardware issues.

Now I have created an external hard drive with High Sierra installed as a boot up disk. The thinking is that I will backup the files from the Internal hard drive to the External hard drive (the machine has a Parallels Virtual Machine on it that I would like to retain), and then I will do a clean install. The MBP boots up wonderfully from it (surprisingly fast actually, even access my network and the internet with no issue) but there is one problem: the internal hard drive does not show up in Finder or Disk Utility. I have checked the /Volumes folder and nothing there either. Looking in the system information though the controller and hard drive are listed there and no errors reported.

Is there any way to find the MBP internal drive, or to scan the machine with another tool that isn't AHT?

PS: I know that I should have used TimeMachine.

Posted on Mar 4, 2019 9:07 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

SchneiderIS4Mac Author

Level 1

17 points

Mar 16, 2019 9:10 AM in response to BDAqua

The hard drive cable did not work. I had a brief bout of excitement when I took the new SSD out (I had replaced the original drive 4-5 years ago) out and put the original HD in. With the original drive in place the MBP booted up fine. I was able to clean off 200Gb of data, then proceeded to do a OS upgrade (El Capitan was the news one that showed up and I figured start small and get to High Sierra in a couple of runs). As with the other drive, when the install gets to the reboot it progresses about 80% and then appears to freeze. Sitting for over 24 hours it does not move off of there.

This really does not make any sense. The drive was working flawlessly (slow but functioning) before the new OS upgrade.

Reply

Answer 2

BDAqua

Level 10

239,435 points

Mar 5, 2019 6:22 AM in response to SchneiderIS4Mac

Sounds like Recovery SW may be your best hope...

Data Rescue...

http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php

rccharles on file recovery...

"Stellar Phoenix Macintosh - Mac data recovery software, recovers data from damaged, deleted, or corrupted volumes and even from initialized disks."

They have a trial version, so I guess you can see if your data can be recovered...

http://www.stellarinfo.com/mac-data-recovery.htm

Reply

Answer 3

Mar 5, 2019 7:15 PM in response to BDAqua

Before spending money on some other solution, my preference is to understand if in fact the drive can be reached and then attempt to handle a simple activity myself. Given that the other boot modes are able to see the internal drive it would be logical to assume that it could be done with out of the box functionality. Presumably it can be done through Terminal.

Reply

Answer 4

Mar 7, 2019 8:09 PM in response to BDAqua

The mystery grows. When I first fire up the MBP I see a "Macintosh HD" listed and running he utility I get the following.

diskutil list

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk0
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                 Apple_APFS Container disk1         1000.0 GB  disk0s2

/dev/disk1 (synthesized):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      APFS Container Scheme -                      +1000.0 GB  disk1
                                 Physical Store disk0s2
   1:                APFS Volume Macintosh HD            729.4 GB   disk1s1
   2:                APFS Volume Preboot                 19.1 MB    disk1s2
   3:                APFS Volume Recovery                517.8 MB   disk1s3
   4:                APFS Volume VM                      4.3 GB     disk1s4

/dev/disk2 (external, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS HighSierra              999.3 GB   disk2s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk2s3

In Finder I click on the "Macintosh HD" drive under devices and it sits thinking. After a long pause it suddenly disappeared and an error comes up that the volume has not been ejected properly. When I then run distil from Terminal I get the following.

diskutil list

/dev/disk2 (external, physical):
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *1.0 TB     disk2
   1:                        EFI EFI                     209.7 MB   disk2s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS HighSierra              999.3 GB   disk2s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk2s3

Reply

Answer 5

Mar 7, 2019 8:16 PM in response to SchneiderIS4Mac

Next was the following.

diskutil activity

***Begin monitoring DiskArbitration activity

***DiskAppeared ((no BSD name), DAVolumePath = 'file:///home/', DAVolumeKind = 'autofs', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0651

***DiskAppeared ((no BSD name), DAVolumePath = 'file:///net/', DAVolumeKind = 'autofs', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0659

***DiskAppeared ('disk0', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0662

***DiskAppeared ('disk0s1', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'msdos', DAVolumeName = 'EFI') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0664

***DiskAppeared ('disk0s2', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0665

***DiskAppeared ('disk1', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0666

***DiskAppeared ('disk1s1', DAVolumePath = 'file:///Volumes/Macintosh%20HD%201/', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Macintosh HD') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0668

***DiskAppeared ('disk1s2', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Preboot') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0669

***DiskAppeared ('disk1s3', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Recovery') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0671

***DiskAppeared ('disk1s4', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'VM') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0672

***DiskAppeared ('disk2', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0673

***DiskAppeared ('disk2s1', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'msdos', DAVolumeName = 'EFI') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0675

***DiskAppeared ('disk2s2', DAVolumePath = 'file:///', DAVolumeKind = 'hfs', DAVolumeName = 'HighSierra') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0676

***DiskAppeared ('disk2s3', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'hfs', DAVolumeName = 'Recovery HD') Time=20190307-19:33:30.0678

***DAIdle (no DADiskRef) Time=20190307-19:33:30.0679

***DiskDescriptionChanged ('disk0s1', DAVolumePath = 'file:///Volumes/firmwaresyncd.0kQjdj/') Time=20190307-19:35:27.4275

***DAIdle (no DADiskRef) Time=20190307-19:35:27.4277

***DiskDisappeared ('disk1s4', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'VM') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9104

***DiskDisappeared ('disk1s3', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Recovery') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9107

***DiskDisappeared ('disk1s2', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Preboot') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9108

***DiskDisappeared ('disk1s1', DAVolumePath = 'file:///Volumes/Macintosh%20HD%201/', DAVolumeKind = 'apfs', DAVolumeName = 'Macintosh HD') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9110

***DiskDisappeared ('disk1', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9112

***DiskDisappeared ('disk0s2', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9113

***DiskDisappeared ('disk0s1', DAVolumePath = 'file:///Volumes/firmwaresyncd.0kQjdj/', DAVolumeKind = 'msdos', DAVolumeName = 'EFI') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9115

***DiskDisappeared ('disk0', DAVolumePath = '<null>', DAVolumeKind = '<null>', DAVolumeName = '<null>') Time=20190307-19:43:05.9116

Going to Terminal and doing an LS on /Volumes I see Macintosh HD, so I LS it and get "Permission denied".

Any thoughts?

Reply

Answer 6

BDAqua

Level 10

239,435 points

Mar 8, 2019 10:10 AM in response to SchneiderIS4Mac

So, what OS version is on your external boot drive?

If you’re using a Mac that still runs macOS Sierra, or an older OS X release, you can’t access APFS storage drives by default. You can’t read files on a backup disk, or from a thumb drive formatted in APFS in High Sierra.

https://www.cultofmac.com/530025/how-to-access-apfs-volumes-on-older-versions-of-macos/

Reply

Answer 7

Mar 11, 2019 11:53 AM in response to BDAqua

High Sierra is used across the board with this box (former install, USB hard drive external OS, and attempted install).

Over the weekend I ended up pulling the HD out of the MBP and putting it in an external enclosure. The idea was to transfer all the desired content off to a backup drive. Then I would wipe it clean and start from scratch. Well that last part just would not work. The HD worked perfectly in the enclosure, not a single problem). When I put the HD back in the MBP it was hit and total miss. That is taking me to point that there is either something wrong with the controller, or maybe the cable.

Given that the machine has been turned off for so long, I am hoping that the cable was starting to go but the heat of running it kept things alive. Turned off, perhaps something dried out or changed in some way that it now failed. A cable is a cheap part to replace and test. The controller being on the main logic board (as I understand it) would be outside of value to replace. So, testing the cable next (arrives Thursday) with fingers crossed.

Reply

Answer 8

Mar 11, 2019 1:40 PM in response to BDAqua

I just wish I had thought of this before deleting the partitions of the drive. At least it forces some cleanup of the old machine. Had this been a PC I would have relegated it to the recycling bin some years ago. With it being a Mac I find the power and capability to last so much longer.

Will update after the cable has been installed and tested.

Reply

Answer 9

Mar 16, 2019 9:16 AM in response to SchneiderIS4Mac

I spoke to soon, I just decided to try a High Sierra install from the USB stick, must have missed the key stroke prior to boot up because the hard restart actually came up.

Now to try and move to the next OS, High Sierra.

Reply

Answer 10

Mar 17, 2019 8:10 AM in response to BDAqua

Given that the other drive worked perfectly fine for many years, works great now as a external USB3 drive on my 2016 MBP, I can only think that there was a firmware installed on the old MBP that killed compatibility. I can't think of any other reason.

High Sierra totally up and running on the original drive. Now to shuffle some files around and see if it can handle the load performance wise. If performance is a problem I may try to build the SSD again through a more manual (partition in advance from the new MBP and even install as a USB) approach. If that does happen I will update this thread (in the even that others might have use for the results), otherwise this is closed now.

Reply