Daughters ssd failed in 11” 2013 MacBook Air, would not boot at all, when ssd is removed I can boot to recovery. Do not really want the expense of new internal ssd but cannot install os to external drive because system is saying firmware portion in not there, I assume this has to be present on internal ssd?
any ways around this problem....
have booted from my MacBook Pro backup on external drive but Wi-fi will not work.
Did you try booting to Internet Recovery Mode using Command + Option + R with the SSD installed? Using just the standard Recovery Mode keys Command + R will try to boot from the SSD's recovery partition first and perhaps it just sees enough to keep it from booting.
IIRC some MBAir SSDs were known to fail in this model so the SSD really could be bad.
You may want to run the Apple Diagnostic to see if it reports any failure. Just because the diagnostic passes does not mean the drive is necessarily good.
when the internal ssd is taken out I can boot, which makes the ssd most likely suspect.
Most likely the SSD is the issue. There is always a slim possibility the Logic Board's SATA port/controller has an issue. Your WiFi issue may indicate other issues though. Figure out the WiFi first.
wanted to try and boot from external drive, have actually done this with a backup drive from my 2012 MacBook Pro running high Sierra. Boots fine but there is no Wi-fi.
connected a correctly formatted external drive, booted to recovery.
spinning globe and asking to select network, click the drop down and select my network, enter password, starts to connect.
when ready to install OS asks me to connect to network but no networks showing?
It appears you may have a WiFi issue or possibly a loose antenna cable on the WiFi card since it happens booted to two different OS. Can you option click on the WiFi icon in the menu bar. The Signal should typically be somewhere in the -40 to -55 db range. The Noise is usually around -85 to -90db.
The last photo looks like you are booting into either Lion or Mountain Lion. I see the lion icon in your screenshot. Is your external drive just a freshly erased drive with nothing on it? Did you ever install OSX 10.12.4+ on this laptop? If so, try booting into Internet Recovery Mode using Command + Option + R which should in theory boot you into a Mojave installer. FYI, we recently encountered a 2013 MBAir which for some unknown reason would only boot into Yosemite IIRC regardless of the keys used for Internet Recovery Mode.
Maybe you should get a Thunderbolt to Ethernet adapter to connect the MBAir directly to your router/modem for your test. If the WiFi issue is not a loose antenna cable, then you may have other issues with this laptop.
Run the Apple Diagnostic. Note that a passing diagnostic does not mean there isn't a problem. It just didn't detect any issues at the time.
Thanks for your reply,
with the internal ssd connected I can only get a black screen boot, no matter what key presses I try.
when the internal ssd is taken out I can boot, which makes the ssd most likely suspect. Internal ssd very expensive to replace.
wanted to try and boot from external drive, have actually done this with a backup drive from my 2012 MacBook Pro running high Sierra. Boots fine but there is no Wi-fi.
so back to getting this air running again, connected a correctly formatted external drive, booted to recovery.
spinning globe and asking to select network, click the drop down and select my network, enter password, starts to connect.
when ready to install OS asks me to connect to network but no networks showing? So cannot install to anything.
(see photos)
now, if I splash out on a new or second hand internal ssd, will I have the same problem?
$128.75 https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ssd/owc/macbook-air/2013-2014-2015
in UK best price is £150 for second hand ssd, who knows how long that would last?, the original apple ssd lasted 6 years.
I’ll look into getting a thunderbolt to Ethernet adapter, gives me another option in situations like this.
i’m pretty Certain that the Wi-fi is ok, always discovers on the first stage of recovery, I think it’s a software issue because it always fails to discover when it’s ready to install os, for some reason I think the drivers are no longer available at that point.
was wondering if there was any commands using terminal that could reactivate the Wi-fi at that stage?, if I remember correctly the terminal is available when recovery mode gets to that point where I am losing Wi-fi.
again when I had the MBair running on my Pro backup, the machine seems to operate just fine but no Wi-fi, which I can see why that would make you suspect Wi-fi probs but I don’t think so, I think I would have more erratic results from the Wi-fi.
its frustrating knowing that the system all seems ok in the way that I’ve managed to get it to run but Apple probably inadvertently have made it almost impossible to get the machine up and running again unless I buy an expensive comparatively short life internal ssd.
i’m thinking there may be some kind of security systems in place as in high Sierra and above where there must be an internal hdd, that’s why I was hoping to boot or install to an earlier os so that an external drive would maybe be acceptable to the system to run.
ssd Failure in MacBook Air
