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10.15 Catalina....bricked my Mid 2014 13" Macbook Pro? Blinking file icon

On 10/07/2019 I saw the update for 10.15 pop up in system preferences, and downloaded and attempted to install it. I clicked install once it downloaded and then walked away. Like I normally do.


When I return to my Mac, it is sitting there with the blinking file icon. here


WHAT I HAVE TRIED:

reset SMC

reset PRAM

Disconnected battery, held power button for 5 seconds (same as SMC reset I think)

(⌘)-R

(⌘)-R-option

(⌘)-R-option-shift

Removed SSD and tried to boot into internet recovery without it (done on the same machine in the past)


I also tried any and all other key combos I could find, but it seems it just does not want to boot into anything at all. I have a 10.14.5 bootable disk and time machine back ups, but cannot seem to get the machine to a point where I can use them.


The computer was perfectly fine before I pressed install, never had any issues with this machine. Any ideas? To me it seems the Catalina upgrade corrupted the firmware on my logic board. Did the Catalina update brick my logic board?


I also had a call with Apple phone support. They were not able to help me. They suggested it was hardware related and had nothing to do with the software. I disagree. Another user seems to have the exact same issue, linked below on apples website. If you have this issue it is not a hardware failure coincidentally at the time of the Catalina install! There are others with this issue. It is the 10.15 software that has caused this problem!

 link

Posted on Oct 9, 2019 5:23 AM

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109 replies

Apr 7, 2020 1:15 PM in response to SenorRobot

Well some how mine is part working after not touching it for 2 months.

I’ve gone from the flashing icon to it booted and I managed to get boot camp booting and windows installed and working.


It works and then I reboot and it’s not working, a few boots later it’s working.

Now I am resorting a 10.14 image from last year to see if that cures the booting for good.


I know it looks like a hardware issue but I never ever saw even a crash or freeze in the past, all my issues started with the Catalina update 🤷🏻‍♂️

Apr 9, 2020 12:46 PM in response to JamminJP

Just to follow on!


Well I don't know how but mine is working again on 10.14.6!!


How strange as the only option Apple gave me was new logic board or install the os to an external drive!


Well I turned it on a few days ago and it booted up, I did the Catalina update and it was appearing to be broken again 🙁

I tried the recovery a few times to no avail, the drive did not show up again.


But I noticed every now and again it would find the drive and boot, well again I did a restore from April 19 from my TM backup and all was OK till I restarted and again the drive vanished, I mean it ran for a good 10hrs restoring with no issue?


Again I was restarting, trying the recovery and every now and again it would boot and run fine as it saw the hard drive.

Well I managed to get 10.14.6 installed and ran for 24hrs without turning off and again no issues, I checked the drives and hardware and no issues were showing??


I started looking at uefi and efi but came up with nothing, what I did do though was to create a spare 10gb partition and now it seems to be back to normal, maybe adjusting the boot drive/container helped?


I have turned off and re-started several times and it seems fine again, all I can say is what the ****!!


I don't think I will risk Catalina!!?


10.15 Catalina....bricked my Mid 2014 13" Macbook Pro? Blinking file icon

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