Catalina installation damaged EFI firmware on MBP mid 2012

The other Catalina killed my mac thread also has this video as an option to restore without replacing the motherboard. Good luck all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywvDgn7JR_c

All the people having this issue should be report it in a single post, a single thread (and also in the official Apple Feedback Site). There's a lot of threads already about the same, so the complain vanishes among so many threads. Making one big would be a first good step.

There are also communities like Reddit where you might make more noise. The Apple Repair Programs normally just start when there's a lot of noise in the media about the same problem, and this is by now an issue that requieres a Repair Program. Trying to reach big YouTubers might also be a solution. I don't know. But here you won't make it, this is an Apple's users forum.

This is not a poll or petition, it's an opinion that doesn't break any rule.

I just found that you can find a new EFI chip on eBay for around 12$, I just order one and i'll try to solder it on my board... There is also some sort of solderfree chips ça you can plug directly on the board without unsolder your old one. If the came from a corrupted EFI, it should work...

https://www.ifun.de/apple-hinweis-zu-startproblemen-nach-der-catalina-installation-144439/

Scroll a litte bit down to "weisser Bildschirm" (that is my problem)

https://macandegg.de/2019/10/startet-nicht-mehr-macos-catalina-kann-euren-mac-bricken/

And, if you're interested, see my Thread at:

https://www.macuser.de/threads/imac-late-2013-seit-10-15-im-koma.833179/

a few guys there flashed the EFI again

Fred

Hello, everyone. I have not installed Catalina, yet. So I don't have this issue. I'm a Japanese, in Jananese Apple User Forum, many people have this EFI problem right after Catalina install.

I hope Apple pay for fixing. Scary to install Catalina. Beta test of Catalina was not enough.

I attempted to update my Mac Mini (Late 2012) with Catalina and received EFI firmware error. I called apple support, and we attempted various reinstall methods. After a few failed attempts, we scheduled a Genius Bar appointment. A couple of things. The hard drive was replaced June of 2019. This device basically is seldom used. Fast forward,  dropped off my mini, explained the problem, provided screenshots. Twenty-four hours later, I received a call from an Apple representative, who explained to me the hard drive was bad and they could replace it for another $200, oh, and the 2019 replacement drive should have been an SSD drive, you know, no moving parts. With that being said, I vented my frustration and shared that I would be picking up my device. So I travel to BestBuy, purchase and have installed a SSD drive, installed original OS, no problem. Upgraded to Catalina and you guessed it, EFI error again. So of course my frustration level is high, but on top of that, I also tested the June 2019 SATA drive and it WORKS! So, I purchased a 2.5" USB3.0 hard drive enclosure and am using the SATA drive as a portable travel drive. To say the least I am EXTREMELY disappointed in Apple. They should own up to this problem and provide a FIX. DISAPPOINTED AND DISGUSTED IN DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA.

I wrote about possible ways to fix MacBook bricked by Catalina, including forcing Apple to do it for free (I succeeded but I pressed really strong), having it done at unofficial shop or doing it yourself. See here: https://www.ifixit.com/Answers/View/612997/Catalina+Bricked+my+Mac.+Now+What

I have a MacBook Air 2012 with MacOS High Sierra. After installing Catalina, my Mac would sometimes boot up but hangs whenever I try to use it. Most of the time, it would just show the infamous folder with a question mark when I try to boot my Mac. I know Catalina has been installed on my internal SSD as I’ve managed to boot it and can see my files, so I was reluctant to reformat my internal SSD. After days of research and trials, I’ve managed to solve the issue. This is what I did:

I prepared two external USB storages:

• Storage 1: Thumb drive 16GB or larger
• Storage 2: External storage HDD/SSD/Thumb drive with greater than 30GB

Step 1:

I made Storage 1 into a bootable Catalina installation drive. I did it myself as I have another Mac. You can either do it yourself on another Mac or Windows machine, OR get a friend to make one for you. There are many sites that can guide you through this process. This is one of them:

https://www.macworld.com/article/3442597/how-to-create-a-bootable-macos-catalina-installer-drive.html

Step 2:

Inserted both Storage 1 & 2 into my problematic Mac. Hold down OPTION and power up my Mac. I chose to boot from my Storage 1 (Installation disk).

Step 3:

Once the Catalina installation has loaded, I ran the Disk Utility. Formatted Storage 2 to APFS using GUID Partition Map scheme. APFS did not appear as an option, so I formatted to Mac OS Extended first, then reformatted to APFS.

Step 4:

I installed Catalina on Storage 2. Followed setup instructions and continued until my Mac booted from Storage 2. Once my Mac has booted with Catalina on Storage 2, I shutdown my Mac.

Step 5:

I reset the SMC. I made sure I’ve connected my Mac with power adapter. I held SHIFT+CTRL+OPTION and the power button for 10 seconds, then release everything together. At this point expect to see the MagSafe charging LED to change colour to indicate that the SMC reset has been completed.

I reset PRAM by pressing the power button then immediately held CMD+OPTION+P+R until I heard the startup sound twice. I released all keys and let my Mac boot.

And my Mac booted directly from my internal SSD! It seems that by reinstalling Catalina on an external USB drive it had also reinstalled my EFI firmware. I believe the previous EFI firmware was causing my Mac not to recognise the internal SSD. As for the question why the new EFI firmware wasn’t installed when I first upgraded to Catalina, well that remains unanswered.

Resetting the SMC was necessary to flush out the previous EFI settings. The PRAM reset was probably unnecessary but I did it anyway! 😊

Give it a try. This problem kept me awake for a few nights as the Mac actually belongs to my wife!  Now you know why I was reluctant to format the internal SSD. I do hope this post will help someone. Good luck!

This is primarily a user-to-user support site in which Apple's participation is very limited. To contact Apple, click the Contact Apple link on their home page.

If those questions are for your fellow users, I doubt anyone will be able to provide a constructive answer, but it seems you were given sort of a runaround at first. No it's not normal, but fixing a seven year old MBP fixed for only $100 seems like a satisfactory outcome.

Excellent post, Jaygrow. You are spot-on in your recommendations. We also know this feedback link also works from changes made to other Apple software products:

Feedback - macOS - Apple

For the others: The people at Apple who work on this stuff will NOT see complaints posted here. Use the link or phone support.

Careful, as far as i know, the new chip would need to be programmed accordingly in order to function correctly. That process is not one I am familiar with, but figured I would give you a heads up about it. The solderless chip might be a safer bet.

I found this on dedicated German Mac magazine website. At least this problem starts to get traction and wider publicity - https://www.macwelt.de/news/Neue-EFI-als-Ursache-Defekte-Macs-nach-Update-auf-macOS-Catalina-10684104.html (you can use G translate to get the sense but it is exactly what the issue with Catalina is). Hope this will eventually be noticed and addressed by Apple.

I wrote several magazines, like heise.de or Golem.de, but they said that the story was still too thin because the number of people affected was still too small to justify an article about it.

Maybe it brings something if you, from the English-speaking area, announce yourselves there! Write to Thomas Kaltschmidt, thk@heise.de, and Oliver Nickel, on@golem.de, maybe we'll make a difference!

I wrote to Tim and Craig, but I don't know if the address was o.k., at least she didn't return it as undeliverable, I also described my problem to the customer service and gave my contact details, I don't know what else I could do.

By the way, my Mac will be ready by Friday and costs about 670€ for the logicboard.

Apple, stand by your mistakes!

I wrote to 9to5Mac.com yesterday and just got an email about the suggested topic/article.

As I said in a previous post: please also write to the heise.de and golem.de addresses I provided.

Maybe we are not completely alone.

https://9to5mac.com/2019/10/24/efi-firmware/