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Level 1

8 points

Unable to install Catalina

I'm using a mid-2012 MacBook Pro 15". Catalina won't install because I don't have the APFS file system, but the option to change over to it is grayed out. I tried booting to the online recovery program, and it doesn't have the option to install APFS either. I even downloaded a new version of Mojave and attempted to install it from an external drive, and the APFS option was grayed out there too. Apple support told me that my firmware is optimized for a HDD, so since I have a SSD it won't install. I'm considering hooking up a HDD and loading my last Time Machine backup, then seeing if I can upgrade to Catalina, do another Time Machine backup, then load that onto the SSD.

Posted on Oct 12, 2019 5:21 PM

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1 reply

HWTech

Level 9

55,586 points

Oct 12, 2019 6:34 PM in response to HazelMotes

Make sure to have good verified working backups before proceeding any further just in case you can no longer boot this computer using the internal drive or access your data.

Boot into Internet Recovery Mode using Command + Option + R (or to a macOS USB installer) to see if you can use Disk Utility to convert the file system to APFS on the fly without data loss. See these instructions:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250713725?answerId=251390345022#251390345022

If you cannot convert the file system to APFS, then boot into Internet Recovery Mode again or boot a Catalina USB installer. Launch Disk Utility and click "View" and select "Show All Devices". In the left pane of Disk Utility select the physical drive and erase it with GUID partition and APFS (the first option). After erasing the physical drive, quit Disk Utility and select "Reinstall macOS".

Unable to install Catalina