Machine will not acknowledge 512 GB PCIe NVMe upgrade with 12 -16 pin adapter. However, it works fine when using the same drive externally. It has been formatted as mac os journaled (extended) and partitioned with GUID scheme. Could it be an internal hardware problem? If, so what can I do to diagnose and narrow down the issue? I'm afraid I may be in over my head at this point.
Mac Pro
amen7921 wrote:
@HWTech I do not have the original Apple SSD the machine was purchased without it. The only disk available that I can see is disk0 with volume OS X Base System. Would it have the firmware that you mentioned? And if so, would I be able to somehow upgrade it in Target Disk Mode or another method? I have an iMac 2013 and a Macbook 2017 as well. Thank you.
No, disk0 is the volume containing the macOS installer. Since your Mac Pro doesn't have the necessary system firmware already installed the macOS installer is unable to see the third party SSD (assuming you are booting macOS 10.13+).
Unfortunately the macOS installer has a system firmware updater which requires a properly erased original Apple PCIe SSD to be installed internally. I am not aware of any way around this requirement and you need this system firmware update to be installed in order to use a third party PCIe SSD on this system. I know this from personal first hand experience.
You may be able to purchase an original Apple SSD, but you need to make sure the SSD is made for your exact model computer. While an Apple SSD from a MBPro Retina may physically fit, there is no guarantee macOS will accept it. Apple made several variations of this SSD. Some may work Ok, but others may not (at least with macOS). Again this is from personal experience.
amen7921 wrote:
@HWTech I do not have the original Apple SSD the machine was purchased without it. The only disk available that I can see is disk0 with volume OS X Base System. Would it have the firmware that you mentioned? And if so, would I be able to somehow upgrade it in Target Disk Mode or another method? I have an iMac 2013 and a Macbook 2017 as well. Thank you.
No, disk0 is the volume containing the macOS installer. Since your Mac Pro doesn't have the necessary system firmware already installed the macOS installer is unable to see the third party SSD (assuming you are booting macOS 10.13+).
Unfortunately the macOS installer has a system firmware updater which requires a properly erased original Apple PCIe SSD to be installed internally. I am not aware of any way around this requirement and you need this system firmware update to be installed in order to use a third party PCIe SSD on this system. I know this from personal first hand experience.
You may be able to purchase an original Apple SSD, but you need to make sure the SSD is made for your exact model computer. While an Apple SSD from a MBPro Retina may physically fit, there is no guarantee macOS will accept it. Apple made several variations of this SSD. Some may work Ok, but others may not (at least with macOS). Again this is from personal experience.
In addition to what @Grant says you also must currently be running macOS 10.13+ since the third party SSD requires a driver as well which is only found in macOS 10.13 or later.
If you still have your original Apple SSD, reinstall it in the Mac Pro and upgrade the OS to macOS 10.13+ so that the system firmware is upgraded to a version that can recognize the third party SSD. Once that is done you should be able to see & use the third party SSD from macOS 10.13+.
I highly recommend you keep the original Apple SSD handy as it may still be needed for a future system firmware update or macOS upgrade.
You must have been running 10.13.6 or later BEFORE the upgrade to be able to replace that drive.
If you use another Mac, you can create a bootable USB-stick Installer. Requires a `6GB USB stick. if you name it exactly MyVolume, you can copy and paste the commands form this article. It takes almost half an hour to write the USB stick, so you will need to be patient while it works.
How to create a bootable installer for macOS - Apple Support
The process does not require drive space, it create 25 or more RAM disks to do its work. But to do the firmware update, it needs to write a tiny firmware updater to the Boot drive, then set startup to that drive. You may be able to get that to work with an external drive.
If 'not familiar with the command-line' then name your 16GB USB stick exactly MyVolume. Then open the article and copy and paste the entire command string, with no editing at all.
You may have to install onto an External drive until you get 10.13.6 completely up and running.
Thank you for the information; you have been very helpful.
Thank you once again. I will definitely try this. Although I am not familiar with the command line, it seems straightforward.
@HWTech I do not have the original Apple SSD the machine was purchased without it. The only disk available that I can see is disk0 with volume OS X Base System. Would it have the firmware that you mentioned? And if so, would I be able to somehow upgrade it in Target Disk Mode or another method? I have an iMac 2013 and a Macbook 2017 as well. Thank you.
Mac Pro Late (2013) does not recognize SSD HD Upgrade
