installing big sur mac not starting

Same Issue. I tried everything from restarting the NVRAM or Booting in safe mode but nothing happened. I took it to an authorized apple service centre in Saudi Arabia and they told me that the logic board is broken and i have to pay for the replacement.

I've a local support service Apple Authorised on Friday for my bricked MacBook Pro late 2013 Retina, that worked perfectly before Big Sur.

We charge a diagnostic fee for out-of-warranty repairs. The diagnostic fee is £69 plus VAT but you don't pay it if you go ahead with the repair. Hardware repairs of devices with warranty or AppleCare are free.

Its out of warranty, but I'm not paying this nor any hardware charges for whatever Big Sur did to my laptop.

Got a call with Apple on Friday morning. I need authorisation that Apple will take any charges.

The same happened to me! Apple support refusing to support unless apple acknowledges that whatever happened to my logic board is because of the update.

the apple support guy told me clearly it is a hardware issue not an operating system issue and no software issue can cause any damage to any hardware piece.

i think apple should begin with educating their support specialists first and then they should acknowledge the damage caused by their worst macOS lunch ever.

This happened to my mid-2014 MacBook Pro too—I got stuck on a black screen during the Big Sur update and the machine became totally unresponsive. I couldn't even get into Recovery Mode.

When I called Apple previously they were not helpful at all, and wanted me to get it fixed at my own cost, even though this is clearly an issue of the Big Sur update bricking quite a number of older MacBook Pros. Disappointed in Apple support, as this has taken a lot of hours to diagnose and fix, and they were unwilling to do anything about it.

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The Data volume is separate from the system volume, so unless you erase the disk or have to reformat, your data should be intact. (I won't comment on any lack of backup for a business machine).

If you can get a USB installer or a clone disk with a copy of the Big Sur installer on it, you can boot from that and install again over the existing one, (ie. without any erasing first) and the data volume should stay as is.

in my case, removing the I/O cable did nothing. The screen did not turn on .

I do believe that for some reason, the internal toshiba SSD has died (it is a 2013 macbook Air 11 inch Haswell), at least it's not being recognized anymore by the MAC.

3 options that are possible in my case:

-Either the installation did something related to the toshiba SSD firmware itself.

-Either , by "bad luck" the SSD has died just in the moment of BigSur installation due to having surpassed the TBW (terabytes written). This, altough possible, it's really awkward, since this macbook air even having 7 years, it has been used very few days per month.

-Or, the installation of BigSur changed some other firmware in the motherboard, and the motherboard has lost the possibility to recognize the internal SSD.

Why I know the SSD is not recognized anymore?

Easy:

Turn On the macbook, it sounds the "chime" sound, and I press command +R for 5 seconds. Nothing happens. The screen is still completely black but the screen backlight is ON.

Leave like that for 3 freaking hours or 4, and after those hours, magically the screen will TURN ON!! with the recovery mode waiting for you.

Once you choose to either do a clean install or choose disk util, you will see that the ssd does not appear anymore!!!

If you choose to install MacOS again, it will ask you where to install it without any disk option!!

And, if you go to disk util, its empty as well. No disk.

People that have the same issue and the I/O board did not work for them, please give it a try this 3hour-boot to see if it happens the same thing as me!

Now why couldn't Apple disseminate that wisdom to all these poor folks who have been held over a barrel by 'engineering' solutions? Better, just fix it? Thank you for sharing your solution, t5vag.

Considering Apple invited me to update through Settings, and following my reading their confirmation that my MBP m14 was a suitable candidate, Apple are in no position to extort cash to remedy their problems. Continuing to distribute this update (to me on Dec 1st) is irresponsible and highly disrespectful.

While looking to update our business MBP and iMacs, maybe this (and the previous updates loss of photo data) is the reason to jump back to cheaper, equally powerful, and dare I say reliable and capable hardware'?

Learning-Too wrote:

While looking to update our business MBP and iMacs, maybe this (and the previous updates loss of photo data) is the reason to jump back to cheaper, equally powerful, and dare I say reliable and capable hardware'?

If you can find cheaper, equally powerful hardware that does what you need and are willing to put up with say Windows, feel free to switch, that's what a consumer economy is all about.

Would be great to note as well that the solution path depicted in this support document does not work for everyone.

I suggest you Google for macrumors or reddit discussions to find alternative solution paths if the support document does not solve your issue.

I recently downloded the Mac OS BigSur on my MacBook 2014 mod ( 13 inc ) and now l can not start the Macbook ( screen is black )

Have been trying everything ( also eplehuset in Norway knows that many is having same problem as me ) and the only help was to change hardware ) almost 7000 NOK almost 950$ or whait until Apple takes responsibility for this ( can take very long time.....)

Apple please fix this is obviously related to Big Sur.

Were you able to get your Mac fixed and did they charge you for the repair? My 2019 MBP died following the install of Big Sur when it went to restart. Was told it was the logic board. Hoping that Apple will take responsibility for this issue.

My MacBook Pro has been stuck for four hours with the message “Less than one minute remaining” on screen.

Same here! Help!

Thank you so much! This worked for me as well. I am excited to check out the updates! Enjoy!