MacBook Pro bricked after failed Big Sur update 😵 ⚰️

Best of luck to you, Riizzo! There's a whole group of people who also unfortunately got their machine bricked by this and are fighting the same fight, so you are not alone in this. My advice is to just remember that this is Apples fault, even though they might say stuff like "an update cant break hardware" or "the machine is too old". They are gonna test your patience and you might start to doubt yourself, but just breathe and continue to ask for escalation if you feel the case is not moving in the right direction. A win for you, even if its small, is a win for us all! You got this, we all do!

Hi RiizzoUK,

I've followed all the steps in:

If you can’t install macOS Big Sur on certain 13-inch MacBook Pro computers from 2013 and 2014

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211242

I've visited the Apple Store twice.

I've contacted Apple Support via chat 2-3 times.

I've contacted Apple "Tier 2" Support by phone 3 times (the Apple Store recommended I contact Apple "Tier 2" support).

I've sent a hard copy letter to Apple outlining what happened, Apple's response to date and asking Apple to own this problem.

I've provided Apple with links to articles such as:

macOS Big Sur bricks older MacBook Pro models

https://www.macworld.co.uk/news/macos-big-sur-bricks-older-macbook-pro-models-3798046/?pn

One month has passed and I've purchased a Windows based laptop while I (hopefully) wait for Apple to resolve.

I am bewildered by Apple's response.

Hi everyone, and thank you for your support during the past month, I have read all your comments, even the deleted ones. I really hope mine does not get censored.

For the TL:DR guys, I fixed my Bricked book and it runs under Big Sur WITHOUT hardware change.

For everyone else, read along.

My expierence

I have a MacBook Pro 13 (mid 2014)

What I did

I did the update from Catalina to Big Sur on 13. Nov and left it running over night, it had a black screen with backlight on the next day, went hiking and left it running for 24h+ since I read it can take a while, but nothing changed.

Did everything, SMC reset, nvram pram reset, tried to start into recovery mode, did all the possible startup key combinations, but the screen kept showing black. I even drained the battery and left it on for several days.

Talking to Apple Support

After a chat with Apple Support (which instructed to do the resets I already did, but was very friendly and tried to help) I was asked to get an appointment at the local apple store's Genius Bar, where I couldn't get an appointment because of, well the situation we all experience.

Today the macOS 11.1 came and it asked me if I want to update, I first flinched but then click install

It took some time, it showed the apple a lot of times and then finally finished installing

I restarted, it did the 2xchime again, I checked the installed EFI version (2012022042) bootrom version (429.0.0.0.0) and SMC version (2.16f68), everything look good so I tried...

I clicked shutdown

I pressed the power button

It started with one chime

Everyone here, I can tell you from my experience, that the IO Board is not necessarily broken, it looks to me like a bug in the startup routine of macOS.

For legal reasons I do not recommend opening the Mac yourself, better have this done certified authorized engineer.

[Edited by Moderator]

Great your back up and running and have some helpful detail in your post.

The update process is certainly different to in the past, I don’t recall so many restarts and the likes but my 2014 MacBook Pro continued the installation in the end with another installing first time.

Forking out large repair costs or buying new devices isn’t really ideal during these odd times.

regenad wrote:

I SO THANK YOU for ALL this INFORMATION!

AS I had SO many problems after the installation of CATALINA {it STILL continues]!

I DO hope they don't suspend you~as Apple did me, when I wrote that I had such PROBLEMS w/that installation!

MOJAVE worked PERFECTLY for me! Plus, I had just had my device--a "vintage MAC PRO" repaired!

SO I AM SO GRATEFUL I CHECKED BEFORE INSTALLING BIG SUR-. due to my horrid experience with

CATALINA~

IF YOU SHOULD EVEN "see this" as Apple may totally remove my access to the Community!

Wishing you & your FAMILY-HEALTH & SAFETY during this TWILIGHT ZONE TIMES we are living in!

PEACE~regenad+

I am not surprised that they said they were going to remove your access to the Community. You should probably read the forums terms of use.

I shared this on one of the first few pages, but Big Sur 11.0.1 bricked my 13" 2014 MacBook Pro. After a ton of troubleshooting with Apple support (the basics, just for data collection) I had to take it in for repair to get it working in again with a logic board replacement.

It came back with Catalina working again with the only outstanding issue being it took literally 30 seconds before it tried to boot or played the startup chime. Annoying, but Apple wouldn't do anything about that. By then Apple had pulled 11.0.1 for these machines. That was fine, it's an admission there was a problem needing to be fixed.

Against my better judgement, I tried the 11.1 installer. I was hoping for something official statement somewhere about the issues being fixed. I felt it was a big risk to try it without it but also decided Apple would be pretty stupid to offer it to these machines if they hadn't have found a solution.

Fortunately, I didn't have a problem. Install took a fair bit longer than usual and rebooted more times than usual and had a disconcerting white flash of the screen at one point. But it did eventually complete successfully and is currently running without issue. I haven't tried restarting it yet to see if the 30 second delay on boot has been fixed.

Hope that gives enough courage to some other enterprising people to give it a shot and share their experience.

This issue seems resolved with the 11.1 update released. My MBP 13" early 2015 was bricked with the final release of Big Sur after having been a part of the developer beta all summer long without issue. After trying everything I retired my dead MBP13 until this evening I figured why not try Internet Recovery with 11.1 and see what happens? Well it worked. I didn't have to bring the MBP into Apple or anything. Everything is now working great.

I powered it up holding down the cmd-R key combo, made sure it was joined to my wifi network (upper right corner) then proceeded to do the normal install of Big Sur. It took awhile but it worked. Previously I had tried resetting PRAM, SMC, booting off an installer on a USB drive...internet recovery...everything. But this worked. So 11.1 has the fix to re-apply the correct firmware before install.

After almost 3 weeks I got my MacBook Pro mid-2015 15” retina with the integrated graphics card. Previous to the issue After updating from Catalina to big Sur 11.0.1 the screen stopped working.

apple wanted 831$

some third party said it was the logic board $$$$

Ubreakifix charged me 349$ and they repaired it. Took a while. But it’s back. They said it was the gpu power ic that needed re-soldering.

they had to wipe my drive and I was fine with that. Not giving passwords out..

so in the end UbreakIfix fixed it.

now it’s at Catalina.... 11.1 came out today.... very gun shy of updating this to big Sur....

probably will at least I’ll be in the 30 day repair window.

👍🏼Big Sur 11.1 fixed my issue. I am able to both Restart and Shutdown/Start with my Apple 27" Thunderbolt display connected.

My original issue: I could not start my MBP with the Apple 27" Thunderbolt display connected. I had to disconnect it, start, then reconnect it. I did not have any other issues. I did not attempt to downgrade after reading everyone's experiences. I did not attempt to make any hardware changes on my own. I lived with this one issue with the hopes that a fix would become available.

Model: MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013)

Processor: 2.6 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7

Memory: 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3

Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2 GB

-Phil

That's awesome! Thank you to everyone who's reporting back saying that Big Sur has been fixed with the 11.1 update. Most people usually don't comment when things are resolved - which inadvertently leaves the rest of the community wondering. So I'm posting a genuine thank you to everyone who's reported back with positive results!

Hello!

To those who have T2 chip machines (if not sure check: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208862) unable to upgrade to Big Sur, I advise you to contact support and ask to schedule a technical appointment in store or authorized tech workshop to solve the issue and ask specifically to restore T2 firmware via Apple Configurator 2 (as I understood, a tech app only available to authorized technicians). Apparently on updating process a “conflict” may arise with T2 chip firmware that prevents the update process to complete. This might save you a lot of time and worries (in my case it took 30 days to find the origin of the problem and it’s solution with a lot of try and error going on between Apple engineering and tech repair). I wasn’t charged any fees for this “repair” which I must say meets my expectations and keeps in track with my previous good experiences with Apple’s support, which has been keeping me as a faithful customer. I guess it’s Apple’s silent but efficient way of acknowledge their responsibility on this issue.

I’m also pleased to see the new version of BigSur is apparently allowing older machines (2013/14) to successfully update as posted by ame1nc

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208862

I suggest to people who got “bricked” to insist with support to reset firmware before going for hardware substitution, which in some cases may prove unreasonable considering the repair price and machine value, as I also suspect these issues might be a bug on the original update packages.

I wanted to give you a quite exciting update on my story, last updated here: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/252034110?answerId=252034110021#252034110021

I've had a case open with senior Apple support. They've been REALLY good, scheduling callbacks, calling me to update me on progress, hand-holding me through the process.

They were trying to get my logic board replaced on my now-bricked late-2013 Retina MacBook Pro. At no cost. They wanted to do this replacement for me.

But my two local Apple-approved service centres both said that they couldn't source the parts so they couldn't do the repair.

So the support guy said he wasn't going to make me travel far, so instead he was going to give me a like-for-like replacement. Not as in a 2013-MacBook for a 2013-MacBook, but the 2020 equivalent MacBook!!!

I kid you not. Here's a screen grab of the replacement message:

The courier are coming today to pick up the old one, and once it's been checked over they are going to ship me a new MacBook.

So, if you can get to the right person, be patient, go through all the diagnostic steps, remain calm and polite and do what Apple tell you, it seems that Apple ARE repairing or replacing old MacBooks that have been bricked by this update.

Hello!

I’m truly happy it turned out great for you! I guess you got lucky to have a proper assistant to your case, who had the authority and sensitivity to offer the kind of support we all expect from dear Apple.

let’s hope others customers affected by these issues also get a similar treatment, specially those outside the US! Because until recently some were being charged quite expensively for repairs...at least if a fix is possible, they should do it for free (my experience). If not, like your case, give customer a functional substitute machine (didn’t need to be the new M1, lucky you ;)

Hey

My MBP13 LATE 2013 IS NOW WORKING

Back story - big sur bricked it, apple support, genius bar, £500 to repair, no thanks - same as many others

First of all the term 'Bricked' is not descriptive enough, I think we need some more definitions

For example

Bricked Type 1 - on start up shows an off black(grey) screen, physical apple logo is lit on case so has power but nothing else happens, can not access recovery mode (cmd+r) or boot from a usb (alt)

Bricked Type 2 - on start up apple logo shows but does not boot in to OS

Bricked Type 2a - as above + you cannot access recovery tools

Bricked Type 2b - as type 2 + you can access recovery tools (arguably not bricked at all)

I had Type 1, but after leaving it a week it powered o and continued the big sur update but would Type 1 brick on restart but would start working again after 4-5 days.

So Type 1a is Type 1 were it will boot every so often but will Type 1 on any restart or shutdown and boot

Over the course of a couple of weeks i was able to finish the bug sur update but it would Type 1 every shutdown and reboot. The usbs and wireless card were still working which is a different symptom to others

I was then able to upgrade to 11.1 which stopped the Type 1 on restart but not on shutdown and reboot (had to wait a few days each time) I eventually managed to reinstall Catalina which fixed my machine

Yes i'm lucky. but if anyone else can boot (by whatever method necessary) you may be able to follow the same path as me.

Would be great if people defined their version of 'bricked' when giving solutions