MacBook Pro bricked after failed Big Sur update 😵 ⚰️

I shared it many days ago but I will not take the risk to be permanently banned from apple discussions. Therefore I will not give the advice to open your mac as other users did. Go to the Apple store and let the genuises fix the problem by replacing the I/O board. With a new I/O board your mac will pass the seftest and the installation will finish.

Maybe the board is not broken but the system do not recognize it or it seems to be broken. I think Apple will fix it by excluding the board during the selftest and reconnect it before the installation goes on as you can see when the apple lights on and the progress bat starts moving. But this is up to the apple engineers. They maybe will provide a repair routine for the genuises to do this job. So stay calm, let them do their job and keeps hands off your mac.

Get the IO board changed (and not the whole motherboard). This is where the problem lies. I had it changed a couple of days ago and My MacBook Pro 13” Mid 2014 (A1502) is now shining again with Big Sur (which, for me, runs better than Catalina).

So here's where I am with my black-screening late-2013 MacBook Pro.

First support call ended with me being told to take it into Apple Service place. There's not an Apple Store near me but there is an authorised dealer/servicer nearby.

They ran what little diagnostics they could and couldn't get it restored.

Next call to Apple got me to a senior engineer who ran through all the startup keyboard combinations and ended with him escalating to some centralised engineering team. I asked what that meant and he said they collect information about failures together and analyse the information to investigate issues.

He ran through a load of questions about what the screen was showing, was the keyboard backlight on, what was plugged in when I ran the update, was there a power or networking outage while running the udpate, stuff like that.

He asked me to send a video of the laptop starting up too.

Sounds like they have put together a set of questions to ask when they encounter this problem and they are collating information about it. So I encourage you to try to get Apple Support to record your failure and pass it up to engineering too. The more failure reports they get the more likely they will be able to figure out what went wrong.

The guy's tone definitely changed when I told him I had an SD Card inserted when running the update. So I reckon they know about this. But are just getting enough evidence.

I had my Macbook Air 13" 2014 fried after Big Sur. It kept hanging and freezing, so I performed a clean install of Catalina, I could not even finish the installation. I figured it would be an issue with the installer, so I tried installing High Sierra, nothing. the computer now kept freezing during install.

I took it to a very talented independent repair shop and they told me the SMC was corrupted. So they had to perform and SMC reflashing to be able to even install back Big Sur. I am considering updating another older machine to Big Sur. but I fear this will happen again. maybe Apple fixed this, I tried to install 11.0 and now we are up to 11.0.1.

I have successfully upgraded my MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014) to MacOS Big Sur after 39 days (~5-6 weeks). My MacBook is now running Big Sur 11.1.

Apple replaced the Logic board and right I/O board free of charge after many interactions. This included three Apple Store Genius Bar visits, several support live chats & telephone calls (some escalated to senior advisors) and after I sent a hard copy letter to Apple setting out the situation.

Apple noted the lithium ion battery had swollen and recommended that it be replaced. I agreed to replace the battery at my cost while the boards were replaced.

I am glad that my MacBook Pro is now running again. It has been bizarre to go through this experience with Apple but I am thankful that Apple did eventually own and rectify the problem.

Well, I didn't want to mention it until it actually arrived, but Apple replaced my bricked 2013 MacBook Pro with a 2020 M1 Macbook Pro at no cost. They were going to do an I/O board replacement for free but they couldn't find a local service centre that could source the parts, so they did a replacement. Pretty good result!

Seems like if you get to senior support and they track down the right issue they will take this seriously and fix it for you. Be polite, and patient, but firm. Apple are fixing these broken Macs!

Make an appointment with the Genius Bar insist on speaking to a senior engineer or getting the number for an engineer. I doubt your logic board is broken but if it is they will repair for free or you should insist.

Thanks for everyone replying on this community thread.

My Macbook Pro was seen by the local Genius store and they recommended a logic board replacement at $500 my cost.

I filled out an online form to the San Jose Better Business Bureau and Apple corporate just replied with a form letter advising it was out of warranty.

I contacted Apple support and asked for a senior support person. They found the documents related to this issue and we are working through a solution. I will update this once resolved.

This was most definitely a software design problem. The update does not check to see if there is enough room on your MAC to install the new OS along side the old version and then chokes into a stalled "no where to go - bricked" status. It is complicated to unravel this situation. Many average users will need to wipe and loose data. I used a repair shop and it cost $260. I researched the problem on several blogs and found many others have had this exact problem. This was my work computer. My Apple store was closed for an indeterminate time due to the pandemic. Apple Support was in denial mode.

I strongly suggest that one should check specifically that you have enough head room on your MAC and have a recent backup.

Do not blithely hit the promoted "install now tab".

Hey Senior Tech: I can confirm the issue IS related to an update. That is an imperial fact.

Denial is not a great long term business model.

Has anyone that has issue tried to let the battery go flat? I’m tracking all the Catalina upgrade issues here

https://mrmacintosh.com/macos-big-sur-11-list-of-serious-install-upgrade-issues-updated/

Try to call the Apple Support try to escalate to superior level and ask for an appointment to Genius Bar.

Where are u located?

Apple configurator.

May need to setup a Genius Bar appointment.

nuoptik wrote:

Hi Guys and Gals.

I saw that there was an update to Big Sur today so clicked update. It all downloaded fine and I clicked all the items to go ahead. It said it'd be a while so i stepped away from the computer. When i returned the screen was black - no status bar, no nothing, but I could tell the LED was on. Nothing would wake it up so I eventually held the power button to force a shutdown.

Sounds like you shut down will the install was still in progress...

How to reinstall macOS from macOS Recovery - https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204904

Restore from back up

Maybe leave it off the charger for a day or a while and try again

SMC resets with internet recovery is what helped me.

when it goes to the black screen force shut down by holding lower button down fir 10 seconds then do an SMC reset. If that doesn’t work shut down and try again

sometimes it takes 3 times. When it restarts the install will continue.

i had to format the drive and reinstall the OS. I had 2 backups so it was ok to do that.

Reinstalling Catalina is not necessary most likely. Only internet recovery worked for me Command R didn’t work. Just keep resetting SMC until install continues again. After resetting SMC and powering it back on the install will continue. At least it did for me. Hopefully it will for you too.

I tried to reinstall the previous version and it made it so it didn’t recognize my FileVault password anymore. I don’t know if it’s because I clicked the checkmark to save it to the keychain when it asked me to enter the password but after I reinstalled Catalina successfully and tried to install Big Sur again it wouldn’t accept my password anymore so I had wipe the drive and restore from a backup. It couldn’t mount the data volume and in order to mount that I had to enter my password which it refused to accept.

It wasn’t easy as it kept booting to a black screen but with many SMC resets it finally finished the install