MacBook Pro bricked after failed Big Sur update 😵 ⚰️

Heres my situation and the steps Ive taken so far. I'll try to make this as short as possible.

I live in Norway, where Apple does not have any Apple stores og Genius bars. We do have an independent company called "Eplehuset" (direct translates Applehouse) which is an Apple Autorized Service Provider. So in november when the update left my machine unresponsive, and I didnt know as much about these issues as I do now, I handed in my machine there for a technician to take a look, at a cost of 600 NOK (69 usd) which I agreed to. They figured out that my i/o board was defect and they needed to replace that for my machine to be working again. The total price for this repair/replacement would be 2500 NOK (300 usd).

I did not agree to this, so I contacted AppleCare and got absolutely NO HELP when speaking to two norwegian advisors, they hadnt even heard of these issues. I found the tip to get in touch with the international AppleCare by staying on the US page on the getapplesupport website and scheduled a call from AppleCare via the chat (Cora).

A guy named Chris called me from Ireland a couple of days later, but since I didnt have my machine at hand he couldnt help me. He had to go through some steps with me that had to get logged before I could talk to a senior advisor. He also repeatedly said that there was no way an software update could cause hardware to defect and break, so my "old" machine had to have some underlying issues. Og boy.. if I hadnt studied all your situations and prepared for the call, I would have started to doubt my case and probably give up. I asked to schedule another call a couple of days later.

So in order to escalate my case at Apple I needed to get my machine from "Eplehuset", even if that ment me paying the 600 NOK for them to troubleshoot my machine. But I could not get my machine, if I needed to hand it back in for repair later (which I have to in the end even if Apple covers the cost or not). But I got the technician to log the information from the troubleshoot in the Apple system, so that when I had my 4th Apple support call they would hopefully see this information via a confirmation ID. That call was supposed to be today but somehow the Apple system ****** up my phonenumber by doubling the norwegian country code so I just receive an email that they had tried to come in contact with me. And also it seems Im back in the norwegian apple support system since the email i received was in norwegian instead of english as the previous one. I havent found a way for me to change my phonenumber and reschedule the call on my case, so now Ive lost my thread and connection to apple support.

Like treaders say, I am bewildered by Apple and their hopeless system

Please share the steps you've gone through with Apple, it is so helpful to read all the experiences and gives me strength to continue this fight.

I would point the Apple support to this thread and escalate the repair to the Apple senior technical team. They have fixed many MacBook Pro’s it’s a problem caused by the upgrade not your machine. It was working with out any problems beforehand!

This is the "official" list I found:

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT211238

The exact same thing happened to me. After troubleshooting with support (after I had done all of those steps) their solution was to take it in to a store or mail it in.

I'm not sure what they would necessarily do to it even if I went that route but if it is something on a software level, I would like to try it.

Very frustrating.

My upgrade attempt resulted in the flashing folder with a question mark. Disk Utility cannot even see any storage other than the ~2GB recovery partition. Apple Customer Support ended up telling me to bring it in and it's really hard to find appointment availability near me.

Same thing happened to me. 2014 13" MacBook Pro. I was on Catalina 10.15.7 (didn't have the supplemental update installed yet), started the Big Sur install, it shut down properly to start the install, I stepped away for a minute and came back to a blank black screen. I figured it must have been doing something so I left it for several hours. Came back and it was still in the same state.

Chatted and talked to Apple support. Tried SMC reset, PRAM, Safe Mode, Recovery, Diagnostics. Nothing worked. Tried to connect it to an external display. The display flashed and acted like it was negotiating the HDMI connection but then didn't get a signal. So it's alive on some level.

Took it into a repair shop. Had to check it in. Sounds like they're going to try replacing the logic board. But since this model is now Vintage (I think that happened this week or some other very recent time) it'll take 2 weeks for repair! I just hope when they get the board that it works and I can get Big Sur installed successfully. No idea what I'm going to do if that doesn't work.

Hi People,

Is everyone replying in here referring to their devices being "bricked?" I am sorry if this has happened for anyone.

After releasing the update, Apple has now offered some Support Articles in regards to updating to Big Sur and what it would entail. Unfortunately, it may be too late for some or all of you for them to help, but read them to see if there is any other recourse besides taking your devices in for repair, or replacing them altogether.

Look here for the Apple Support Articles that concern updating to Big Sur. Please note that some, if not most, are dated after the update was seeded to the public: https://support.apple.com/kb/index?page=search&q=big%20sur&product=&doctype=SITE_HELP,PRODUCT_HELP,LEGACY,HOWTO_ARTICLES,TROUBLESHOOTING_ARTICLES&currentPage=1&includeArchived=false&locale=en_US&src=support_searchbox_main&type=organic

I hope this helps some/most of you and I wish you good luck!

Force it to shut down

hold power button down for 10 seconds.

then do an SMC reset. Google it to do see how to do that. Use apple’s support article

then restart and the install will continue. If not do the previous steps again till it works. Keep doing that and if it restarts again to black screen later keep doing those steps until the install is finished.

I had a similar thing today with my iMac. Updating fine then the screen went off, waited 2 hours for something to happen, nothing. Tried the power button still the same, switched the power off then on from the wall and the apple appeared and the update continued and finished.

No help as such unless there is a way to fully power down your MacBook.

1) Power on your Mac.

2) As you hear the startup sound, hold the Command and R keys on your keyboard.

3) Once the Apple logo appears on your screen, you can release the keys.

4) You can either connect your Mac to the internet using an Ethernet cable, or, when prompted, select the specific WiFi Network.

5) Once the recovery menu appears on your screen, you can opt for the option of installing OS X.

6) You are now required to follow the onscreen prompts and select your destination disk and complete the installation for OS X.

Through these steps, you can reinstall the latest version of OS X that you had previously been using on your Mac.

For the ones who are looking to restore Mac to its factory settings using the same version of OS X, they must hold Command-Option-R at startup instead as this starts the Mac from Internet Recovery.

I have a Genius Bar appointment today, they called me to discuss the device symptoms beforehand and from the sounds of it the news of this issue hasn’t reached the engineers in stores yet. So they couldn’t tell me whether I would need to pay should there be any hardware issues caused by updating as others have pointed out. I’m hoping it’s just a case of re-installing the OS using their external recovery tools but I will provide updates as they come.

When I was going to my Genius Bar a few minutes ago my 9 years old has tried to switch the MBP on and the Big Sur update resumed with 30 min left. Amazing because I tried several times during the last days in vain. The only one change I’ve done is on my WLAN. I was having 2 wlans, one 2.4 GHz and other 5GHz. So this morning I merged both in one with steering. I mention it because I read many people is resolving the issue disconnecting the I/O Board. At some point, doing so could be like changing WLAN setup... Maybe, when the MBP reboots during the update tries to reconnect to the WLAN and fails... So now, after having change the WLAN setup (also the SSID) seems like the update resumes... I moved my appointment with Genius Bar to Thursday, just in case from now on something is not well finished.... But at the moment the WLAN change is the only one thing that I can think could affect the installation. I hope some of you can support this hypothesis.

Who had FileVault enabled when the update caused a black screen? I have a mid-2014 MacBook Pro. Maybe having FileVault may be a factor? I did fix mine. I posted how I did that but had to restore from backup and it was challenging. I had to wipe the drive because it i longer recognized my password.

As far as I can see there is still no solution for those who own a 2013 or 2014 macbook that has got bricked.

After I updated my machine I tried all the methods mentioned by Apple according to black screen problems.

The macbook responds noting, no way to restore anything.

In the past Apple handled their issues in a proper way. iPhone batteries got replaced, expanded macbook batteries got replaced too, staingate problems got fixed.

At the end it will be important that all the customers having this issue with their macbook get in contact with Apple. They call it vintage hardware but they provided this update for our computer. What would you say if your six years old Mercedes or Tesla would brake down after you did a service?