Level 1

20 points

MacOS Big Sur - Recovery Partition gone?

Word of advice to those installing MacOS Big Sur on an older machine - build yourself a USB installer and keep it handy - especially if you need Recovery.

I have a Late 2013 MacBook Pro 15" Retina and have successfully installed Big Sur by selecting System Preferences > Software Update. However, I've noticed that booting into Recovery seems to bring up the Internet Recovery page and does not use the local recovery partition. This is a problem for me since Internet Recovery takes me back to OS X Mavericks if I try to reinstall.

So, I created a USB installer and reinstalled Big Sur. Again, installation goes fine and everything boots up. However, Recovery boot still loads into Internet Recovery.

Does Big Sur not have a recovery partition? It looks like it's no longer there.

Thanks.

MacBook Pro Retina

Posted on Nov 13, 2020 11:32 AM

Similar questions

20 replies

giocalo

Level 1

4 points

Apr 7, 2021 6:25 AM in response to indy913

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/imac-17-1-retina-5k-27-inch-late-2015-efi-firmware-update-failures.2228324/

https://eclecticlight.co/2021/03/23/how-to-update-your-macs-firmware/

PocketSevens Author

Level 1

20 points

Nov 14, 2020 5:57 PM in response to PocketSevens

Just to add additional information: I used the USB installer to reformat the hard drive and then load MacOS Big Sur from scratch. I saw the format delete the Recovery and Preboot partitions. I then installed MacOS Big Sur and then retrieved all of my files via Time Machine. However, I am still unable to access the Recovery partition using Command-R on bootup.

I can see the Recovery partition using Diskutil:

diskutil list

/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk0

1: EFI ⁨EFI⁩ 209.7 MB disk0s1

2: Apple_APFS ⁨Container disk1⁩ 749.0 GB disk0s2

3: Microsoft Basic Data ⁨BOOTCAMP⁩ 250.4 GB disk0s3

4: Windows Recovery ⁨⁩ 548.4 MB disk0s4

/dev/disk1 (synthesized):

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: APFS Container Scheme - +749.0 GB disk1

Physical Store disk0s2

1: APFS Volume ⁨Macintosh HD⁩ 14.9 GB disk1s1

2: APFS Snapshot ⁨com.apple.os.update-...⁩ 14.9 GB disk1s1s1

3: APFS Volume ⁨Preboot⁩ 283.2 MB disk1s2

4: APFS Volume ⁨Recovery⁩ 655.5 MB disk1s3

5: APFS Volume ⁨VM⁩ 1.1 GB disk1s4

6: APFS Volume ⁨Macintosh HD - Data⁩ 365.8 GB disk1s5

Barney-15E

Level 10

125,196 points

Nov 15, 2020 6:41 AM in response to PocketSevens

@Barney-15E - thanks for replying. Sorry, I'm not understanding. Are you saying there's a problem with my recovery volume or recovery for MacOS Big Sur? If you mean my recovery volume, shouldn't that have been fixed on a drive reformat and fresh install? My recovery partition worked fine on every other MacOS release before Big Sir.

If it goes to Internet Recovery when you start up with cmd-R, there is something wrong with the Recovery volume.

You have a BOOTCAMP partition. There is nothing "fresh" about that install. The modification to the EFI boot manager to handle BOOTCAMP may be the issue, but it shouldn't be.

jcp-123

Level 1

9 points

Nov 18, 2020 1:36 AM in response to PocketSevens

@PocketSevens - Thanks, very helpful. I followed the guidance here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201372 I then booted into the USB installer drive and I could then access the Recovery Partition as required.

PocketSevens Author

Level 1

20 points

Nov 17, 2020 10:26 AM in response to jcp-123

@jcp-123 - for now, if you have a 16 GB or greater USB drive, make a USB installer and boot off of that. That will allow you to boot into Recovery for Big Sur for the time being.

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MacOS Big Sur - Recovery Partition gone?