big sur 11.1 update fails

Question

Level 1

6 points

big sur 11.1 update fails

My late 2013 Macbook Pro has Mac OS 11.0.1 installed. I am getting a system message to update to Big Sur 11.1. I've tried updating twice. Both times I briefly see black screen with a message saying the computer restarted due to an error. I still see the Apple logo and progress bar after that. When I log in, I get a prompt to enter the email and password for my cloud account. After that, once I'm fulling logged in, I find a system crash dialog with the option to send the report to Apple.

The system thinks it still needs to update to 11.1, and says it will try automatically. What should I do? How do I get out of this cycle?

thanks for your help

Cynthia

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 11.0

Posted on Dec 16, 2020 8:48 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

74Flamingo

Level 1

19 points

Dec 18, 2020 7:42 AM in response to ctoryu

I’ve tried to download Mac OS Big Sur 11.1 onto my Mac and each time I get the message that the download has failed and I am advised to check my internet connection and try again. This has happened three times now. My internet connection is sound as I am able to connect all my other devises. Any suggestions?

Reply

Answer 2

Dec 18, 2020 1:02 PM in response to 74Flamingo

I’ve downloaded the 11.1 Big Sur update successfully by updating in safe mode.

Close down, wait 10 seconds or so, switch back on and press and hold down the shift key whilst the device is booting up. Release the shift key when the Apple logo and progress bar appear. Sign in and proceed to download the update.

Reply

Answer 3

BDAqua

Level 10

239,111 points

Dec 16, 2020 11:50 AM in response to ctoryu

Safe Boot, (holding Shift key down at startup), does the problem occur in Safe Mode? Could take 10 minutes.

Safe mode attempts to repair Disks & clears lots of caches & loads safe Drivers, & prevents loading of 3rd party extensions, so if Safe Mode works try again in regular boot.

Reply

Answer 4

Dec 24, 2020 7:26 PM in response to ctoryu

May be an edge case (given my configuration) but I had this exact problem, and Safe Boot nor anything else mentioned here helped. I have both ethernet and wifi enabled (ethernet for Internet, wifi for Watch unlocking mostly) but when I disabled wifi, it downloaded normally. Hope this helps someone.

Reply

Answer 5

klars

Level 1

8 points

Dec 29, 2020 7:28 AM in response to 74Flamingo

It's now December 29th and nothing has changed. Have tried safe mode and other work arounds I have read about. Still get the message to the check my wi-fi on the iMac (2017). My wi-fi works well for everything else. The download and update on my MacBook Pro went smoothly. Hello Apple! Anyone home?

Reply

Answer 6

ctoryu Author

Level 1

6 points

Dec 29, 2020 1:56 PM in response to ctoryu

I was able to successfully update to 11.1 from Safe mode. Thank you for the instructions for restarting in Safe Mode.

Note: I tried to update from a wired connection instead of wireless since someone else mentioned wireless was a problem. However, when I tried this, I discovered that my Thunderbolt Ethernet was showing as not connected. To fix this problem, after I updated to 11.1, I created a new Location in Network in System Preferences and deleted the others. It seems to be working fine now.

Reply