Reinstall/ downgrade impossible! SSD not showing in disk utility in recovery mode, but visible in Disk utility when booting normally

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Reinstall/ downgrade impossible! SSD not showing in disk utility in recovery mode, but visible in Disk utility when booting normally

Hello!

I have the following problem. MBP Early 2015 - Monterey mac OS is installed.

As the goal is to downgrade to an earlier OS (Catalina) I want to do a clean install.

I start the MBP in recovery mode - but when I go to disk utility to format the SSD it shows nothing on the left. Yes, I "view all" is active, not just "volumes" nothing should be hidden- still nothing shows: neither internal volumes nor internal physical drive. Only "apple disk image" and "OS X Base System".

similar to what was posted by User "qwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnm34" in

SSD not showing in Disk Utility or termin… - Apple Community

Disk utility works as external drives are recognized and shown in DU in recovery mode.

I tried everything:

cmd+opt+R, cmd+shift+opt+R - neither reinstall, reinstall from backup or reinstall from external bootable USB Drive in recovery mode can be implemented as all these options require to choose an installation medium, which is not shown when trying to run these options.

using "diskutil list" in terminal in recovery mode shows a bunch of small disk images, none of these could be my 1TB SSD.

using "diskutil list" running the OS shows this:

also DU after normal Booting:

As compared to DU in recovery Mode:

1) I tried to identify the disk in OS and format it with the terminal but the identifiers for the disks are different in Recovery Mode and after normal boot - formatting "diski0" in RecMode would format the base system so I did not run that command.

2) I did a normal boot, run first aid on all partitions and volumes - except for the top one (physical drive) where it was not possible.

3) Reset SMD, NVRAM/PRAM - no changes.

4) Run in safe mode - run first aid there - same thing. The "repair disk permission" button does not exist in Monterey, so could only run "first aid".

5) I would try to create and run a bootable backup - however it takes ages and I do net expect this to change the availability of my drive in RecMode. Or could I maybe access the drive while running an OS on an external drive?

6) Filevault is disabled - no changes.

Two things left:

a) I noticed in normal DU that only the "lowest" volume "Macinthosh HDfranz" is writeable according to its information window - I cannot find instructions for permission repair in Monterey OS. I'm not a pro and don't know anything about containers. maybe the problem lies there?

b) I stumbled about information that there might be a conflict of default formatting at factory settings macOS Journaled and AFPS for the SSDs - could the problem be about this? If so, how to solve it?

Any Ideas? I'm lost!

The HARDWARE is working - I can run the OS and it finds everything in there, but I cannot find the SSD in RecMode and thus cannot do a Reinstall.

MacBook Pro Retina

Posted on Mar 5, 2022 4:06 AM

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Answer 1

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joshukn Author

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15 points

Mar 6, 2022 7:35 AM in response to joshukn

UPDATE/SOLUTION

After all I did install High Sierra on an external drive and booted from there and low and behold the drives showed - container etc structure is still confusing but at least I could format the drive and reinstall the OS anew.

I do not remember if I had tried - maybe the drives would also have shown if I had chosen a bootable install drive at startup.

Maybe this helps somone else in the future.

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Answer 2

joshukn Author

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15 points

Mar 5, 2022 4:08 AM in response to joshukn

EDIT:

This how the Disk and volumes are shown in DU booting normally - maybe that helps

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Answer 3

Mar 6, 2022 7:38 AM in response to joshukn

first, let me try to reduce the clutter slightly.

25 disks:

Internet recovery creates over 25 small RAM-Disks to use for its temporary items, so that it can leave the standard MacOS volume untouched. This leaves you free to repair or ERASE the standard macOS Volume.

2GB MacOS Base system:

That is Recovery-in-ROM system, it cannot be erased or repaired or used for anything else.

around 8GB MacOS Base System:

that could be an incoming installer image

TWO Volumes named Macintosh_HD:

one contains the absolutely invariant parts of MacOS, and is double-locked and read-only. Only the other one with the more complex name is User-modifiable, and only by using system functions.

Snapshot:

These are generally Time machine lists of links to files, waiting to be actualized onto your backup drive. If time machine could talk to its drive, these would disappear.

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Answer 4

Mar 6, 2022 7:43 AM in response to joshukn

MacOS has never allowed you to return to an older version -- unless you remove all traces of the newer version by completely erasing the physical drive, not just the Macintosh_HD Volume.

Your solution of using a new clean drive is an excellent way to sidestep everything and just install what you want.

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Answer 5

joshukn Author

Level 1

15 points

Mar 6, 2022 7:57 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Hello Grant!

Thanks for the update! I finally achieved accessing and formatting the drives. Replying from my freshly set up MBP!

After writing my post I realised I do not have to make a carbon copy/ create a bootable backup - I could just do a fresh install on an external drive of the OS only wich is much faster than creating an entire bootable backup.

The solution was either via running HS from an external drive and/or (I lost track after all this intents) running the bootable external macOS Catalina installer drive at start up and then the internal disks showed up in Disk Utility and I could format the drives to APFS and reinstall Catalina.

Thanks again for the info!

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Answer 6

Mar 6, 2022 8:12 AM in response to joshukn

The incoming Installer is always a stripped-down version of EXACTLY the same version that is to be installed. (This simple but remarkably clever solution reduces the enormous number of different combinations of macOS and installer scripts to ONE. It also means that if the Installer can't run [typically due to unsupported Hardware] there is no point in continuing.)

You are working around and about the versions of MacOS that saw the adoption of Apple File System APFS for the boot SSD.

When you attempt to install High Sierra, that is the version that expects to see a MacOS Extended Volume, and if it is an SSD, intends to convert it to an APFS Volume for the fist time. If you already have an APFS SSD Volume (because you installed ANY later macOS) High Sierra Installer can not find that Volume -- it is looking for a MacOS Extended Volume, out in the open, and an APFS Macintosh_HD Volume is hidden inside additional File System fru-fru.

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Reinstall/ downgrade impossible! SSD not showing in disk utility in recovery mode, but visible in Disk utility when booting normally

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