I've been running my late 2015 iMac from a Samsung T5 SSD, which also has all of my applications etc on there. I went to upgrade to Monterey the other day but (incredibly foolishly) didn't make a backup first. Monterey update failed on the SSD and now I'm stuck in some sort of limbo there. Can I move all of my application and data etc over to the HDD somehow to keep all my apps running as before?
iMac 21.5″, macOS 12.3
Can you boot from the internal drive? If so boot from it and see if you can copy files from the external SSD.
If you can't boot from internal, connect another external drive, boot to Recovery and install the macOS version on that external drive and boot from that and see if you copy files from the problem SSD.
Can you boot from the internal drive? If so boot from it and see if you can copy files from the external SSD.
If you can't boot from internal, connect another external drive, boot to Recovery and install the macOS version on that external drive and boot from that and see if you copy files from the problem SSD.
First, what happens when you try to boot from the external? If you cannot then If your internal OS is at or later than the SSD you can boot up from there and then try to use migration assistant and see if it will transfer all your files and apps. If the HDD is outdated then update that to latest and try to transfer. Depending on what happened to the external drive will determine if this will work.
After the fact in your situation but >>
There are reports appearing on the ASC Forums regarding failed installation of Monterey on older Qualifying Apple Computers. In most cases this is related to having a NON Apple Original internal drive ?
In your case the External Drive would the source of the Non Installation go Monterey
The EFI Boot ROM included in Monterey is verifying for Original Apple Drive and if not found , may Balk or fail to upgrade to Monterey.
The only was I know to install Monterey to External Drive is, to First Install Monterey to the Internat Drive thusly Flashing the Computer with the required EF Boot ROM.
Reports indicate the EFI BOOT ROM is Required to Flash the Computer and is a requirement for a Successful Monterey Installation.
Yeah I unfortunately read about that after the fact as well. I followed tbirdvet's advice and used Migration Assistant and successfully copied over everything from my SSD back to my HDD which has a working OS of Monterey. Now I'm going to downgrade and get everything back onto my SSD
Thanks so much for the advice on migration assistant. This worked, so now I'll downgrade from Monterey and move everything back to my SSD . Thanks again
When I try to boot from the external, the Monterey update fails, even through Recovery mode and Internet Recovery mode. I have since read something about Monterey being problematic on external non-Apple SSDs. I'll try the Migration Assistant to HDD as that is now running Monterey. Thanks
Good to hear.
Monterey update failed on SSD; can I transfer all SSD files over to HDD?
