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Volume Hash Mishmatch on Volume Disk 2s5 error?

Got this today when I restarted. Took several restarts just to get up and running again. The iMac has been difficult lately -- backup drives will not eject because they're "being used" by another program; Time Machine will backup exactly ONCE before it refuses to do so again unless I eject the backup drive (replaced twice now) and plug it in again, and now this. The error says I need to reinstall MacOS on "this volume" and I don't even know what Disk 2s5 is. I am reluctant to reinstall anything until I know more. Can anyone advise?

iMac

Posted on Aug 14, 2022 3:18 PM

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Posted on Aug 15, 2022 9:10 AM

Most likely the file system is corrupt. You can try booting into Internet Recovery Mode and running Disk Utility First Aid on the hidden Container. Within Disk Utility you may need to click "View" and select "Show All Devices" so that the hidden Container appears on the left pane of Disk Utility. Even if First Aid says everything is "Ok" click "Show Details" and scroll back through the report to see if any unfixed errors are listed. If there are any unfixed errors listed, then you will need to erase the whole Container, followed by reinstalling macOS and restoring from a backup. Unfortunately Apple's instructions to reinstall macOS are a bit vague here, but I suspect they really mean a clean install versus just reinstalling macOS over top of itself which won't fix any file system issues.

How to reinstall macOS - Apple Support


I've recently seen a post on here where the user mentioned the issue was caused by bad memory (determined by Apple during a repair of their Mac). A failing drive could also be the problem as well as mentioned by @Barney-15E.


Make sure to have a good backup before attempting anything.


You should always have frequent and regular backups of your computer and all external media (including the cloud) which contains important & unique data.



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7 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 15, 2022 9:10 AM in response to Tom Hayes1

Most likely the file system is corrupt. You can try booting into Internet Recovery Mode and running Disk Utility First Aid on the hidden Container. Within Disk Utility you may need to click "View" and select "Show All Devices" so that the hidden Container appears on the left pane of Disk Utility. Even if First Aid says everything is "Ok" click "Show Details" and scroll back through the report to see if any unfixed errors are listed. If there are any unfixed errors listed, then you will need to erase the whole Container, followed by reinstalling macOS and restoring from a backup. Unfortunately Apple's instructions to reinstall macOS are a bit vague here, but I suspect they really mean a clean install versus just reinstalling macOS over top of itself which won't fix any file system issues.

How to reinstall macOS - Apple Support


I've recently seen a post on here where the user mentioned the issue was caused by bad memory (determined by Apple during a repair of their Mac). A failing drive could also be the problem as well as mentioned by @Barney-15E.


Make sure to have a good backup before attempting anything.


You should always have frequent and regular backups of your computer and all external media (including the cloud) which contains important & unique data.



Aug 15, 2022 9:46 AM in response to Tom Hayes1

A Bad RAM Module can manifest itself in various ways as per the below links


From what Other in these links found out ;


An overnight Stress Test by Apple or Apple Authorized Device Centre maybe required and be sure to bring along these links as some Techie are not ware of this issue


Please help - Terminal.app keeps crashing upon reopening - macoS Monterey version 12.4


Volume hash mismatch, cannot reinstall MacOS


Monterey rev 12.4 - Hash mismatch


Volume Hash mismatch


Strange Disk Space Issue

Aug 15, 2022 11:06 AM in response to HWTech

Did the work with Disk Utility. No unfixed errors found. Updated Monterey via the App Store from 12.4 to 12.5. (There had been no notification showing in Software Update for 12.5 until this morning, at least that I noticed on my Mac.) So far (and it's only been hours, admittedly) everything is working just fine. External drive backing up and ejecting when asked to; Mail and Safari behaving normally. Certainly no mismatch errors popping up. I'm at a place of "if it ain't broke don't fix it" at the moment.

Aug 15, 2022 4:31 PM in response to Tom Hayes1

Interesting.....thanks for the update.


Glad it is working fine again after the OS update. I also agree with that philosophy as well.


Make sure to have frequent & regular backups. If the file system did not have a problem, I am concerned about a memory issue. Unfortunately this "Volume Hash Mismatch" error has only recently been seen so we really aren't sure what is going on here so the more information we get from users the better. Please update this thread again if the problem recurs.



Aug 16, 2022 1:49 AM in response to Tom Hayes1

Well, it’s not clear yet what actually causes the hash mismatch error in macOS, as users have reported it randomly appearing, or after a significant system crash or kernel panic. However, whenever user experience this error message, it’s a good idea to immediately backup all data on the Mac with Time Machine or any other backup method of choice.

 

Further, user can also try the below troubleshooting methods to fix the issue:

 

1. Reset SMC

2. Reset PRAM/NVRAM

3. Reinstall macOS

 

Hope this will help!

Aug 16, 2022 5:23 AM in response to HWTech

Will do. And totally agree about backing up. I have always backed up, religiously, at least once a week. I used to use Time Capsule/Time Machine on automatic but found I was going through external drives because they were always powered on. For what I do, a weekly backup is more than sufficient. That backup has saved me more times than I can count, from retrieving "lost" banking information to getting back a missing Music library. Cannot recommend strongly enough that people back up their data. Make it a habit!

Volume Hash Mishmatch on Volume Disk 2s5 error?

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