My MacBook Pro can’t find startup disk
TLDR: MacOS10.15 MacBook Pro can’t find startup disk. Tried all the usual methods online with no success. Help!
details:
Two days ago my mid-2012 MacBook Pro was playing up (very slow, music would start and stop despite it being downloaded and not streamed etc), so I restarted it hoping it would help. Instead, I got a white screen with the flashing folder + ? Symbol. After following other guides on here and elsewhere, I tried booting it in recovery mode, running first aid, reinstalling MacOS catalina (also tried mountain lion), restoring from time machine on an external drive, multiple times. Never worked. Always the flashing ? folder (or sometimes 🚫 sign).
Late 2020 I had an issue with it not turning on after doing a lot of high-demand work with it, and after getting it looked at and being told the HDD was dying, I replaced the HDD for an SSD. It’s worked well since then, and, for transparency, about a month ago I upgraded the RAM from the original 8gb to 16gb as my coding workspaces for work were getting larger than the RAM capacity. That, again, has worked brilliantly. Until two days ago, there was no sign of issue.
I dug out the original HDD and plugged that back in, to eliminate the SSD as a possible issue. It booted up, and while slow like it used to be, it just about worked. I concluded it was probably the SSD, so ordered a new one.
I thought that would be the end of my issues, but I’m still unable to boot it with the new SSD. Have tried the previous things mentioned, wiping and trying reinstalling Catalina or mountain lion with the different recovery modes I can get, and restoring from time machine. I’ve run first aid on the new SSD and everything seems fine. I’ve also run a hardware test and it did not identify any issues.
I would take it to a third party technician (I know apple won’t touch it what with the age of it and my upgrades) but I currently have covid, so if anyone has any suggestions I can try in the meantime while I’m housebound, I’d be grateful!
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
MacBook Pro 13″, 10.15