The Sonoma Update Saga Continues. Maybe found an old windows trick that works.
The recent Mac OS Sonoma 14.3.1 update did not change to problem. I have a 2023 Mac Mini M2 8G ram 250 G internal drive with 2 Thunderbolt/USB-4 Ports. After this Sonoma update, my externals still do not function properly. External 2-T NVMe drive with USB-C connection unreadable/unreliable-keeps ejecting/disappears completely. But Sonoma just keeps on giving, now my Samsung 32" 4k TV/monitor display stopped working on a USB-C cable. The HDMI connection works.
Everything was fine on Ventura 13.6.3 until I updated to Sonoma 14.2 in January, then the external HD went haywire. I tried all the fixes, nothing worked. Thankful for Time Machine. TM backups are on my external 2-T drive, which was accessible in Recovery Mode. Rolled back to Ventura 13.6.3 and the external drive worked as before, no problems.
Along comes the new Sonoma update 14.3.1, so I rolled the dice and updated via a clean install hoping to avoid any conflicts with Ventura OS updating to Sonoma.
Same old same old, the external drive became unusable, same as before. The new thing with Sonoma 14.3.1 was my monitor quit working as well on the same USB-C cable it had been working on since March 2023. I had to connect via HDMI which worked just fine. I opened up a support case with Apple and we tried many things but nothing worked. On advice from Apple, I purchased a new Belkin USB-4 cable, but still no monitor.
I made an appointment for a week later with the Genius Bar at the Apple Store 60 miles away. In the meantime, I rolled my Mac Mini back to a clean install of Ventura 13.6.3, my monitor still had the same problem, but my external drive was working again just like before.
At the store, my Mac Mini connected to a Thunderbolt display with no problem. My 2-T drive worked perfectly on 2 different MacBook Pros running Sonoma that the store had. They tried a firmware revive on my Mac Mini but it made no apparent difference.
Back home my monitor still didn't work, so I chatted with Samsung support for hours and tried all sorts of stuff, but my monitor refused to work on the USB-C cable. I read an old support forum article that suggested an old school Windows Millenium trick I remembered well. Shut down the PC, unplug the power cord, then hold the on/off button in. You would hear the fans spin as the residual power in PC was discharged. Apparently, the PC held some static memory in the RAM that was causing all sorts of crazy behavior in Windows ME. Back to today, I tried it with my monitor, and to my amazement, it worked, my USB-C cable connection was back. I had turned my monitor on and off many times to no effect. But by unplugging my monitor and then pressing and holding the on/off switch, cleared something in the monitor that was causing the USB-C malfunction. The Samsung support guy had never heard of such a thing!
I thought, what if I try this to my Mac Mini? I shut it down with my 2-T HD attached, pulled the power cord, and then I held the power button down. The Startup light came on for a few seconds and went out. Apparently, my 2023 Mac Mini also holds some residual electrical power. Will this help with Sonoma Hard Drive issues? I don't know, I am back and happy with Ventura and there is no way I'm upgrading to Sonoma 14.3.1 just to check out this theory to see if it works. But I will try again when 14.4 comes out.
