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Macbook Pro 2014 won't boot to recovery mode

Help. I tried searching the discussions but nothing clear is coming up.


Last night, I saw that my machine (MPB mid2014, Big Sur) suddenly open to the OS Utilities window - I wasn't using the machine at the time.


I shut down and rebooted, and things seemed back to normal. But the same thing happened this evening. I shut down, did a PRAM and SMC reset, logged in ok but as apps were reloading the machine froze, reset, and now I can't get to the Recovery Utilities window again despite holding cmd-R at start up. It goes straight to Internet Recovery mode when I try or otherwise comes up with the Question Mark folder screen.


I want to get to Utilities to use Disk Utility to check my SSD - I don't want to do an Internet Recovery reinstall!


Any help greatly appreciated 🙏🏻 ☹

MacBook Pro 15″

Posted on Nov 10, 2023 11:21 AM

Reply
21 replies

Nov 13, 2023 5:13 AM in response to HWTech

Ok, installation to the external continued and finalised. I am now working on the Macbook Pro having booted from the external OS. (It's very slow).


Disk Utility does not show the internal ssd at all. Terminal "diskutil list" returns the attached list, which also doesn't reflect the drive. DriveDx similarly only sees the external.




The internal SSD from OWC doesn't need an adapter. The given specs are PCIe 3.1 x4, NVMe 1.3. https://www.owc.com/solutions/aura-pro-x2 The pins match the OEM Samsung drive exactly. It is specifically compatible with this Macbook Pro model and I've been using it without problem for 2 1/2 months (installed end of August this year).


I kept the original drive in a box, and tried reinstalling it on Saturday. It boots no problem, so I don't think the problem is in the communications.


I read somewhere that re-seating and restarting can help, so I'll try that but looking for more guidance, thank you!

Nov 10, 2023 11:48 AM in response to AntMonster

Update: if I plug in an external USB (which has an old TM backup on it), the Apple logo comes up as if the OS is loading, but then opens to Language selection screen which seems to me like the beginning of a reinstall procedure. I don't want to reinstall, and I haven't chosen any option to do that or gone any further than this Language page. I have no idea what's going on.


Safe Mode (shift at startup) doesn't work either.

Nov 11, 2023 12:42 PM in response to AntMonster

Update: I removed the SSD and reinstalled the old one to test if the problem is with the pcie connection or logic board. The machine booted up cleanly with no problem. So, the connection and board seem good.


Put the problem ssd back in, and the problem persists: question mark folder screen on bootup. So went through with internet recovery (cmd-option-r for the latest OS) and that eventually opened the Recovery Utilities menu. Disk Utility does not have the ssd listed, the only device showing is the OS Base System disk.

I saw a video where someone uses a terminal command to list the drives and their ssd showed up but there is no Utilities drop down menu as used in the video so i don't know how to open terminal - any advice? Please?



My next move will be to make a bootable working external drive and run Bug Sur off that to try access the internal ssd. Thoughts on this? Any input greatly appreciated 🙏🏻

Nov 11, 2023 10:48 PM in response to BDAqua

Thanks. I'm going to try the external install now. Hoping I'm able to do that via Internet Recovery, otherwise I'll have to via a Windows machine (I only have one Mac).


Re the terminal command, yes, but there seems to be no way to open Terminal through Internet Recovery. So guess it would only be possible from the external installation?

Nov 12, 2023 3:40 AM in response to BDAqua

@BDAqua yes that's what I saw in the vid but it's definitely not there on my machine. I think maybe it's not available in Internet Recovery.


Speaking of which, I had to restart Internet Recovery and am now sitting with the problem where it's just NOT loading. The "time remaining" counter starts at around 30min but just steadily increases. It's now sitting at 4:57 and increasing 🤦🏻‍♂️ the machine is also running hot and fans are going. I've tried PRAM reset and SMC reset but it's not helped.

Nov 12, 2023 8:34 AM in response to AntMonster

Update: Internet Recovery finally loaded, formated the external drive to GUID partition etc, and was able to select the drive and proceed to install the OS to the drive.


NOW, I'm staring at the "less than a minute to go" situation. It's been at least 45 minutes. There seems to be activity on the external drive. It's USB 3, and it's not a solid state drive, so I suppose this could slow things quite a lot. It's an empty 1TB disk so I'm sure it's not the problem with available space that I've seen people encountering.


I'll leave it running overnight if needs be, but at which point can it be accepted that the installation has failed? Some people have said that a reboot solves it (somehow). But to me that suggests just hitting the power button (there's no menu to restart from) - surely that's no good for the external drive? Thoughts?

Nov 12, 2023 11:41 AM in response to AntMonster

AntMonster wrote:

NOW, I'm staring at the "less than a minute to go" situation. It's been at least 45 minutes. There seems to be activity on the external drive. It's USB 3, and it's not a solid state drive, so I suppose this could slow things quite a lot. It's an empty 1TB disk so I'm sure it's not the problem with available space that I've seen people encountering.

Not surprising if using an external hard drive. Hard drives are very slow with a max transfer rate of 150MB/s at best, but usually more along the lines of 60-80MB/s or even less especially when using the APFS file system which tends to work the drive harder because the read/write heads must move around a lot when using an APFS file system.


Plus it is obvious the internal SSD has a problem of some sort which is very likely interfering even when booting to external media such as your external hard drive or Internet Recovery Mode.


I'll leave it running overnight if needs be, but at which point can it be accepted that the installation has failed? Some people have said that a reboot solves it (somehow). But to me that suggests just hitting the power button (there's no menu to restart from) - surely that's no good for the external drive? Thoughts?

Only you can decide when to force a power off. If the OS was fully copied when it got stuck, then rebooting will allow the system to start with phase 2 of the installation process.....sometimes you may need to Option Boot to select the external boot drive which may have a name such as "Install macOS" (not to be confused with a USB installer of a similar name).


You can remove the internal SSD & adapter in order to try to complete the macOS installation on the external drive. You can also remove the internal SSD to try performing another clean install of macOS to the external drive which may have a better chance at working if the internal SSD or adapter is causing problems.


What SSD adapter are you using with the third party SSD if it is an M.2 SSD? The Sintech SSD adapter is the only one I've seen on these forums which seems to be the most compatible & reliable. I've never seen anyone report any issues when using a Sintech SSD adapter, but I have seen almost every other brand of adapter reported as being problematic.


Plus not all SSDs are compatible with all computers, so there is always a chance the SSD may be incompatible.


Or the SSD may actually have a hardware problem. Once you get macOS installed & booting from an external drive, then you can run DriveDx to check the health of the internal SSD. Post the complete DriveDx text report here using the "Additional Text" icon which looks like a piece of paper so I can review it for clues since not all "Failing" or "Warning" conditions indicate a bad SSD....these reports need to be manually interpreted by someone familiar with interpreting SSD health reports. There are other ways of checking the health of a drive which I can provide if needed. Unfortunately most SSDs fail due to controller communication issues which do not show up in any health report.

Nov 13, 2023 1:53 AM in response to BDAqua

Update: After 12+hrs it was still on "less than a minute" and the external drive and laptop completely idle. I powered down. Restarting with Option+Power brought up the external labeled as "MacOS Installer". I selected that, and it brought up the Apple Logo+Progress Bar+"26 minutes remaining", and the drive is active again. Hoping this finishes the installation.



Once I'm able to run from the external, my hope is that I'll be able to access the internal ssd to diagnose and possibly reformat, salvage files. It's a brand new (installed 2½ months ago) Aura Pro X2 1tb from OWC. Any recommendations for the way to do that?

Nov 13, 2023 6:17 AM in response to AntMonster

This is becoming super frustrating. I tried a simple restart as suggested in my last post, without swapping ssds out or anything. The machine booted up again to the login screen as expected, but hung (spinning ball) after entering my password.


So I tried again - and ended looking at the 🚫 screen with a link to the Apple support page, which says the OS on the drive is not compatible with the machine.


And as I'm typing this post out (on my phone), the login page has just opened on the laptop. No intervention from me. It went from the 🚫 screen to login screen on its own. I've now managed to login. How is it possible??


No change to the SSD status - it's still not visible at all.

Nov 13, 2023 5:22 PM in response to AntMonster

What OS did you install on the external drive? With a third party NVMe based SSD like the OWC Aura SSD, you need to be running macOS 10.13+ since older versions of macOS don't have the necessary NVMe driver to communicate with the SSD.


If you are running macOS 10.13+ and don't see the OWC SSD, then it indicates either a problem with the OWC SSD or the SSD slot/circuitry on the Logic Board.....the OWC SSD is utilizing the SSD slot differently than the Apple OEM SSD because the OWC is an NVMe based SSD while the Apple OEM SSD is SATA based. Plus the OWC SSD is trying to use at least 3x the speed of the Apple SSD.


I take it you did not purchase the OWC SSD kit so you don't have the OWC Envoy Enclosure?

Nov 14, 2023 1:58 AM in response to HWTech

I installed 11.7 Big Sur according to the OWC instructions, which were very clear. The installation went smoothly without a hitch.


No unfortunately opted not to get the enclosure because I don't need one, but it would have come in useful now.


Have now engaged with the OWC customer support and they want to do some diagnostics through Internet Recovery mode, which I'll do later today. Their view seems to be that if the EFI version is correct then the SSD is faulty. A strange comment was that "it's not unheard of for a first OS installation to fail" - whatever that means. I've not come across that as a possibility in any of the (many) forums and troubleshooting guides I've been reading through all weekend.


Is there any way to test the NVMe functionality? The machine was idle when this happened and I don't use it for any applications which would put a significant strain on the ssd (video editing/3D renders/code compiling/gaming etc.)

Nov 14, 2023 8:48 AM in response to HWTech

OK an update: OWC believe the drive has failed and are going to replace it.


Regarding the point you raised about the NVMe vs SATA functionality, and the Aura Pro X2 trying to run 3x faster, would it make more sense (and be safer) to get the Envoy enclosure and use the Aura as an external expansion while using the OEM Samsung as the internal OS drive? I don't want this to happen again.

Nov 14, 2023 10:24 AM in response to AntMonster

That would only be an issue if the Logic Board has a problem. If the Logic Board has a problem with the speed increase of the OWC SSD, then it may not be restricted to just the SSD as it may still have a problem with the OEM SSD even if it is not immediately noticed due to the slower speed.


More than likely, the SSD is just bad. The behavior you described is common with SSD failures where the SSD's controller is not able to properly communicate with the system. Wait & see how the replacement SSD works. If the replacement SSD works, then you know the old OWC SSD was bad. If you still have the problem, then you can try booting from the SSD connected externally.

Nov 14, 2023 9:56 PM in response to HWTech

It's become a question of logistics for me now. I live in South Africa, and may only receive the replacement SSD in January. Getting the Envoy locally can double the cost (if you can find one available). My thinking is that, when I finally upgrade to a newer machine, I could use the Aura as an external expansion drive (or backup OS). So I would prefer a thunderbolt enclosure because USB 3 maxes at 5gb/s, but not sure if these exist for the Aura nvme profile other than the Envoy?

Macbook Pro 2014 won't boot to recovery mode

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