I run an external boot drive on my 2017 iMac, and it is having problems. I want to boot into safe mode but seem unable to do that. I can boot into safe mode on the internal drive, but using option to select a boot drive then using the shift key does not seem to trigger the safe boot on the external drive. Is there another sequence order I need to perform to get the external drive to boot in safe mode?
iMac 27″ 5K, macOS 12.7
In Restore Mode look up top for Utilities in the Menubar.
In Disk Utility>View, select Show all Devices, highlight the top left entry.
Run Disk First Aid on all items in the left panel, from top down. Especially for the external drive.
If you gat another external drive Carbon Copy Cloner. can use Legasy Mode to clone the new Apple drive schemes...
Thanks - the external drive has been having issues, and now panics about 30 seconds after booting. Trying to get it over to an internal drive and rebuild everything, but this definitely makes it more challenging. I can see the data from the internal drive (mainly because Apple is making it impossible to run external SSDs for boot drives lately) and copy over, but trying to clean up everything to not bring over what problems are lurking on the external. Disk utility comes back with no problems, and not sure what recovery would do to the external drive.
Skidrow wrote:
I run an external boot drive on my 2017 iMac, and it is having problems. I want to boot into safe mode but seem unable to do that. I can boot into safe mode on the internal drive, but using option to select a boot drive then using the shift key does not seem to trigger the safe boot on the external drive.
That should work assuming the external drive can boot. Maybe the timing is off. Don't hold the Shift key down until about a second (maybe two) after clicking the external boot volume. Sometimes holding special startup keys too soon can prevent them from being recognized (it varies by system).
Since you get a Kernel Panic within 30 seconds of attempting to boot the external drive, then it sounds like you may have a more serious issue with it if Safe Mode cannot be accessed. Try disconnecting all other external devices in case one of them is causing a problem and connect the external drive directly to the computer.
Do you have another USB cable (and adapter if using one) to use with the external drive?
Not that I'm aware of, but try using Dic Utility in Restore Mode... CMD+r keys on startup/
Cannot boot external drive to safe mode on 2017 intel based iMac
