Why is my Apple SD5SL2 SSD not recognized in MacBook Pro?

The picture of the SSD appears to look like it may be an Apple OEM label although a lot of people out there like to trick people. I found an eBay item which purports to be an Apple OEM SanDisk SSD with the exact same label. Plus I saw a somewhat similar label for an Apple OEM Samsung SSD from a reputable third party vendor....it also did not have an Apple logo or Apple name. Unfortunately I rarely worked on the 2012 & Early-2013 MBPro Retina models so I am not certain what the Apple labels look like for those SSDs so I cannot confirm the SanDisk SSD you have pictured is an Apple SSD or just a third party SSD. The part number listed on the SanDisk label did show as an Apple SSD in Google search results for what that is worth these days.

What version of macOS are you trying to install? If this SSD previously had macOS 10.13+ installed and you are trying to install macOS 10.8 - 10.11, then it won't recognize the drive layout used by later versions of macOS. You need to use Disk Utility to erase the whole physical SSD before attempting to choose the "Install macOS" option. If you are booted to a macOS 10.13 installer, then you will need to click "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical SSD appears on the left pane of Disk Utility.

• If installing macOS 10.13+, then Erase the whole physical SSD as GUID partition and APFS (top option).
• If you are installing macOS 10.11 or 10.12 (perhaps even 10.13 - 10.15 if macOS 10.13+ was never installed previously), then erase the whole physical SSD as GUID partition and MacOS Extended (Journaled)
• If you are installing macOS 10.8 to 10.10, then you need to partition & format the physical SSD using the instructions in the following article:

https://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/formatting/Mac_Formatting_6-10_R3.pdf

If macOS 10.12.4+ was previously installed at some point in the past, then you should have access to the online Apple Diagnostics.

You may be able to use a third party M.2 NVMe SSD along with a Sintech SSD adapter (adapter must be compatible with a mid-2012 or early-2013 model). The Sintech SSD adapter is the only one which seems to be recommended because it appears to be the most compatible & reliable. Keep in mind not all SSDs are compatible with all computers or adapters so a third party M.2 SSD is very risky since it requires an extra third party adapter. None of the company's involved will assist if there is any problem since this is a completely unsupported configuration.

You can get the exact model of the Mac by entering the system serial number on the check coverage page here (please do not post the serial number on the forum since it is considered personal information):

Check Your Service and Support Coverage - Apple Support

@Grant is absolutely correct that if you are using a third party NVMe based SSD, then you will need to use & install macOS 10.13+ in order to use the laptop with a third party NVMe based internal SSD. Since the history of this laptop is unknown, using a third party SSD is very risky although you can determine the version of system firmware using the command line while booted to a macOS installer (Internet Recovery or macOS USB installer).

Unfortunately you have two major unknowns here. You don't know any history about the laptop nor about the SSD you purchased. One or both of them may be faulty. Or it is possible the SSD pictured (if an Apple OEM SSD) was made for one specific model and won't work in the other model associated with the A1425 designation. I have personally seen this happen with the Late-2013 - 2015 models. To check if this is the case, try installing Linux Mint onto the SanDisk SSD. Linux won't have any restrictions like macOS does. If Linux Mint works, then you know both the laptop & SSD are good, but you have an SSD that is incompatible with this specific model laptop (at least according to macOS behavior).

You can try creating & booting a Knoppix Linux USB stick unless you have a full external Ubuntu (or other Linux distro) boot drive. I mention Knoppix because it has so many utilities installed by default on the USB boot disk unlike a Linux installer or even a full install of a Linux distro. From the Linux command line you can check whether the physical SSD is seen by using:

sudo  lsblk  -f

If the physical SSD is not seen, then you can look through the Linux boot logs to see what errors may be listed for the SSD. I forget the exact command to use in order to filter the log entries regarding the SSD and I don't have a Linux system available at the moment to confirm, but I think it was something like this:

sudo  dmesg  -tH  |  grep -iE  '^ata|^ahci|^scsi|^sd|^nvme'

The output may include references to an external disk as well since I included "^sd" as well.

If Linux sees the physical SSD, but macOS (or macOS installer) does not, then you likely have a compatibility issue with the SSD.

I think you have identified the major hurdles. you need to have installed a later MacOS [My recollection is High Sierra] to get updated firmware that can allow you to boot for a third party drive. that MAY require a genuine Apple drive. but the firmware is installed on tappovate store on the processor card, so the drive can be swapped out once the firmware has been updated.

The drives that work right out of the box (after firmware upgrade) are made by OWC, specifically for this MacBook Pro.

Using a different commercial drive:

Most of the success stories include the use of a SinTech adapter, but there may be several different ones for different Macs.

if you drive is not seen in Disk Utility, your don't have an adequate adapter in place yet.

SteveMus wrote:

Actually I will make a Knoppix usb and try that.

I forgot to mention that the Mac may appear frozen on the Apple boot picker menu while booting Knoppix due to Mac's firmware and how Knoppix was created. Give Knoppix lots of time to boot.....at some point you should see a Knoppix boot screen of some sort whether the command line/prompt or a GUI interface.

Other versions of Linux don't usually have the same issue. Knoppix is just so useful since so many utilities are installed by default and it has support for so many drivers by default. Unless of course you already have a bootable external Linux USB drive with the full Linux installation (most people do not).

Knoppix may not know anything about a drive using APFS so it may not identify it as such on the output of the first command, but it should still list the drive if it is communicating with the system. It is possible you may not recognize the drive as being listed there.

Unfortunately I need to see the commands you typed as well as the output from them in order to have any idea what is going on there. It could be something as simple as a typographical error (either by you, or perhaps by what I provided to you). It could also be that I made a mistake with the option given to "dmesg" so it would not properly parse the system log.

The command line is very unforgiving, but it usually provides hints to get you in the right direction.

so your Mac is late 2012 or early 2013 13-in model?

do you have a link to that drive's specs?

If you provide pictures of the commands & output of them it would help to understand.

You must use an Option Boot which is holding the Option key down immediately after hearing the Startup Chime. You are unlikely to select the Knoppix USB stick using the Startup Disk utility since macOS doesn't understand the Linux file systems or drive layouts. Only the Mac EFI firmware is able to recognize the bootloader on the bootable Linux USB stick....and that only occurs when booting the Mac normally or from the Apple boot picker menu with an Option Boot.

When using Etcher, it should just transfer the raw image contents of the Knoppix .iso to the USB stick destroying any partitions & file systems. Most boot issues stem from bad USB sticks since the quality of USB sticks is very poor and Macs are very picky about the drives used for booting.

Try using the USB port on the other side of the laptop to make sure it is not an issue with one of the USB ports. Again, booting requires a better connection & drive than just reading a simple data drive.

I know that Knoppix v9.1 & v8.6.1 ENglish DVD .iso images work on Macs since I have used both on some Macs. Perhaps you should try Knoppix v8.6.1 since it is a bit older....maybe it will work better since there have been changes to the v9.1 boot process.

I provided two commands to use in a Linux terminal app to check on the internal SSD. There is another utility that can check the health of a drive (internal or external) providing the SSD is seen by the system and an external adapter/dock/enclosure does not prevent the necessary communication.

FYI, the Knoppix v8.6 version had some issues which were fixed in the 8.6.1 version. It has been too many years since v8.6 was released that I do not recall the issue, but I think it was a boot related issue.