FileVault stuck on "Encryption Paused"

My situation is even worse. Whenever I connect my Macbook to power cable and the Filevault encryption says it's in process but it actually stuck, no move at all. The worse thing is it causes the system to freeze so I now have to run on battery, if I plug in the power cable, the system hangs. It's so annoying.

I also submitted this bug. Hopefully Apple will look into this issue.

I have the same problem as the two people above, after upgrading to Yosemite - it hangs or won't boot when the magsafe power adapter is connected. If the MBP is running on battery it will boot fine and operates normally.

I have a mid 2012 15" MacBook Pro, I upgraded to Yosemite and chose the default setting to use FileVault 2 Encryption. The installation seemed to go well and when I checked the privacy and security settings after installation I could see that FileVault was starting to encrypt my drive (I have a 750gb hybrid hard drive).

However when I restarted the system I started to have problems (please bear in mind that the encryption process was reporting 2 days to completion - this is a background process that is supposed to allow interruption) Then my MBP wouldn't boot at all, it would just hang on the progress bar after I'd entered my password. This was only with the power adapter connected. If I disconnected the power adapter it would boot normally. If I connected the MagSafe adapter once the system has booted the beach ball of doom appeared and the whole thing locked up. I did try launch the activity monitor (and then applied power) but I couldn't glean anything useful.

I have now had to resort to a fresh install of Yosemite with FileVault turned off. I had to erase my main partition to do this. initial testing showed that it was operating normally with the power adapter connected after the fresh install - I'm sure FileVault is the cause.

My theory is that there is a bug in the encryption process which means it can get stuck or stops working correctly - The encryption process will only run when the external power source is applied and this is when I was having trouble. So this seems to match my symptoms. I presume the encryption process attempts to resume at boot or I f there is power connected.

I'm now in the process of running a 20 hour restore over ethernet from my time machine backup. 😢 Fingers crossed. I would give FilwVault 2 a miss.

Right, Filevault 2 is the cause. Just to update, after almost spending the whole Saturday dealing with this (trying to reset PRAM several times, looking for ways to decrypt...). Finally It magically started decrypting process and finished successfully. I don't really know how that happened. I tried to turn it off through Disk Utility and I got the same message saying I have to wait until the encrypting finished to turn it off but somehow it still sends the process to decrypting .

It didn't take me a second thought to turn off Filevault after the decrypting done. Now my Macbook is back to normal phew...

I have been dealing with pretty much the same problem since the 16th. My MBP was stuck encrypting after being prompted to enable FileVault just after my upgrade to Yosemite. After 2 days it looked like it was about to be finished, but then got stuck "Estimating Time Remaining" with less than a millimeter of the progress bar left.

I spent all of yesterday troubleshooting with all the steps everyone has already mentioned. I even played around with Parallels a little to make sure there wasn't some issue there. Finally, using battery power I opened disk utility. Selected my drive, then clicked File, and then Decrypt Drive (may have actually been Turn Off Encryption), MBP immediately started decrypting the drive. Here's to hoping after that completes in a few hours all will back to normal.

Hope this helps.

I did my 6hrs restore from Time Machine and crashed at 80%.

2nd try Another 8hr restore successfully but the booting only stuck at Apple logo.

3rd installing the OS X Mavericks again and successful. I am now able to boot up with personal files and software looks in tact. Except my outlook database among with other settings Needs resetting.

Now downloading Yosemite again and this time will pass the FileVault.

Another one here to chime in on issues with FileVault and Yosemite. I had a complicating issue, I think, with Norton Security (provided by comcast) that is not compatible with Yosemite. The system was extremely sluggish..taking 10-20 min just to bring up a window, much less using an app. After 2 full days of messing with the issue, I finally booted into safe mode, removed Norton, and reinstalled Yosemite. I still can't turn off FV, but at least the system is semi usable. The other thing I noticed is I've lost my speakers (MacBook Pro, Late 2011)

BTW, I couldn't enter a bug report as it wouldn't recognize my Apple ID.

I have found a solution. To forcefully disable Filevault, you have to go to the Terminal application and enter the sudo command "

sudo

fdesetup disable

Update: Although the command does not disable FileVault if the encryption process is on prior to the command execution, it resets it. Basically kickstarting the process once more. I am currently at 90% encryption based off of the information from the "diskutil cs list" command. I have no idea what will happen after the encryption is complete, but the command does work.

Hope this helps.

~ Hik

Source: http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2013/10/22/managing-mavericks-filevault-2-with- fdesetup/

The command was a commonly used command. Didn't think it'll work in this situation though.

Pretty much the same thing happened to me on a late-2013 MacBook Air. Installed Yosemite as an App download over Mavericks. Everything else seems to be fine although I haven't tried my external drive with the TM backup -- probably won't until I know it won't be screwed up.

Haven't previously used FileVault in 6+ years of owning Macs but naively agreed to use it during the Yosemite set-up. Big mistake. From what I can tell, my "fatal" error was not leaving the MacBook plugged in while FileVault ran through its initial encryption routine. Apparently, there's no easy way to fix this mistake or reverse the process & opt out of FileVault but then, on the other hand, a big kick in the kiester to Apple for NOT warning people during setup that (1) encryption takes X amount of time, and that (2) the power cord needs to be plugged in for that whole time. Did, however, say NO to FileVault when doing a Yosemite install + set-up on my late-2013 iMac. All is well there.

I've been on Chat with Applecare today and they couldn't resolve it immediately. They've escalated it to engineers and upper level techs & I am to get at least an update tomorrow via phone call. Will post back to relate what happens and if a solution is provided.

Thanks to all who've posted solutions here - it may be I'll have to use one or more of them!

ETA: the link to bug reports wouldn't recognize my Apple ID either -- maybe this is only for developers or beta-users? Submitted a comment to feedback as well as my Applecare request, so hopefully there will be some action on this bug.

I had the same issue and spent all of yesterday trying to fix it. Unfortunately, my computer was too slow to do anything at all except when on recovery mode. You can start the process of decrypting your files even if the encryption is not fully completed using disk utility in recovery mode by following the steps on this website:

http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2011/11/23/using-disk-utility-to-unlock-or-decr ypt-your-filevault-2-encrypted-boot-drive/

Hope this helps!

Here is my solution

http://himindz.com/blog/?p=116

1. First in order to bring the machine in some usable condition, unplug the power adapter, so that filevault pauses whatever it is doing.

2. Now open the terminal (if you can otherwise try hard rebooting the machine)

3. Then enter following command

diskutil cs revert /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD -passphrase

do not forget to replace /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD if needed.

4. Finally reboot machine, plug the power adapter back and go to FileVault property page in System Preferences. You should see that FileVault now starts encrypting the disk again and now hopefully it is running as expected that is showing the progress bar moving.

Remember a 3/4TB SSD/hybrid hard disk may take more than 6 hours to encrypt or decrypt. So be patient and better leave it working overnight.

Thats all well and fine but it appears if my drive is not "revertable"

Running "diskutil cs list" shows

When I run "diskutil cs revert /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD -passphrase" I get:

Started CoreStorage operation on disk1 Macintosh HD

Error: -69666: This Core Storage operation is not allowed on a sparse logical volume group

This worked for me! Typed in command "

sudo

fdesetup disable

" and my status went from around 1/6 of the bar, to nearly finished. Just 40 minutes more until this horrific thing is over!

Like all of you reported, my MacBook started to become unusable when I turned on FileVault when upgrading to Yosemite. I was so upset! Three days gone with barely being able to use my computer! Thanks!

eltonjpt,It doesn't seem you have the same issue as most of us. We're talking about a problem stating "Encryption paused" reason being "Connect power adapter to resume encryption." even if the computer is fully charged and the adapter is plugged in.

Same issues with no resolutions. Was on the phone with Apple multiple times and they are looking into it. Unfortunately waiting does not work for me and I ended up backing up the drive, reformatted it and re-installed Yosemite (without filevault) since I didn't see the sudo command tips.

FYI, the process will pause under 2 conditions. 1) running on battery and 2) when booted into safe mode. The safe mode boot halts the encryption process and allows you to backup and copy files,

Best to all, no filevault for me.

My FileVault is stuck on the Yosemite update now for 3 days already.. It's just saying "connect power adapter to resume encryption".

I tried everything that was written above in the past 2 pages of posts and nothing...