Sierra install stuck a 5 minutes remaining

That's about two days too long.

Force the Mac to shut down by holding its power button depressed for at least five seconds. It may fail to restart, but you really don't have any choice but to do that. If it does not restart, you will need to repeat the exercise. It's not possible to determine the reason it stalled at "about 5 minutes remaining".

Hi, I also faced the same problem while clean reinstallaing mac OS Sierra and thought the download stucks everytime.

Whwn the instqllation starts it does not tell the correct time of 6 minutes or 5 minutes remaining. You just gow to windows tab and look for Installer log. In installer log just click show all Process. In that you will see that Mac os is downloading chunk file which are 471 in number and each chunk file takes approximately around 2 minutes. So if you can see the chunk files downloading then dont worry macOs is downloading on your device.

For my mac it took around 13 hours to complete the download and once you have started the installation please do not cancel it. Your downloading depwnds upon your internet network. Even if the download is interrupted you can reconnect it to the internet and it will begin from where it left off.

So dont forget to check installation log if its progressing then no need to worry Apple does that often.

I had this problem trying to upgrade to Sierra on my MacBook Pro, which is about 5 years old. I decided in the end just to try holding the power button down to force it to turn off, then simply turn it on again. To my surprise it started up sweetly with the old OS, and the Sierra install icon had vanished. I won't be upgrading to Sierra after all, since this is now my secondary machine. Or I'll wait a few more months until Apple have sorted out the problems with Sierra; long experience has shown that this is how it generally happens and being an early adopter is a bad idea. I have Sierra on my new machine anyway and tbh can't see many differences.

I have similar situation on iMac (fast internet connection). It has downloaded and apparently installed most or all of the software but has stopped on the loading screen with the loading bar full (black). I tried once to restart manually but that just pushed the loading bar to 2/3 full; it reached the end (full/black) then has apparently stopped again. Guess I'll give it another hour before restarting again.

I have similar problem...

I am updating my MacBook Air 2011 to Sierra, and after downloaded the new OS, the Mac rebooted and now is on the white screen with the black apple in the middle, and the progression status bar showing to be close to the end... it is already 24 hours (1 full day) in this status!!! I can hear the fan working very fast like when I use the Mac with heavy applications.

Command + L does not work

What should I do?

Many Thanks in advance

I was experiencing errors on start up and I too wanted to erase the hdd and reinstall MacOS Sierra however it was stuck at "5 minutes remaining".

After I cancelled the download and forcefully shut down my macbook, I pressed CMD+R and the system asked for the network and loaded the factory settings (OS X Mountain Lion). I am now planning to just update the MacOS to Sierra and hopefully everything will be working smoothly from there. Not the most efficient way to restore your Macbook.

I am almost in the same situation. Installing Sierra on my Macbook air and it is on the installation screen with the apple in the middle and the installation status bar fully completed.

I tried both SMC and PRAM reset but nothing changed.

I do not have any backup on time machine, and I would like to keep some photos stored on this mac, at least.

Hello,

Did you solve this problem ? I'm having the same issue since 4 days. I did recovery mode but can't download high sierra as it gets stuck somewhere in download. I tried 4 times download starts but it is stucking last 50min or 1 hour. Can you help me please ?

thanks, same exact thing happened to me with my Macbook Pro (about 5 years old). Hung after 1st install reboot, was at max progress bar and I hit the power button to hard reboot and it came back with the new Sierra OS but all my old apps/files which surprised me as I was expecting a clean install. Depending on how things look I may redo the whole process and format the disk first (didn't do that this time). Good thing it is a non-primary work device that I don't need anything off.

Go up to the status bar and click install macOS sierra. Click services and then show errors and progress. I thought mine was frozen but now I can see there is very slow steady progress. Mine said 5 minutes to start and has taken 20 so far and is at .365935% so I'm not sure if it will finish but it IS working even though it appears frozen.

Thanks Eric Root for replying.

I did the shutdown and restart, it back exactly where it was before the shutdown, although stuck again there for 6 hours. I did the shutdown again and restart, but nothing changed, the Mac back at the same situation and still there.

So, what now?

PS: missing you Steve!

I tried everything but noting worked. Spent 2 whole days researching blogs, calling apple, and doing all the methods recommended. Nothing worked. Finally I had to erase my hard drive, and install Sierra all over. Worst of all, macbook air worked better before Sierra. Big disappointment I get from mac after many years of enjoying their laptops.

Hi! I'd go back to Recovery mode (CMD+R or Apple+R) and start from the beginning. Format the target HDD before and Restart again in Recovery mode and check the progress (real progress bar) with CMD+L . There you will see the packages that are getting downloaded in order to install, you just have to pray Apple servers won't get slow and take you from a 6 min job to an over night job😮. It's not the internet connection, not the 2700Euro you spent is just Apple making fun.

My MacAir still stuck on full installation status bar without progressing.

I have tried with booths resets SMC and PRAM, but no luck.

Cmd + L does not work

I do not have any backup for this and need to recover some photos from in there before scratching everything.

Thinking to create a boot disk on USB key with OSX, although the instructions I have found out around are not really clear on how to make it, especially for OSX versions before Sierra.

Any help?