filevault stuck on encrypting for days after sierra upgrade

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Level 1

15 points

filevault stuck on encrypting for days after sierra upgrade

I have a late 2011 MacBook Pro which has been a dream until I upgraded to Sierra 10.12. It started freezing up a few days after upgrade. I am not very technical and tried the usual things:

1. Boot into safe mode, same freezing issues

2. Boot into recovery mode and run disk utility on all drives (nothing found)

3. Boot into recovery mode and reinstall Sierra

When I try to reinstall it says FileVault encryption in process. This was days ago. When I boot normally and check on FileVault the status bar stays in the same spot with no estimated time remaining. I am self employed and my Mac is part of how I pay my bills. Any and all help is GREATLY appreciated.

MacBook Pro, macOS Sierra (10.12)

Posted on Sep 2, 2017 2:42 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

laxp50

Level 1

4 points

Nov 28, 2017 6:56 PM in response to hcrim33

This has been taking a long time for me too. It has been encrypting for a couple of days now and the status hasn't changed much. It appears that the encryption status only changes when I'm using the computer. I read about the potential cause in the following thread https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7908056?start=0&tstart=0

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Answer 2

John Galt

Level 10

141,186 points

Sep 2, 2017 4:24 PM in response to hcrim33

If your Mac started "freezing up" then a hardware fault is the likely cause. The fact FileVault conversion is taking a long time with no apparent progress suggests a hard disk drive that is operating in a state of failure.

Replace it, and restore its contents from a Time Machine backup.

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