"Recovery server could not be contacted" Error Message

Thanks for the detailed help, but the most frequently occuring issue here is a discrepancy in the system date, which is likely due to a user resetting the VRam or SMC.

To enable the update server to accept the request, a user must change the date in Terminal to the current date.

Step 1) Press Power Button and immediately press ‘Command + R’ (this will boot computer into Restore Mode)

Step 2) At the option screen, there are 4 Options, however, use the mouse on the Menu Bar (top of the screen) to open ‘Terminal Utility’

Step 3) In the terminal window type the command ‘date’ which will display the time that the system thinks is the current date. If this date is not correct, (will likely say something in 2001), you’ve found the issue.

Step 4) Change the date to the correct time and date by using the ‘date’ command:

date MMDDhhmmYY

Example for January, 1st, 2018 at 12:34 am:

date 0101123418

Once you type the current date and time exactly in the format above, your system will modify the time. You can type ‘date’ then hit enter to have the system display the time, if the system now states the time as that which you entered, you’re ready to move on to restore.

You can now exit Terminal by Command + Q or selecting with the mouse from the menu File > Quit Terminal.

It will bring you back to the main screen which includes those four options. Select ‘Restore MacOS’ then hit Continue.

As long as an internet connection is active, your system will begin downloading the installer files. If you get to the Disclaimer Accept prompt, you’re connected.

PRO TIP: You should use an Ethernet cable to connect your computer to the modem (fastest) or router (faster, depending on hardware), but you can also use Wi-fi (slowest).

You can use Terminal Utility to determine whether you have an internet connection (I’d leave more details here but you should find a help article for that elsewhere.

I ran in to this problem and found a solution....

Actually your Mac looses it's wifi connection sometimes when you wipe your drive. Clicking the wifi button (top right corner) and connecting to the internet will set the correct date and time for you. After that it works, enjoy 👌

mostly it means migration assistant (because let's face it, you are here trying to reinstall macos because migration assistant already failed for you and insisted on keeping a botched transfer of your main account and now will not let you try that again but instead wants you to send your real account to some made-up name that does not conflict with the botched initial transfer that is somehow really really important to preserve), anyway, where were we? right, reinstall macOS. Because Migration Assistant just got confused enough to toast your machine and you can't think of anything better than scrubbing it all and starting over, and like me you are frustrated that there seems no way to do that.

I am searching for the the jealously guarded really-really-wipe-my-machine-and-start-over option, and promise to update this post if i ever find it. They have hidden it well. Does this ever turn out ok?

THE CORRECT TERMINAL COMMAND IS: ntpdate -u time.apple.com

Credit to levlaz here: https://gist.github.com/levlaz/16b63384bd5e1bee3593be0d91aedbd7

Full post below:

I was trying to reinstall High Sierra on an older MacBook Air using internet recovery and I kept on getting an error message when trying to reinstall High Sierra.

The recovery server could not be contacted

It appears that this has to do with the time on the machine not being synchronized, so when the MacBook tries to reach out to the recovery server the certificates do not validate and we get this useless error message.

To fix this.

1. Open up a Terminal from the utilities menu
2. Enter the following command

ntpdate -u time.apple.com

1. Try to install High Sierra again. It should just work™.

If you literally did exactly what he said, then that may be the issue. The numbers provided we're specific to that date and time. Edit yours to match today and the current time.

You gotta enter the current date. It worked for me. Try that. If still error exists, try contacting Apple!

For me it was because I had not reconnected to my wireless network. Just confirm that you are connected and you should be good to go. Check icon in upper right on the menu bar.

This resolved it for me: https://gist.github.com/levlaz/16b63384bd5e1bee3593be0d91aedbd7

This just happened to me but I realised that when you erase the drive it also erases your wifi passwords as well so I wasn't connected to any kind of wifi. Sometimes it's as simple as reconnecting.

Hello! Was just going through this thread as im currently facing a similar situation. Does the date thing still work for a 2013 laptop? Or do i use the current date?

Make sure that you are connected to the interned. As it turned out internet recovery `forgets` wifi settings that you entered at the beginning. Wifi icon is at the top right corner. Cheers.

To fix type

sudo date 0307035919

which is March 7th 03:59 (or 3:59Aam) 2019.

So mmddhhmiyy

all two digits.