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Updating to High Sierra interrupted to a "flashing folder w/ question mark"

Hi everyone, I got a problem when updating my operating system from Sierra to High Sierra.


I have a mid-2014 version MBP retina (A1502) running the last version of macOS Sierra, but last night I run into a weird problem when updating it to macOS High Sierra. I let it download the files and restart to do the installation for hours. When I came back, I found a folder with a question mark blinking on the screen. Something was wrong, it went too high.

User uploaded file

Following was what did:


1. I forced shut down and restarted it.

2. Hold the "option" key when booting (because holding command+c give me the same ? folder flashing), and the system let me choose a wifi network to "internet recovery", see the following beautiful picture:

User uploaded file


3. After that I was able to see:

User uploaded file

4. "Reinstall OS X" doesn't work, because it failed to find a disk. I tried to repair my disk. Click the  on the top left. There was an option called "Startup Disk". But I cannot found the start-up disk in the window:User uploaded file

What is wrong with my mac, the hard disk is physically permanently but strangely damaged? Is there any possible solution to try to save it?


Thanks, everyone.

MacBook Pro with Retina display, macOS Sierra (10.12.6), mid-2014 MBP

Posted on Nov 15, 2017 5:55 AM

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Posted on Nov 15, 2017 6:41 AM

The question mark folder means your Mac cannot find a valid system to startup from. It sounds like your hard disk is failing/failed. If you have another disk with a system on it try starting from that. You'll probably need to replace the hard disk. Hopefully you have a good backup. If not, after installing the new drive, put the hard disk in an enclosure and you may be able to recover your data that way.

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Updating to High Sierra interrupted to a "flashing folder w/ question mark"

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