iMac Pro - can't install the 10.13.3 supplemental update (from 19.2.2018)

I worked all week with Apple Support giving them logs and all kinds of stuff. I was emailed earlier today saying they removed the old iMac Pro update from the App Store and released a new one that is suppose to fix this issue for us.

(I was going to make a thread about this, but Stefan beat me to it. Here's what I was going to write:)

So I've tried and failed four times to install the macOS High Sierra 10.13.3 Supplemental Update on my iMac Pro. And much more annoyingly, after each attempt, I've had to reinstall the whole operating system. I had no problem installing the update on my MacBook Pro.

First I downloaded the update through the App Store like usual and clicked "Restart" when instructed to... Only to be met with a screen that says "The version of macOS on the selected disk needs to be reinstalled". (That error message BTW returns no search results on Google, which I find very weird and worrying.) At that point, I wasn't sure if it was the update that was the culprit, or some apps that I had just installed before the restart. But now, after three more attempts, I'm sure it's the update.

I was very worried that I would lose all my files if I just went through with the reinstall. After some googling, I managed to copy my files to an external hard drive through Recovery Mode. After that I proceeded with the reinstall.

Okay, so now I had reinstalled High Sierra for the first time. I checked the App Store for updates, and it offered me the Supplemental Update again. I downloaded it, clicked "Restart", and was again met with the message that I needed to reinstall the operating system. I went through with the reinstall again.

After the second reinstall, and after some googling, I tried to download the update through Apple's website (https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1957?locale=en_US) rather than through the App Store. But the same thing happened, I had to reinstall the whole operating system, now for the third time.

So after this, I contacted Apple's support chat, and explained the problem. They advised me to try downloading and installing an older update through their website (https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1952?locale=en_US). The installation went smoothly. Afterwards, the App Store again offered me the Supplemental Update. I tried to install it, thinking that the DL1952 update had fixed the problem. But again, for the fourth time, I was met with the error message that I had to reinstall the operating system.

This has wasted like two days of my time, googling for help, backing up my files to an external drive, waiting for the very slow reinstalls to complete, chatting with support... _Extremely_ annoying.

I've now hidden the Supplemental Update from the Updates tab in the App Store, and I'm obviously not going to try installing it again. There's clearly something wrong with it.

I suspect this is specific to the iMac Pro. As I said, I had no problem installing the update on my MacBook Pro. And interestingly there are separate update files for the iMac Pro and all other Macs:

https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1957?locale=en_US

https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1958?locale=en_US

Some things that might be important:

- I have FileVault full disk encryption on

- I have set a firmware password

- I'm dual booting Windows 10

teemufromkiuruvesi wrote:

Some things that might be important:

- I have FileVault full disk encryption on

- I have set a firmware password

- I'm dual booting Windows 10

FWIW, I suspect you are correct in your assessment that one or more of the three things you've listed are very important.

I had zero problems running the supplemental update on my iMac Pro but I have none of the three situations you have. I have no firmware password, not running FileVault and not dual booting.

I had the same thing happen, got into a continual boot loop. I had to restore from a backup disk to get my computer running again and I still need to do this supposed update again. I am not going to do so till they fix the problem.

Had exactly the same problem. Reinstalled the system for al least 8 times during the lat 20 hours, had the entire internal SSD erased and even tried to install a 10.13.4 beta, but still a no go.

It is ridiculous for such thing to happen, been a Mac user for more than 10 years and never had such bad experience like this one, let alone this is the top model of all Mac at this time.

Removing the firmware password did not help. So now I'm in the middle of my fifth reinstall. And I was not able to boot into MacOS by holding down the option key, unlike Stefan.

At the beginning of the reinstall it said "About 8 minutes remaining". Now, one hour and 46 minutes later, it says "About 2 minutes remaining". 😠 The progress bar is about two thirds full.

BTW, removing the firmware password turned out to be quite an ordeal, which wasted yet a few more hours of my time. I only had a disk password setup, no user account had the ability to unlock the disk with their account password. The solution was to delete the file /var/db/.AppleSetupDone, reboot, and in the presented wizard, add a new admin account with the ability to unlock the disk. Found the solution in some obscure Reddit thread, thanks Reddit.

Those who have the same problem: do you have FileVault encryption enabled? I might try turning it off and then installing the update. I've already wasted probably 20+ hours fighting this thing, might waste a couple more. What a farce.

Hi - I've had a very similar problem after downloading the 10.13.3 supplemental update on my mid 2015 Macbook Air.... Endlessly reporting a fault and then rebooting. It starts OK in safe mode. I tried reinstalling OSX from recovery disk but that didn't work. Restored from an earlier backup from Time Machine and still not happy but the error report changed to a kernel panic problem with a security app called Trusteer... Rapport. Ran the uninstall for this and now everything seems ok .. Interesting that when I check for software upgrades it doesn't offer the supplemental any more so I'm staying with just 10.13.3

Unfortunately, the same thing happened. I assume there is something wrong with updating iMacPro for the time being. As a note, I even have the special Security Settings entirely off and boot from ext drive on. I personally think the iMacPro has so many encryption, security settings, etc, it became so complicated that a simple update can't be done.

I just encountered the same issue after installing the 10.13.3 Supplemental Update on my iMac Pro. After it installed, it rebooted into a screen saying that macOS needs to be reinstalled.

I was able to get back to a working system by rebooting again, holding cmd+R, and restoring from the latest Time Machine backup. It took just a few minutes to restore, and I was up and running again.

Not sure what's going wrong here, but I would have hoped that Apple would have verified this update didn't brick users of their newest and most expensive hardware...

I am having the same issue on one of our iMac Late 2015 (I have two identical machines purchased at the same time same spec - but one of them updates the Supplemental Update no problem... the other returns this same error as you are getting.... very frustrating

I have been having this issue as well. This machine is 14 days old and the only thing installed on it is Java and Xcode.

No firmware password

No Bootcamp

No encryption

Everytime this update installs I'm prompted with "The version of macOS on the selected disk needs to be reinstalled"

Same issue here with a 5K imac 2018. Had to nuke and pave the machine 2 times. Yet no issue on the brand new macbook pro with the 10.3.13 update.

so I am not going to install the supplemental until a newer version comes out.