TarDisk and Mojave

Hello Jim,

Yes to following the instructions. Here is what I did. I backed up anything that needed to be backed up and un-peared my Tardisk and then re-formated it to HFS+ and named it TarDisk. (Then run FSCK if you feel the need). I then installed Mojave and got it up and running. (You do not have to do this first if you don't want to) Once it was up and running, I backed it up to a portable drive as my time machine backup. I then followed the steps on the Pear_TarDisk_Mojave.pdf.

Note: While you do copy the Sierra installer to a USB stick, you do not actually install Sierra. It is merely to change the structure of the file system back to HFS+ when Mojave has changed it to APFS. Once that is done, you go then restore your time machine backup of Mojave and everything works great. About the PDF...let me know how and I will send it to you.

Tp

Do you still have the Tardisk installed and peared? If so I would remove it and try to install Mojave just on the apple hard drive. That's the only way I was able to get Mojave installed on my MacBook. I then was able to restore my documents and files through time machine. There is an option to just restore particular items and not do a full restore. Then I would reinstall the Tardisk and reformat it to APFS and just use it as an external hard drive that happens to be always plugged into your MacBook. You can then go to system preferences, users and groups, login items and make sure that it launches the Tardisk every time your computer is restarted. That's what I did and although it's not the way I wanted to use it it works. I moved all my photos and documents to my Tardisk and it seems to work fine. I moved my home folder as well but it seemed to cause slow downs and random freezes so I moved it back to my apple hard drive. I don't use iTunes otherwise I'd move that folder as well. I use Plex connected through a NAS but that's a whole other conversation.

The Tardisk doesn't support High Sierra. So again if it's still installed on your computer it will not work. You need to remove the Tardisk and then upgrade. There is no reformatting except to turn the Tardisk into an SD card that happens to be plugged into your computer. I spent hours at the apple store learning all this the hard way.

I've had the same issue , but I needed my Mac... so ejected Tardisk, nstalled Mojave, restored (somewhat) from backup

(note to self - backup to Disk shares not user shares on a network drive - Time Machine doesn't fare well with user shares...). That got me going again...

I did get in contact with Tardisk - with the same Luis - and essentially what you have to do is:

backup your HD

Erase and reformat the Tardisk

Download a High Sierra installer to the Tardisk

Reformat your HD to HFS+ using the high sierra installed on the Tardisk (you are NOT installing High Sierra on the HD)

restore your backed up HD (with Mojave) onto the HFS+ formatted HD.

Erase and reformat the Tardisk once more

Then I arranged with Luis for him to reinstall the Pear on my Tardisk (as I'd lost my original receipt in the partial user share debacle)

He did that via a Google remote desktop session - took 15 minutes.

I am now back to a peared drive....!

I was a little apprehensive, to be sure, but was actually very pleased with the response from Tardisk. They were responsive, and worked with me (despite my lack of receipt) to get the re-install done.

I am now on a HFS+ drive of course, but I guess i will be more careful about future upgrades - and I will definitely un-Pear first.... Hope that reassures you

Mike Souter

One note - I don't recommend wiping your hard drive and attempting to restore from backup, because Mojave's APFS file system is apparently incompatible with TarDisk and you won't be able to Pear it back. You will therefore not be able to restore the backup, because if you were using any of the extra storage at all there will not be enough space on your drive to do so - you'll just be back down to your base hard drive storage capacity.

Even if you manage to reinstall High Sierra somehow, that OS mandates APFS for all solid state drives as well - unless you have a Fusion Drive or old-school spinning hard drive, you'll be unable to Pear under High Sierra either, and thus unable to restore. You'd have to find a way to go back to Sierra and Pear under that OS. Then you could try to upgrade to High Sierra, which doesn't mandate APFS for Fusion Drives, and only then would you be in a position to restore. Not a terribly workable workaround.

Painful as it may be, the majority of us should simply wait for a solution from the company.

I've sent TarDisk a detailed email about the problem and pointed out that it's an emergency for virtually every user, since just about everyone's going to want to do the upgrade. They knew about the APFS compatibility issue long ahead of time and it's not okay that they didn't warn us not to upgrade.

Okay, they got back to me. It actually only took them two days (and they got back to me on a Saturday, no less), but they still apologized for the delay, so minor point in their favor.

Here's the text of the email I got:

Really sorry for the delay to answer. I was checking your issue and the Mojave Compatibility with TarDisk. We have a guide to Pear the TarDisk on the new Mojave OS (I'm attaching it to you). In your case, you will need to reinstall your OS, install the TarDisk and restore from Time Machine backup after that. We are aware of the issue to upgrade to the new Mojave OS. For now, we have a guide to Pear the TarDisk on the new OS and we are looking for the answer to the upgrade issue. Please let me know if you need any further help.

I'm not entirely clear on how I'm supposed to do the "reinstall your OS" bit when I'm still stuck in the Mojave install loop, and have asked for further clarification. I think he meant that I have to format the drive and install a clean copy of Mojave, as others have done here, because he indicated that the document he provided was a guide to installing it on a system where Mojave is already up and running.

In the meantime, they still haven't posted the Mojave Install Guide to their web page (and OMG they really need to do that), so I'm posting it here in its entirety. I recommend following these instructions very carefully. Don't be intimidated by Terminal -- it doesn't bite.

The usage of first person singular in that final sentence implies to me that there's exactly one guy working on this. Less than encouraging, but it this works, that's what matters.

Thinking on my feet here, but I'm going to go ahead and wipe the drive and do a clean install -- it's the only thing he could have possibly meant and there's little point in waiting another couple of days for the clarification.

I'll let y'all know how it goes.

Hi all:

I just stumbled across this problem myself. I have a MacBook Pro from 2014, 15”, 256GB SSD and a 128GB TarDisk. After installing Mohave, the computer will not boot. I have run disk check and repair from the recovery console. I also attempted to restore from a network TimeMachine backup and that also failed. The TimeMachine backup restored back to the disk, but when I tried to boot up, I got a 'no' circle symbol which I understand means the computer cannot find a folder to boot off of, is that right? I did a repair after that again from the recovery console and it still booted to the 'no' symbol even though the disk appears fine.

It looks like there is virtually no way to upgrade without removing the TarDisk, re-formatting the SSD, and re-installing Mohave? Is that the consensus?

Update: I got this response from TarDisk after I emailed them from a corporate email address (they seemed to ignore my gmail addresss).

"Yes, that's right. You need to Unpear the TarDisk, restore your system, upgrade to Mojave, update your Time Machine backup and we can install the TarDisk after that. I'm sending you the instructions to Unpear the TarDisk now. Please let me know if you need any help.

Please follow this guide paying attention to all the steps! Do not forget to reduce the used disk space on your Macintosh HD to at least 20%. Turning your File Vault OFF is also really important.

Make sure to select the proper OS X version!

Let me know if you need any help!

Best regards,

Luiz Carlos

Customer Support,"

Sorry you are having some many issues. Have you tried booting up and then downloading Mojave? Once downloaded place the file on USB drive and make it a bootable USB using ”Install Disk Creator” or a similar free option. Once you have done this, boot to the Boot selector by holding option key when you hear the Mac chime. While off make sure you remove the TarDisk. Install Mojave and follow the instructions I posted a few pages back.

Let me know if you run into issues.

Just to let everyone reading know, yes, I did go ahead and unPear the TarDisk chip. The process was complicated only slightly by the facts that a) the instructions from TarDisk are a bit scant for people using High Sierra and b) they actually printed out missing a step on my first attempt - so if you follow in my footsteps, READ what you've printed first to insure you got everything!

I even skipped ahead a bit, killing two birds with one stone. Prior to the unPearing, I created a bootable USB flash drive using instructions I found from a British tech mag's website (a quick Google search will turn up plenty of reliable articles on the topic). As suggested by the mag, I used a 16 Gb drive rather than the minimum recommended 8 Gb. I then moved as many files as I had to off the Mac onto an external hard drive to get the storage down to only 80% of original capacity, backed up with Time Machine and went ahead with the unPearing process. (I pre-formatted the external 1 Tb drive to the new file format, APFS, just as a precaution. A word of warning - when I later attempted to make a backup of my Mac using MacOS Extended to the APFS-formatted external drive, I was told it would reformat the drive to the older disk format!)

Before completing the final few unPearing steps, which involved restoring the Mac and my files to whatever OS I had from the backup (in this case, it was High Sierra), I just went ahead, booted to the Mojave USB flash drive with command-R, used Disk Utility to format the internal SSD to APFS and the TarDisk chip to MacOS Extended (the most recent format version I was allowed to select, both for the 256 Gb TarDisk and my old USB flash drives ranging from 8 Gb to 32 Gb), then installed Mojave right away, which asked me for my files from Time Machine and went ahead copying them for me.

The upgrade appears to be running perfectly smoothly. I've got my iTunes library running from the old un-Peared TarDisk chip, using it in essence like a second SSD (which is really what it is, when you get down to it) and will probably throw some personal files there as well. I don't think Time Machine will back up the second drive (I haven't put anything of substance there yet, nor have I attempted a backup yet), but it's not the end of the world to simply copy the files stored there manually to my 8 Tb MyCloud drive.

In the end, it was a bit on the time-consuming side and there was a little bit of nail-biting on my end, but it wasn't a terribly painful process at all. I'm not a rocket scientist/computer technician, just a knowledgeable computer user for the past four decades or so - I know a little bit under the hood, but that can be just enough to get one in trouble at times! In this case, though, I think it served me well - I knew that in a worst-case scenario, I'd taken enough precautions that at the least I'd get my Mac up and running again, and if all else failed there was always the Genius Bar.

It's a shame that the TarDisk no longer functions as smoothly as it's supposed to - but for me, it NEVER functioned as smoothly as it's supposed to. I do like being able to put my computer to sleep mode without it crashing nearly every time like clockwork, that's for certain. Adjusting to having two quarter-terabyte drives instead of one larger half-terabyte drive will take a bit of time, to be sure, but I enjoy having a smoothly operating Mac again.

Okay, here's the deal for everyone with the TarDisk and APFS dilemma. There is a way to create your own 'Fusion' drive via the 'Terminal' application. However, by following the steps outlined, it WILL ERASE both your hard drive/SSD and TarDisk. (IOW: do either a Time Machine backup, beforehand, or a Carbon Copy Cloner image backup.)

By following the steps outlined in the URL below, you will create your own 'Fusion' drive. This will combine the storage space of your HDD/SDD and the TarDisk. There is no need for pearing. I have tried this, it is involved and time-consuming, but at the end of the day it works. My late-2013 MacBook Pro 15 Retina which was originally configured with a 256GB SSD now has a total of 512GB of storage. (256GB SSD and 256GB TarDisk). My MBP is running macOS Mojave on top of the AFPS file system with no problems.

Hope this helps.

https://www.macworld.com/article/2014011/storage-drives/how-to-make-your-own-fus ion-drive.html

I've been reading some of the stories of folks who weren't able to update to Mojave with a TarDisk, and just wanted to take the time to reiterate that as I reported on January 3rd, I was able to successfully do the upgrade following stephaneCal's method. It's now January 19th with no discernible problems. And I did not need to go through Luis @ TarDisk to accomplish this.

The only gotcha I experienced was that I chose to restore from my Time Machine Backup (done while I was on High Sierra). While the process worked, I found my machine to be sluggish, using a lot of memory and giving me the spinning ball many times. So I did what stephaneCal had originally done and made a copy of my most important files to an external drive, reformatted my new fusion drive again (with Mojave), reinstalled all of my applications, and then brought back all the important files that I needed. It took a while, but doing a clean install of the applications like Office 365 and Adobe products seem to do the trick, and now my MacBook Air 2017 is good as new. If you're brave enough to attempt this upgrade and still want to keep your HD + Tardisk as one virtual drive, this method definitely worked for me.

I have installed Mojave on a system using a Tardisk without issue. I was running High Sierra previously and did a regular install and it worked fine. I ultimately decided to completely reformat the computer and do a clean install as I was having issues Mail and a couple other native apps but once I did a clean install it runs fine (with the exception of some minor bugs here and there that I don't think are related to the fusion drive)

Mojave actually brings supports for APFS on Fusion Drives FYI

One important note — as was mentioned earlier in this forum, we've determined that the Sierra installer required in the first step of the guide TarDisk forwarded cannot be downloaded from Apple after you've upgraded to Mojave. So in the steps I posted this morning make sure you download the Sierra installer before you do anything else on that list, so that it will still be available on your machine after the upgrade.

The installer apparently does not actually have to be run at all for the process laid out in the guide to work — it just has to be present on the machine.

You can download the Sierra installer from here: Get macOS Sierra

Hopefully it stays intact and useful after the Time Machine restore on Mojave.

Oh, I see. If what you are looking for is ultimately Mojave running smoothly, then I would say go ahead and install. I have Mojave running with no issues. I had to downgrade my file system to HFS+ but no noticeable issues after doing it. My Mac runs as good as it always has.

Let me know if you need more help.

Tp

I was experiencing all of these symptoms. I Have a Late 2013 Mac Book Pro, Was on High Sierra with a peared Tardisk 256 + 256. Was experiencing the Sleep crashing, spinning wheel etc etc. I decided I would be happy to unpear and just use the tardisk as a permanent extra drive. Upgrade to Mojave? well, that was a second priority.

I read every article in this thread and I want to say a huge thank you to all contributors. Your successes and questions helped me plan a course. I'm no guru - nor am I a goose. I have never delved so deep into a Mac before and have learned heaps from doing this.

I tried once to get help from Luiz, but I guess he was too busy to answer. So it was down to reading this thread and using common sense. Firstly I did a time machine backup where I was up to and put that USB Drive away for safe keeping.

One huge hurdle for me was the instructions for un-pearing the Tardisk if using High Sierra.

The info on the Tardisk support page said to reduce data to 80% of original - so down to less than 204 GB for me. I did that :-) And guess what - the sleep crashing stopped. OK. Now I did a whole new time machine backup on a different USB Drive so I could recover back to here once I had expelled the Tardisk. So then to the next step.

It said to Disable or turn off the file Vault thing. Well mine wasn't turned on - so I couldn't turn it off. OK - skip on to next step. Then it says - turn off computer, and take out the Tardisk. NOTE If YOU'RE USING HIGH SIERRA DON'T TAKE OUT THE Tardisk. it said. Hmmm. So I didn't take it out. Well, you guessed it, When I rebooted I still had my 500 GB drive - the thing was still peared. After all - I hadn't done anything, so there was no change.

I decided that at some stage I had to take the plunge and take out the Tardisk. So I read your articles again and decided that I should create a USB Bootable recovery media. It seemed from the readings that Luiz said that one should have the OS X Sierra system available. So I googled how to make the USB recovery installer, and I found a download of Sierra (as opposed to high sierra). Made that USB media and had it on standby. Then I also went ahead and made a Mojave one, just for good measure.

After much hesitation and many cups of espresso, I said my goodbyes and I turned my Mac off. Then removed the Tardisk. Then rebooted. Of course it didn't reboot. So I rebooted Command + R with the USB recovery media with Sierra on it. Tried to use Disk Utility to see if I could re-format the SSD Hard drive, but I couldn't seem to achieve that. Sorry about the lack of memory here but I tried lots of things and was getting nowhere. After a couple of attempts to restart Command + R I received some grave error messages, and I had managed to Erase the SSD. So now there was nothing. I new I had reached a deep and dark place when I saw a black screen and a Spinning Globe (map of the world) and a message that the Mac was searching for an recovery OS on the internet. I'd never seen that before.

Here's a thing. I had NO OS installed - and a blank SSD. How was this computer going to access the internet wirelessly with no router password or anything. ???

So the globe just spun and spun. Eventually I turned it off - and thought I can't go lower than this. So, nothing to loose. Turned it back on and got the spinning globe again. Just left it alone for a while and miraculously, I feel, it had downloaded a recovery OS - the same one as when I bought the computer, it was Mavericks. That took me back. Well, I installed that OS and was really encouraged when I had restored the computer back to where it was when I bought it.. So, another coffee to celebrate.

So then I thought I would try to do the time machine restore to the one I made after reducing the data to 80%. That wouldn't work, because the backup was done with a newer OS. So I then did an OS update. Sorry I can't remember whether I used the Sierra USB media that I'd made or whether I just downloaded the update of the OS to Sierra through the usual update OS method. Well, that worked. I now had a computer running Sierra. Then I tried doing the time machine restore - and Bingo! My Mac was restored to High Sierra and All my stuff - including parallels VM was all there and working better than ever. Phew.

1 hour later, having had no more problems I upgraded to Mojave. That worked perfectly! The file system was now APFS.

Then I reformatted the tardisk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and it seemed fine. So, lastly I went to System preferences, Users-Groups, Login Items and added the SD Card (Tardisk) there so it will always be there ready when I restart.

Computer sleeps happily and seems to be running better than ever. Happy times.

I still want to know how the dead computer can get through my router with no password and download an operating system. Can anyone explain that?