(Intel, 2014) Mac mini failing to install Mac OS

[skNDstry]

So, long story short, I swapped out the hard drive for an ssd and have been failing to install Mac OS ever since

 

1st problem: after removing the hard drive, I realized that my data to usb cable broke. Great start to the day.

 

2nd problem: keys for recoveryOS goes into internet recovery for some reason. After going into internet recovery to install El Capitan, It shows the apple logo for 1 sec and then goes to prohibition sign and folder w/ question mark. Great. Reseting NVRam doesn't help.

 

3rd problem: using actual shortcuts for internet recovery gives error -50101F after loading the files. Great. 

 

4rd problem: After creating a Big Sur installation usb using terminal and another Mac, it loads fine but then, in the middle of the installation, it comes up with "An error occurred loading the update.". Me thinking that the problem might be the fact that the disk was using Mac OS Extended as its file system, I formatted the ssd. This somehow took an absurd amount of time. Then I used the first aid tool within to check. Nothing was wrong. The same error occurred after the format, failing about 12 minutes till the end of the installation.

 

Basic specs of this Mac mini:

2014

i5 4th Gen (forgot specific specs but shouldn't be big deal (or is it?))

8GB RAM

1T Apple standard hard drive (no hybrid) (This will become a Kingston A400 ssd after upgrade)

 

So... I guess, help? TwT

 

[ProjectBox153]

Have you tried to make a bootable USB drive with something other than Big Sur?

[skNDstry]

3 minutes ago, ProjectBox153 said:

Have you tried to make a bootable USB drive with something other than Big Sur?

Hi! I haven't yet. I don't see why this is a problem right now, but this seems to be a suggestion. I will try doing that now. Thanks for the suggestion!

[septic slayer]

hi if i don't recall incorrectly you can install any version of macos from internet recovery if

you select local file and have the .img file for big sur on a usb stick

 

but i could be wrong

 

[skNDstry]

12 minutes ago, septic slayer said:

hi if i don't recall incorrectly you can install any version of macos from internet recovery if

you select local file and have the .img file for big sur on a usb stick

 

but i could be wrong

 

Hi - Thanks for the suggestion!

 

I will try this later on.

 

After running diagnostics, the code VDH002 comes up. From my understanding it is just a common error from installing 3rd party ssd on Macs? 

1 hour ago, ProjectBox153 said:

Have you tried to make a bootable USB drive with something other than Big Sur?

It seems like that even this suffers from the same problem. *sigh*

[septic slayer]

9 minutes ago, skNDstry said:

Hi - Thanks for the suggestion!

 

I will try this later on.

 

After running diagnostics, the code VDH002 comes up. From my understanding it is just a common error from installing 3rd party ssd on Macs? 

It seems like that even this suffers from the same problem. *sigh*

i have not had that issue my self but it is possible (i run a 2012 macbook pro unibody with a western digital ssd and have not run into issues [but i am running windows 10 so might change something ? not sure tho]) if i might ask what brand ssd are you using ?

maby the ssd brand is not in apple's native suported drives (you know apple likes to lock things down )

 

[skNDstry]

1 minute ago, septic slayer said:

i have not had that issue my self but it is possible (i run a 2012 macbook pro unibody with a western digital ssd and have not run into issues [but i am running windows 10 so might change something ? not sure tho]) if i might ask what brand ssd are you using ?

 

Hi - I am using a Kingston A400. This SSD has been verified to be working before I have installed it into the Mac.

 

Update: For some reason, an reboot attempt shows a new boot option, windows. Upon entering said option just says something along the lines of "No valid boot device found", "enter boot device and press any key" etc. any clues?

 

 

[septic slayer]

2 minutes ago, skNDstry said:

Hi - I am using a Kingston A400. This SSD has been verified to be working before I have installed it into the Mac.

 

Update: For some reason, an reboot attempt shows a new boot option, windows. Upon entering said option just says something along the lines of "No valid boot device found", "enter boot device and press any key" etc. any clues?

 

 

it would help alot if you could send me a picture of the screen and the message 

 

[skNDstry]

13 minutes ago, septic slayer said:

it would help alot if you could send me a picture of the screen and the message 

 

Hi - will do tmr morning. Jez, its 4 in the morning wtf am I doing

 

anyways, is it possible that this is not working because of outdated firmware?

 

Usb image confirmed to be OK. Still doesn't work. Going try to put El Capitan on this puppy and see it if work miracles.

 

Cheers guys  

[Flannelist]

1 hour ago, skNDstry said:

After running diagnostics, the code VDH002 comes up. From my understanding it is just a common error from installing 3rd party ssd on Macs? 

It seems like that even this suffers from the same problem. *sigh*

This could be the case, sometimes those errors come up if the diagnostics cannot find a recovery partition, or various things that may not actually be failure of the drive itself. I have had that happen before when working on Macbooks with known third party SSDs in them.

You said this drive was verified to be working before? How did you format the drive before attempting to install?

[skNDstry]

13 minutes ago, Flannelist said:

This could be the case, sometimes those errors come up if the diagnostics cannot find a recovery partition, or various things that may not actually be failure of the drive itself. I have had that happen before when working on Macbooks with known third party SSDs in them.

You said this drive was verified to be working before? How did you format the drive before attempting to install?

Hi - it seems like that it may be an issue with the recovery partition. The drive had gone through a lot of forms of formatting, but for the few latest attempts, these were in apfs. Is there something that I'm missing on? Thanks!

 

[Flannelist]

8 minutes ago, skNDstry said:

Hi - it seems like that it may be an issue with the recovery partition. The drive had gone through a lot of forms of formatting, but for the few latest attempts, these were in apfs. Is there something that I'm missing on? Thanks!

 

First, if you're trying to go to recovery and it goes straight to internet recovery, this is expected behavior. The recovery partition would have been on your old drive if this unit doesn't have flash storage (so no fusion drive). if you're getting errors booting into internet recovery now, I would suggest removing the coin cell battery on the board to remove all power to components, wait a bit (like 10 minutes) and then put it back in. I would normally say try reseating RAM, but I know that unit doesn't have upgradeable RAM.

Also, if you're getting Windows boot options, if you ever used that SSD for a windows install before, there may be partitions you didn't remove during the format (they may not have been labelled, or hidden). In which case I would look in disk utility, there should be an icon towards the top that says View under it (looks kind of like the usual sidebar icon). if you click this, select view ALL devices. Usually this will allow you to see the whole disk, not just labelled volumes.

[skNDstry]

5 minutes ago, Flannelist said:

if you're getting errors booting into internet recovery now, I would suggest removing the coin cell battery on the board to remove all power to components, wait a bit (like 10 minutes) and then put it back in. I would normally say try reseating RAM, but I know that unit doesn't have upgradeable RAM.

Hi - wondering could you clarify on this a little more?

 

So its kind of interesting. Using the method to recover to the factory macOS version does not throw errors. However, after installing, the macOS disk then fails to boot.

 

Whereas the method to install latest version just fails halfway through installation.

 

So could you dig a bit deeper? My ElCapitan image just finished downloading, so I will try creating boot images from this now and see if this works. 

 

Cheers!

[Flannelist]

5 minutes ago, skNDstry said:

Hi - wondering could you clarify on this a little more?

 

So its kind of interesting. Using the method to recover to the factory macOS version does not throw errors. However, after installing, the macOS disk then fails to boot.

 

Whereas the method to install latest version just fails halfway through installation.

 

So could you dig a bit deeper? My ElCapitan image just finished downloading, so I will try creating boot images from this now and see if this works. 

 

Cheers!

I didn't realize it said you only got errors when you intentionally tried to boot to internet recovery. Still weird. But I wouldn't worry about it if you can get in using the regular recovery mode keyboard shortcuts. So totally disregard that.

Definitely try installing from the El Capitan image, shouldn't be a huge issue to go from El Capitan to Big Sur, but I wouldn't be surprised if some weird things cropped up. And I would still look into the disk utility thing I mentioned I mentioned. I will be curious to see how you make out.

[skNDstry]

Hi - good / bad news

So, El Capitan install failed.

However, it points to fail to repair / verify file system.

Hmmmm...

I am now doing a low level format, as inspired by previous post.

 

Hopefully this gives me a completely clean disk to work with. However, I am still concerned with the VHD002 error from diagnosis. Non-the-less, I'll try to see how this works out.

 

Cheers!

 

Ah, BTW, why is there no TRIM support? Is it just with MacOS, or is it something else that shouldn't be happening? 

[skNDstry]

1 hour ago, Flannelist said:

I have had that happen before when working on Macbooks with known third party SSDs in them.

Ah, on that note, the Kingston shows up all fine. System information also shows this correctly. Kind-off wondering what the heck is wrong with Mac OS...

[skNDstry]

Okay - totally out of being expected.

 

The ssd died.

 

Probably the controller. Its a A400, with a phison s11 that had been failing all over the place.

 

Even with a secure erase,  it still does not work. Even for windows.

 

Anyways, thanks everyone for replying to this topic and I gladly appreciate your contributions :D.

[skNDstry]

Okay, guys, final update on the situation.

 

First, I have to thank all of you for the input to this thread. Without the input of all of the members of this threat, my ssd and my mac mini will probably have gone into the bin.

 

Secondly, it is fixed. It is happily running on MacOS (Despite being disembowelled lol Poor mac), as such in the pictures.

 

To those that

On 2/23/2021 at 5:42 AM, Flannelist said:

I will be curious to see how you make out.

what I did was beyond complicated and I should have just ditched the ssd. Certainly not worth the trouble lol.

 

So, here is what I did to attempt to save the drive

1. Disk utility

2. Diskutil command line

3. DD erase command

4. Parted Magic

5. Windows PE

6. Some weird chinese version of windows PE that I found on a chinese website

7. Windows to USB stick. Then, I figured that there was something wrong with the mac's handling of the ssd.

 

So, the final solution took less than an hour.

1. Completely disassembled the Mac to take out the ssd (You literally only need a screw driver, some fingernails, two hex bits and some luck that you don't kill your mac by ESD)

2. Rammed the SSD from the Mac into my Windows PC

3. Fired up Kingston SSD manager that wouldn't work in any shape or form on a mac (If anyone knows why, please tell me!)

4. Oh no! The ssd is partitioned!

5. Windows ey, diskpart, enter, list disk, select disk 1, clean, format quick fs=NTFS

6. Back to Kingston SSD Manager. Wait WTF it is still frozen???

7. Slept my pc and woke it up. Hurray! It is not frozen!!!

8. Pressed secure erase. Wait its THAT fast??? (Literally, 2 seconds, and the job is done)

9. Plugged the ssd back in

10 Internet recovery. WTF? still -5101F?

11. Ran Diagnostics. What???? No errors????

12. Lets Net install El Captain for a try!

13 (an hour later, after playing the piano) WTF still 12 hours to go???? Apple, are ur servers okay???

14. Ran our of patience. Found a samsung bar lying around on my desk and made el capitan boot disk

15. installed in 15 minutes.

 

So yeah, thanks for all for their input! Hurray! Now its time to assemble the mac together without finding out that there is an extra screw

 

 

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