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Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

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61–70 of 422 posts

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#61

Consider options like Framework laptops that let you actually own your hardware, and repair it.

You do not actually own a Framework, though. Unlike say a Raptor Talos II -- the only example I know of, albeit not a laptop.

https://community.frame.work/t/free-the-ec-and-coreboot-only...

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Silly idea in tech, the hardware will be long outdated before someone look for parts which are going to be overpriced, and the company might be gone forever. You can buy common business laptops such as thinkpad and swap the parts easily and cheaply. People aren’t swapping their 2011 i3 for a 2011 i7 if they care about performance; they’re getting an i5 from 2018. None of these swappable parts are unique aside from th…

And the used 2011 i3, that wouldn't become garbage if it were repairable would get sold to someone less performance / price consciousness? Now it gets trashed.

The other comment points it out correctly, no one wants it price conscious or not.

Between the fact that many of them work without issue for years, and the fact that an new equivalent to your 2011 i3 becomes exponentially cheaper over time, repairing it will never be worth it.

A Raspberry PI 4 is a functional computer but costs less than just the CPU of that i3 based machine while trouncing it in performance and power efficiency.

https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/intel-core-i3-2100 https://browser.geekbench.com/v4/cpu/16396722

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#63

Consider options like Framework laptops that let you actually own your hardware, and repair it.

Silly idea in tech, the hardware will be long outdated before someone look for parts which are going to be overpriced, and the company might be gone forever. You can buy common business laptops such as thinkpad and swap the parts easily and cheaply. People aren’t swapping their 2011 i3 for a 2011 i7 if they care about performance; they’re getting an i5 from 2018. None of these swappable parts are unique aside from th…

It's not just about upgrades, in fact it's not even mainly about upgrades. It's about being able to understand the machine, repairing it when necessary and ultimately being able to rely on it. Otherwise your device might be a candidate for the bin after the warranty expired, which can be surprisingly quick.

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#64
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SSDs of 2015-2017 macbooks start failing and they are soldered on the board. I have a 12" that I can only boot from external now otherwise the device would be dead. With the M1 models you don't even have the chance to do this. Apple won't even change the failed ssds they will sell you a new logic board for the prize of a new machine. It's infuriating and the only reason I won't buy a machine until they make user…

I suspect they began soldering it because the cable connecting the disk drive had a lot of problems in older MacBooks. Soldering may have been an easy fix for that. I hate the soldering, too. I'm just offering an explanation that may make some sense given the context.

I like your Ockham razor reasoning, but given the history of this company, it would be very difficult to defend this claim. Soldering the SSD and memory made the device unupgradeable (in contrast to pre-2013 models where I have currently have 2x2TB!).

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#66

I'd be curious what Marcan (Asahi Linux founder/hacker) would have to say about this. Perhaps there's a workaround?

He’s talked about this quite extensively in the past. Here’s a link to the Asahi project docs: https://github.com/AsahiLinux/docs/wiki/M1-vs.-PC-Boot

> iBoot is the main bootloader on M1 machines. It is small. It cannot understand external storage. It does not support USB. It does not have a UI. All it can do is boot from internal storage, and show an Apple logo, a progress bar, and a few error messages.

IIRC he’s said before that iBoot doesn’t even have keyboard support; it can tell if you’re holding down the power button to enter recovery mode, but that’s it. There is no workaround for this; it is not possible to boot over USB if the bootloader does not speak USB.

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#67

This is old information and no longer the case - https://shirtpocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.htm...

I'm not sure your link disproves this article. The first paragraph just says bootable backups are supported (they are by CCC too), and the rest of the page hasn't been changed in years. The SuperDuper blog says: > Note that, as I indicated above, M1 Macs can't readily boot from external drives. There are things you can do, if you have an external Thunderbolt 3 drive (USB-C isn't sufficient), but even that won't work…

The blog entry you're referencing is old. Please follow the link I had provided - https://shirtpocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.htm... - note the recent version number and its respective description.

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#68

Consider options like Framework laptops that let you actually own your hardware, and repair it.

Silly idea in tech, the hardware will be long outdated before someone look for parts which are going to be overpriced, and the company might be gone forever. You can buy common business laptops such as thinkpad and swap the parts easily and cheaply. People aren’t swapping their 2011 i3 for a 2011 i7 if they care about performance; they’re getting an i5 from 2018. None of these swappable parts are unique aside from th…

I'm using a MacBook Air 2015 and it's basically still a fast, perfectly usable machine. Quad core i7, 8GB RAM, SSD. However, I wish I could replace the battery, I wish the SSD was more easily upgradeable, and it would be nice to double the RAM.

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#69
post #39

General grumpiness about this particular design decision aside, it appears that since the T2 Macs, the main SSD was being used to store core system firmware. On T2 I think it's BridgeOS that sends the EFI image to the Intel side to boot it, and it does the firmware verification and loading. This setup has a benefit; namely, it is now impossible to brick the system with a bad BIOS/EFI flash, and you'll never need to u…

This seems like a failure on a part of M1 systems rather than the T2 chip. I have an intel Macbook Air with the T2 chip for touchid, and I have a bootcamp partition that I boot off of via an external ssd over usb3 no problem.

Note that AS Macs still support external boot, just not when the internal drive is dead, since booting relies on the iBoot volume stored on the internal drive.

Re: Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed

#70
post #18

Unsurprising. Given the countless times I have warned about the risks of going 'all in' on an Apple Silicon Mac and now they realise. Good luck with your files if the internal hard drive is dead. Consider creating regular backups otherwise your can say goodbye to your files. No thanks and absolutely no deal to that.

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