Apple Silicon Macs can't boot from external drive if internal drive failed • Hacker News Board

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

#271

Post by GhettoComputers » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:16 PM UTC

pvarangot wrote: post #264

GhettoComputers wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which one did you get?

It's a P53 with 32gb ram, 1tb SSD, an i7-9750H and a Quadro. It's a beast. It smokes my one year newer similar MacBook Pro because it actually runs at clock rate because it doesn't get as hot. But no one wants it because it's a niche market to have an ugly workstation on your desk. If I could sell it for something like 1600 I would buy an M1 Mac in a brim but it's really though. They go from 600 to 900 on Craigslist,…

Install hackintosh on it and sell the MacBook.

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

#272

Post by neilalexander » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:17 PM UTC

nsxwolf wrote: post #185

Is this also why you can’t install Monterey on a non-Apple SSD? I haven’t seen an article acknowledging this problem but others are experiencing it in various forums. My 2013 Mac Pro had an SSD failure so I replaced it with a standard M.2 drive and an adapter. Can’t upgrade.

I replaced the Fusion Drive in my 2017 iMac with an off-the-shelf Samsung SSD and had no problems at all upgrading to Monterey.

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

#273

Post by quitit » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:23 PM UTC

kennywinker wrote: post #192

The only lens I care about these days is the impending climate disaster. Technology like this, that embodies a lot of carbon and has a built-in expiration date, is getting more and more upsetting to me. I don't need a faster computer, I need air that will still be breathable in 20 years. My next computer will likely be whatever 5-10 year old laptop I can snatch up on it's way to the landfill. It definitely won't be a…

Landfill and the environment are legitimate concerns.. i’m just gonna quote the website

> The new MacBook Pro has been carefully designed with the environment in mind. The enclosure is now made with 100% recycled aluminum. And we use recycled rare earth elements in all the magnets in the product. MacBook Pro is free of numerous harmful substances and all the virgin wood fiber in our packaging comes from responsibly-managed forests.

Other notable objectives: 1. full carbon neutrality across their supply chain and services by 2030, inclusive of the use of the device. 2. Recycling and refurb program 3. Circular sourcing (e.g reclamation.)

You concerns are valid, but the princess is in another castle.

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

#274

Post by dsego » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:29 PM UTC

GhettoComputers wrote: post #131

UseStrict wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why does it have to be that way? They ship off-the-shelf RAM and SSDs in the Framework fully or partially assembled kits. They released CAD files and drawings for their module system. They actually sell replacement parts for other components, much like an OEM automaker does. If my touchpad dies I'd rather be able to swap it out with a new $100 part than buy a whole new $1500 laptop. It's a new company and have no…

The thinkpad trackpads are $15 new. If you want to get repairable laptops just get business laptops. Don’t be fooled by the marketing, many Dell, HP and Lenovo laptops have those benefits on top of a huge aftermarket which framework doesn’t have and can’t leverage. You can way cheaper buy a broken laptop of the same model and fix yours with it whereas framework will only have their niche market which won’t be cheaper…

Broke my t480s screen, found a replacement from a german online store, ordered it and it came to my address in croatia in a day or two. Went to a local repair shop and had it installed in less than 20 minutes. Imagine doing the same with a macbook, lol.

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

#275

Post by formerly_proven » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:31 PM UTC

marmaduke wrote: post #174

GhettoComputers wrote: post #17

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…

We have a compute cluster made mainly of Westmere-generation Xeons from 2011, which has been the workhorse for research publications from our group for a decade. They are still running fine, the (non soldered, replaceable) ECC DRAM chips are failing before anything else.

Being able to replace memory and storage is very critical for anything that will see a lot of use. Both of these are certainly not "lifetime" items.

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

#276

Post by pvarangot » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:33 PM UTC

GhettoComputers wrote: post #271

pvarangot wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a P53 with 32gb ram, 1tb SSD, an i7-9750H and a Quadro. It's a beast. It smokes my one year newer similar MacBook Pro because it actually runs at clock rate because it doesn't get as hot. But no one wants it because it's a niche market to have an ugly workstation on your desk. If I could sell it for something like 1600 I would buy an M1 Mac in a brim but it's really though. They go from 600 to 900 on Craigslist,…

Install hackintosh on it and sell the MacBook.

Yeah it already runs Hackintosh. The MacBook is not mine, it's my work laptop. What I'm saying is instead of the Thinkpad if I had bought anything Apple with similar performance, like an iMac Pro or a Mini Pro, I would be up around 1000 and now that money just disappeared into nothingness because the used market for PCs suck.

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

#277

Post by GhettoComputers » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:34 PM UTC

formerly_proven wrote: post #275

marmaduke wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have a compute cluster made mainly of Westmere-generation Xeons from 2011, which has been the workhorse for research publications from our group for a decade. They are still running fine, the (non soldered, replaceable) ECC DRAM chips are failing before anything else.

Being able to replace memory and storage is very critical for anything that will see a lot of use. Both of these are certainly not "lifetime" items.

I never had to replace either, although I don't want them non replacable. External/cloud storage can take care of space, and memory corruption is a fear, but nothing I worry about, batteries are worst than both combined.

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

#278

Post by jacquesm » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:35 PM UTC

liminalsunset wrote: post #26

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…

> since whatever failure damaged the SSD is statistically likely to compromise the reliability of the rest of the board

That's a pretty big assumption.

The SSD is the component that is most likely to fail next to the battery.

So effectively this makes the lifetime of the computer the lifetime of the SSD, which is just one shade away from planned obsolescence due to the write limitations of SSDs.

edit: ChuckNorris89 wrote pretty much the same but four hours earlier.

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

#279

Post by kube-system » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:35 PM UTC

Chocola wrote: post #238

kube-system wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you seriously consider a state actor to be a threat, then you likely make many other compromises to your ability to conveniently perform disaster recovery. There is not much overlap between these use-cases: * I need an easy way to recover my family pictures because I didn't make backups and * I have state actors interested in my data If you really have state actor threats, you probably like that M1 Macs are very h…

If you are a state actor you probably love M1 Macs. You literally can't restore them without phoning home. Everone should consider state actors as a threat because they are. They maybe are not specifically after you. But every now and then some big box gets popped leaking all kinds of personal information (including yours) and the actors are probably state sponsored. Also it is not state actors scanning your data, ma…

Your concerns are not unfounded, but there is a very significant functional difference between being generally concerned about data privacy posed by any third-party bad actor, and having a threat profile that includes specific state actor threats.

If you think it is a realistic scenario that the US would serve a warrant against you, then yes, your iCloud backup will probably be disclosed to the authorities. But if this is a real concern of yours, then you probably have much bigger things to worry about than whether your SSD is soldered to the board or not.

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

#280

Post by Wingman4l7 » Tue, Nov 02, 2021, 9:35 PM UTC

quitit wrote: post #273

kennywinker wrote: post #192

The only lens I care about these days is the impending climate disaster. Technology like this, that embodies a lot of carbon and has a built-in expiration date, is getting more and more upsetting to me. I don't need a faster computer, I need air that will still be breathable in 20 years. My next computer will likely be whatever 5-10 year old laptop I can snatch up on it's way to the landfill. It definitely won't be a…

Landfill and the environment are legitimate concerns.. i’m just gonna quote the website > The new MacBook Pro has been carefully designed with the environment in mind. The enclosure is now made with 100% recycled aluminum. And we use recycled rare earth elements in all the magnets in the product. MacBook Pro is free of numerous harmful substances and all the virgin wood fiber in our packaging comes from responsibly-m…

I'm going to call very large amounts of BS on #2 -- Apple devices are infamous in electronics refurbishing circles. Thousands of very functional devices are being scrapped instead of being reused because they are soft-bricked due to never being deregistered from iCloud accounts, for various legitimate reasons that have been discussed ad nauseam (and shouldn't be the responsibility of the end user in any case).

Many solutions have been repeatedly suggested to Apple to mitigate the e-waste damage from this without compromising their supposed dedication to iCloud-locking to prevent theft; they have fallen on deaf ears.