Bad Terminal command has "lost" my SSD

[Sai22]

I successfully upgraded my 2014 Mac Mini with a SSD blade (PCIe 250GB) - then upgraded to 500GB.
With the upgrade to Big Sur and later to Monterey it was working ok when in use, but when I left it in sleep mode, I would come back to an error/restart message ("your computer shut down because of a problem).
I read that some early Mac Minis used something called a FUSION DRIVE and for some reason I thought this may help me. Until now I had been using my new SSD as a start up disk and the 1TB HDD was sitting there without much activity.
A quick search about resetting a fusion drive brought me to this video

, and I went ahead to open the mac in recovery and type in the TERMINAL COMMAND "diskutil resetFusion", despite not having any coding knowledge at all.
The TERMINAL WINDOW spat out a lot of lines just like what seemed to be happening in the video, and then man with the gentle voice on the you tube video in question instructed me to type "diskutil cs list", here my computer reacted differently and told m I had no CORE STORAGE to list! What to do next? Well, being a complete newbie I decided that was enough and the fusion had been completed 😖
I went to disk utility and now my SSD wasn't showing! I figured that it was in Fusion mode so it had somehow become integrated into the HDD ... but alas, the start up disk was now the HDD and it just wouldn't open Monterey, no matter how long I left it.
I tried restoring to OS X El Capitan, and it started up but still no SSD showing in disk utility. (Not even in Terminal when I type: "diskutil list")
Thank you for reading this far down, is there anything I can do to reverse what I have done? Any commands to type or resets to perform? Can somebody think of something? (Yes, I will get a new M1 Mac Mini but I would also like to save this one). Thanks again.

 

[diego.caraballo]

Hi there!
How about internet recovery?
CMD + R, or Option + CMD + R or SHIFT + Option + CMD + R
When it loads, go to Disk Utility, then click on the upper left "Show all devices".
See if listed there.

 

[Fishrrman]

If there was no SSD in the Mini BEFORE you upgraded, then you didn't have a "fusion" drive.

A fusion drive is TWO physical drives:
- A small SSD
and
- A larger HDD
...blended together with software.

 

[Sai22]

If there was no SSD in the Mini BEFORE you upgraded, then you didn't have a "fusion" drive.

A fusion drive is TWO physical drives:
- A small SSD
and
- A larger HDD
...blended together with software.

You're right, I didn't... I just messed up by trying to create one

 

[Sai22]

Hi there!
How about internet recovery?
CMD + R, or Option + CMD + R or SHIFT + Option + CMD + R
When it loads, go to Disk Utility, then click on the upper left "Show all devices".
See if listed there.

Will try again, but earlier the SSD wasn't showing up, just the HDD

 

[Fishrrman]

I'd advise you to NOT create a new fusion drive.
Just leave the two drives inside.
Let the SSD... be an SSD.
Let the HDD... be an HDD.
You'll get used to having TWO drive icons on the desktop instead of one.

 

[Sai22]

Will try again, but earlier the SSD wasn't showing up, just the HDD

Sorry about the image quality but you can see here that there is only the basic (HDD) drive and no tab offering to "show all devices" - although I had seen that option previously.
The only thing I can think of is something about the command I typed to "resetFusion" has hidden my SSD.

 

[Fishrrman]

What happens if you boot to internet recovery?
Do this:

1. power down, all the way off

2. press power on button and hold down Command-OPTION-R (and keep holding them down a while)

3. If you connect via wifi your wifi password will be needed.

4. The internet utilities take a while to load, be patient as the globe spins.

5. When the utilities are loaded, open disk utility.

6. VERY IMPORTANT:
Does disk utility have a "view" menu? If it does, choose "show all devices".

Can you see the SSD now?

 

[Sai22]

I'd advise you to NOT create a new fusion drive.
Just leave the two drives inside.
Let the SSD... be an SSD.
Let the HDD... be an HDD.
You'll get used to having TWO drive icons on the desktop instead of one.

That is definitely NOT a problem for me, if you read the original post hopefully you will understand that the SSD SEEMS TO HAVE DISAPPEARED, although it is still connected inside the mac mini shell. I believe that happened due to a strange command line I used to try to do something I didn't understand. I have used Two drives (ssd and HDD) for over 2 years and I had no problem with it. I just thought I may be able to solve a crashing issue by fusing them - I regret that move now. I'm wondering / hoping someone may be able to recommend a different command line to make the SSD visible again

 

[Sai22]

What happens if you boot to internet recovery?
Do this:

1. power down, all the way off

2. press power on button and hold down Command-OPTION-R (and keep holding them down a while)

3. If you connect via wifi your wifi password will be needed.

4. The internet utilities take a while to load, be patient as the globe spins.

5. When the utilities are loaded, open disk utility.

6. VERY IMPORTANT:
Does disk utility have a "view" menu? If it does, choose "show all devices".

Can you see the SSD now?

the picture above goes over this

 

[rm5]

@Sai22 I understand the problem—the SSD is not mounting and thus is not showing up in Disk Utility. Try going into Terminal (in Recovery) and type in diskutil list, and see if it shows up. If not, try what I have at the bottom of the post.

Please read this super carefully—the reason the SSD disappeared is because you tried to create a Fusion Drive out of something that is not supposed to be a Fusion Drive (i.e. a NON-Apple-Branded SSD mixed with an Apple-branded HDD). Next time, just keep them separate and it will be fine.

When you type in diskutil resetFusion (which I would assume is the command you typed in), it attempts to create a sort of RAID set (not necessarily a RAID set per se but sort of)—and that REQUIRES the "normal" Apple-branded hardware.

So... how to fix? Try taking out the SSD and putting it back in. I know that's a bit of work, but just see if that helps. If not, try another NVMe SSD—you might have bricked that one.

 

[arw]

That is definitely NOT a problem for me, if you read the original post hopefully you will understand that the SSD SEEMS TO HAVE DISAPPEARED, although it is still connected inside the mac mini shell. I believe that happened due to a strange command line I used to try to do something I didn't understand. I have used Two drives (ssd and HDD) for over 2 years and I had no problem with it. I just thought I may be able to solve a crashing issue by fusing them - I regret that move now. I'm wondering / hoping someone may be able to recommend a different command line to make the SSD visible again

MAYBE the little connector of the blade‘s flex cable wasn’t 100% pushed into the motherboard or got loose over time.
To rule out a simple hardware cause you could re-check all connections.

edit: Although the post above seems more plausible, it doesn‘t hurt to check. Happened to my mini once.

 

[Sai22]

@Sai22 I understand the problem—the SSD is not mounting and thus is not showing up in Disk Utility. Try going into Terminal (in Recovery) and type in diskutil list, and see if it shows up. If not, try what I have at the bottom of the post.

Please read this super carefully—the reason the SSD disappeared is because you tried to create a Fusion Drive out of something that is not supposed to be a Fusion Drive (i.e. a NON-Apple-Branded SSD mixed with an Apple-branded HDD). Next time, just keep them separate and it will be fine.

When you type in diskutil resetFusion (which I would assume is the command you typed in), it attempts to create a sort of RAID set (not necessarily a RAID set per se but sort of)—and that REQUIRES the "normal" Apple-branded hardware.

So... how to fix? Try taking out the SSD and putting it back in. I know that's a bit of work, but just see if that helps. If not, try another NVMe SSD—you might have bricked that one.

Thanks, that's exactly what happened, I really appreciate the explanation. I'll try to take it out and put it back then.

 

[Sai22]

Thank you to all those of you who have replied, I really appreciate your time

 

[Sai22]

MAYBE the little connector of the blade‘s flex cable wasn’t 100% pushed into the motherboard or got loose over time.
To rule out a simple hardware cause you could re-check all connections.

I will give this a go. Thanks

 

[rm5]

Thanks, that's exactly what happened, I really appreciate the explanation. I'll try to take it out and put it back then.

Absolutely! Let me know if you need anything else.

 

[macguru9999]

If there is a blade in there as well, you may need to replace it as its not showing up in utility. BUT, the crashes may have been coz it was nvme and the 2014 mini may not sleep well as the firmware is old (not sure)... best to replace the spinner with a sata ssd in that case, anyways... thats fast enough.

 

[Sai22]

If there is a blade in there as well, you may need to replace it as its not showing up in utility. BUT, the crashes may have been coz it was nvme and the 2014 mini may not sleep well as the firmware is old (not sure)... best to replace the spinner with a sata ssd in that case, anyways... thats fast enough.

Good call, sounds like the way to go!