High Sierra Boot Drive Issues

[schmadrian]

Hello, all. I'm on a late-2012 iMac. I've created a boot drive of a 500Gb SSD external drive. The problem is that when I boot from it, I'm immediately shown the macOS Utilities screen, offering me choices of Restore From Time Machine Backup, Install macOS, Get Help Online and Disk Utility.

Any insights?

Thanking you in advance,


schmadrian/

 

[KeesMacPro]

How did you make the boot drive e.g. createinstallmedia, carbon copy cloner, clean install ?

 

[KeesMacPro]

I assume you made a bootable installer and not an install of High Sierra.
This would explain why it shows the utility screen .

 

[schmadrian]

KMP, thanks for getting back to me. Since the time that I posted, my iMac died. I had great help from Apple Support; she tried as many troubleshooting possibilities as she could over an hour and a half. (Non-warranty issues!)
As far as how/what I made re: the boot drive, I followed online instructions. But, despite having been a Mac user for decades, I guess I'm still a doofus tech-wise.
Anyway, I'm now looking at either installing an SSD in this iMac, or having an external drive. I know I shouldn't be hijacking my own thread, but do you have any advice as to which route to take?

 

[KeesMacPro]

I assume an SSD is the route to go and will improve overall performance .
If you can afford it , or do it yourself, I'd install an internal SSD.
To open up an iMac is a bit tricky...
If costs play a role ,the fast and easy way would be to use an external SSD as your main (=boot) drive.

 

[schmadrian]

Thanks. I have a friend-of-a-friend who owns a computer repair business, so the ins-and-outs of doing a replacement on an iMac (the screen) shouldn't be an issue. Don't suppose you have any offhand suggestions as to what make and model I might want to consider for the SSD?

 

[KeesMacPro]

To know a skilled person to do the job for you is luxury!
I've never had issues with Samsung 860 EVO Sata ssd, I can definitely recommend them.
AFAIK the iMac models from 2013 and later got a auxiliary NVMe slot inside for a super fast blade ssd.
I'd ask the person who's going to do the operation to your iMac to check if there's a slot available in your model.
In case he finds one when it's opened I'd install a NVMe ssd too as the boot drive .

 

[schmadrian]

"I assume you made a bootable installer and not an install of High Sierra."

Looking at the external SSD drive, I see 'Install macOS High Sierra'.

Guess I messed up.

And I would have sworn I did it correctly.

 

[KeesMacPro]

Looking at the external SSD drive, I see 'Install macOS High Sierra'.

Yes ,that's definitely an installer and not a clean install of an OS