Is there a way to distinguish if the SSD has failed or the logic board has failed?

[Avery1]

Is there a way to distinguish if the SSD has failed versus the logic board failing?

I awoke to a shut down iMac this morning, and upon boot up, received the flashing folder with question mark. Confirmed with apple support, by connecting another Mac in Target mode to the iMac, that the SSD was not reachable. Would I learn anything about any logic board issues by installing MacOS on an external hard drive and booting the affected iMac from an externally installed OS?

 

[Nermal]

If you can successfully install to/boot from an external drive then it'll likely be a failure of the SSD. What model/year of iMac do you have?

 

[Avery1]

If you can successfully install to/boot from an external drive then it'll likely be a failure of the SSD. What model/year of iMac do you have?

Thanks. It is a late 2015 iMac. When I went to the apple store today, their thought was that it was the SSD, but possibly could also be the logic board. They wanted 3 days to diagnose it, and was under the impression at the time that I'd only have OS support through Big Sur - so I did not leave it. But now that I am seeing it it actually Monterrey, that would be a bit more life.

I have not tried to boot from an external drive yet, but can test that tomorrow.

 

[Realityck]

Thanks. It is a late 2015 iMac. When I went to the apple store today, their thought was that it was the SSD, but possibly could also be the logic board. They wanted 3 days to diagnose it, and was under the impression at the time that I'd only have OS support through Big Sur - so I did not leave it. But now that I am seeing it it actually Monterrey, that would be a bit more life.

I have not tried to boot from an external drive yet, but can test that tomorrow.

I had a 2015 27" iMac logic board failure, when it starting to go I encountered system panics more and more until it became unbootable/unusable. It really depends on what is failing, but since the logic board contains a lot you get the idea. intel iMacs internal heat (example playing games) can shorten the life of a iMac because of the so so heat exhaust thru the back.

 

[Fishrrman]

Here's a quick way to tell:
Boot to INTERNET recovery.
Command-OPTION-R
at boot

If you connect via wifi, you'll need your wifi password.
The internet utilities take a little while to load, be patient as you see the globe spin.

Try this... I suggest right now.
Then... get back to us.

Does it boot to internet recovery?
If so, your logic board is good.

While you're booted that way, try this:
Open disk utility.
Check to see if there's a "view" menu. If there IS, go to it and choose "show all devices".

Now look at the list on the left.
The top line should be your internal drive.
Does it show up?

If it does, click on it and click "first aid".
Does that go through ok?
If so, click the NEXT line down and repeat.
Etc...

 

[Avery1]

I had a 2015 27" iMac logic board failure, when it starting to go I encountered system panics more and more until it became unbootable/unusable. It really depends on what is failing, but since the logic board contains a lot you get the idea. intel iMacs internal heat (example playing games) can shorten the life of a iMac because of the so so heat exhaust thru the back.

Thanks... yes, possible. Not much gaming, but it is powered on 24/7 (with some level of standby) for it's whole life. Lately CorelCad was running it pretty hard, due to some shoddy coding.

 

[Avery1]

Here's a quick way to tell:
Boot to INTERNET recovery.
Command-OPTION-R
at boot

If you connect via wifi, you'll need your wifi password.
The internet utilities take a little while to load, be patient as you see the globe spin.

Try this... I suggest right now.
Then... get back to us.

Does it boot to internet recovery?
If so, your logic board is good.

While you're booted that way, try this:
Open disk utility.
Check to see if there's a "view" menu. If there IS, go to it and choose "show all devices".

Now look at the list on the left.
The top line should be your internal drive.
Does it show up?

If it does, click on it and click "first aid".
Does that go through ok?
If so, click the NEXT line down and repeat.
Etc...

Thanks for your note. The apple store ran diagnostics and said the SSD had failed, as well as memory errors (under OWC warranty). The gotcha here is that the display also is working intermittently. More of the time it is not working, than working... including after I replaced the RAM with the factory original and also tried to boot off an external hard drive having Big Sur. I saw that drive light flashing after booting up with the Opt keystroke, but nothing ever appeared on screen. This started when I dropped off the machine at the apple store. The display eventually worked for them long enough to run diagnostics, and after that ceased working again. I saw it once more after that, but not again.

Any idea what leads to this combination of issues? I do wonder if the actual SSD has failed, or perhaps the logic board failing caused a diagnostic to look like an SSD had failed?

 

[Avery1]

Does it boot to internet recovery?
If so, your logic board is good.

When this thing first started, and the display was more reliable, I was able to boot to internet recovery, and the SSD could not be seen through disk utility.

 

[Fishrrman]

You haven't told us WHICH iMac you have (what year made). EDIT -- saw from another thread that it's a 2015 -- now approaching 8 years old.

If you've been told that the drive, display, etc., are bad, perhaps it's time to be looking for a replacement, rather than putting much money into it (again, because of its age).

 

[Avery1]

You haven't told us WHICH iMac you have (what year made). EDIT -- saw from another thread that it's a 2015 -- now approaching 8 years old.

If you've been told that the drive, display, etc., are bad, perhaps it's time to be looking for a replacement, rather than putting much money into it (again, because of its age).

Thanks. I had mentioned it inline above.. I don't think the display is bad per se, but I think there is another issue with the logic or graphic card... hard to know for sure. At SSD replacement, would have been worth fixing, but with the other issues, I am replacing with a 2019.