MacBook Air kept restarting, now won’t let me install Big Sur and is stuck with mountain lion?

[rmfcb]

I have a mid 2013 MacBook Air, just bought last month.
It was first shipped with Catalina. I wanted to upgrade to Big Sur, but it crashed during the update. Then, it forced me into recovery mode with mountain lion. I installed it and tried to go back up to Big Sur, but it kept crashing on installs of even old OS that I needed to climb up the ladder to get to Big Sur. I can recall mavericks and sierra not working, I think El Capitan was as far as I could get it. I let the seller know and he sent me a new ssd with Big Sur already installed.

Now with the new ssd, it worked for a couple days just fine. Then it started randomly restarting. Even trying to update Big Sur would crash. Eventually I tried to reinstall Big Sur based off the Apple website suggestions. It crashed, and now I’m back to mountain lion. Internet recovery or regular recovery only show me the old mountain lion recovery screen.

I know I should just return it but that’s a hassle so I want to see if I can fix it myself. If I can’t by this weekend I will be getting my money back. I want to try to figure it out though, I’m interested in computers so I want to see if I can fix this.

Any advice?

 

[The Clark]

What happens when you reboot holding option + cmd + r? Should allow you to install the latest compatible version of MacOS via internet. Have you also tried installing MacOS via flashdrive or just through recovery? Making a bootable MacOS drive isn't too hard and it's quicker (and often more efficient) than internet recovery.

 

[rmfcb]

What happens when you reboot holding option + cmd + r? Should allow you to install the latest compatible version of MacOS via internet. Have you also tried installing MacOS via flashdrive or just through recovery? Making a bootable MacOS drive isn't too hard and it's quicker (and often more efficient) than internet recovery.

90% of the time it simply goes to regular recovery mode. Meaning only mountain lion. 10% of the time it just shows the folder with a question mark on it. So even though it starts up with the loading internet recovery screen, it never truly goes into it. I want to try that I just need to buy a big enough flash drive lol

 

[The Clark]

90% of the time it simply goes to regular recovery mode. Meaning only mountain lion. 10% of the time it just shows the folder with a question mark on it. So even though it starts up with the loading internet recovery screen, it never truly goes into it. I want to try that I just need to buy a big enough flash drive lol

Try the flash drive and report back. If you're able to install MacOS via flashdrive and it crashes later it's probably the board in which case, get your money back.

 

[Juicy Box]

I wonder if this is a firmware issue.

A while back on a Mid 2011 iMac, I had an issue where I could not install the OS beyond Sierra.

This iMac was a dumpster find, and didn't work at all when it was given to me. I got it working, and it ended up being a top of the line, BTO 27" Mid 2011 iMac.

The internal HDD was barely functioning, so I swapped it with a SSD that had High Sierra already on it.

It ran great, and ended up giving it to a friend that needed a Mac. I decided to do a fresh install of the OS, but had issues installing it. I wanted High Sierra, but it wouldn't let me install it on the SSD. I found out the latest OS I could install was just Sierra.

After some research, and a lot of trial and error, I discovered that the firmware was not up to date. The only way to update the firmware was to install High Sierra (at least that I could find), but I couldn't do that do to the firmware not being up to date. Catch 22.

The only way I figured it out was to reinstall the failing OEM HDD, wiped it, installed El Capitan, then installed High Sierra from there.

This updated the firmware.

After that, I could swap the drives again and install High Sierra.

If you want to check your firmware version, maybe this might show if it is up to date or old.


Not sure if firmware is your issue, but a work-around for you might be to clone the OS you want to your internal drive. You will need the OS on a drive or from another Mac.

I like CCC for cloning.

 

[Juicy Box]

Now with the new ssd, it worked for a couple days just fine. Then it started randomly restarting.

I had this issue when my boot drive was failing.

A wipe would fix things, but first over a few months, then weeks, then days, the restarts would happen, also lock ups, and weird glitches.

I think there were bad parts of the drive that were not being used after the wipe, but then would be used with time leading to my OS getting corrupt.

 

[rmfcb]

I had this issue when my boot drive was failing.

A wipe would fix things, but first over a few months, then weeks, then days, the restarts would happen, also lock ups, and weird glitches.

I think there were bad parts of the drive that were not being used after the wipe, but then would be used with time leading to my OS getting corrupt.

At this point I think it’s a board issue, I finally got it to work with Big Sur but it’s still freezing and even the screen has a random glitch at the bottom now

 

[rmfcb]

Try the flash drive and report back. If you're able to install MacOS via flashdrive and it crashes later it's probably the board in which case, get your money back.

You were on the money, flash drive worked but it still had issues so I’m gonna get a refund now ?? Thanks