Unable to find startup disk in disk utility (recovery mode)

[lrnzmr]

Hi

I was cleaning my MacBook Pro 13 inch (Mid 2014) when it suddenly went in recovery mode.
Because I thought I toggled recovery mode on while cleaning the keyboard, I simply rebooted the thing.
I can now only get it to boot into recovery mode and this in OS X Mavericks, while the machine was running the latest Big Sur version before.
I followed the steps guided by support.apple.com/mac/startup and understand that the start up disk needs repairing. However, as the screenshots show, I am unable to retrieve this start up disk. Does this mean I bricked the computer/start up disk by perhaps getting a tiny bit of liquid on the SSD?
Or there any other steps I can look into to repair the start up disk?

Thanks in advance

 

[chabig]

The computer isn't bricked. Bricked means dead. You just no longer have any flash storage. Maybe it got damaged by liquid, maybe not. But your SSD looks to be dead.

Replacements start at $140: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Mac/OWC-Aura-Pro-X2-SSD/IF123-133?o=1

Here are the instructions to replace it: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Retina+Display+Mid+2014+SSD+Replacement/27849

 

[lrnzmr]

The computer isn't bricked. Bricked means dead. You just no longer have any flash storage. Maybe it got damaged by liquid, maybe not. But your SSD looks to be dead.

Replacements start at $140: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Mac/OWC-Aura-Pro-X2-SSD/IF123-133?o=1

Here are the instructions to replace it: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Retina+Display+Mid+2014+SSD+Replacement/27849

I was misinformed and of the idea that the SSD is soldered onto the motherboard. Thanks for the reply, I ordered a new SSD and battery while I was at it.

Cheers

 

[lrnzmr]

The computer isn't bricked. Bricked means dead. You just no longer have any flash storage. Maybe it got damaged by liquid, maybe not. But your SSD looks to be dead.

Replacements start at $140: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Mac/OWC-Aura-Pro-X2-SSD/IF123-133?o=1

Here are the instructions to replace it: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Retina+Display+Mid+2014+SSD+Replacement/27849

To give some feedback, I replaced the battery (and not the SSD). This seems to have solved the problem as I typing this message on my MacBook

 

[brianmowrey]

Yeah, the drive would not have been completely dead, because recovery mode disk image lives on the drive. But at the time Disk Utility was failing to see the remaining file structure for some reason, even as an unmounted drive. It could have just been something very messed up in P/NVRAM, which replacing the battery effectively reset. Or it could be that the drive is near-failure, but not totally there yet.

 

[avz]

Mavericks can’t see the APFS volume as it was before its time. You must eraser your target disk as hfs+ using HS or Mojave USB installer.

 

[brianmowrey]

Mavericks can’t see the APFS volume as it was before its time. You must eraser your target disk as hfs+ using HS or Mojave USB installer.

It won't see the volume, but will still see the SSD itself, and can erase/reformat it from there. Macs that haven't run High Sierra before could run into a firmware issue with newer SSDs but the Installer does not itself roll back firmware anyway.

 

[avz]

It won't see the volume, but will still see the SSD itself, and can erase/reformat it from there. Macs that haven't run High Sierra before could run into a firmware issue with newer SSDs but the Installer does not itself roll back firmware anyway.

View attachment 1685354

Mavericks Disk Utility can do it too?

 

[brianmowrey]

I could only test with El Capitan Installer, which is pre-APFS. It still can see/erase the drive. There's no reason any version of OS X Disk Utility should have trouble doing the same.

I bet the OP's problem was in P/NVRAM

 

[lrnzmr]

The computer isn't bricked. Bricked means dead. You just no longer have any flash storage. Maybe it got damaged by liquid, maybe not. But your SSD looks to be dead.

Replacements start at $140: https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Mac/OWC-Aura-Pro-X2-SSD/IF123-133?o=1

Here are the instructions to replace it: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Retina+Display+Mid+2014+SSD+Replacement/27849

I now installed an SSD with larger storage capacity. I can't get it to work tho. Recovery mode boots in OS Mavericks, no startup disk is detected, can't be found in disk utility. Nor when opting for OS reinstallation or restoration from time machine. Tips?

 

[brianmowrey]

Well, you can try P/NVRAM reset to test the same theory I was offering for why the battery change worked last time.

If that fails: Your OP never mentioned, what is the latest version of OS that you had installed on the previous drive? (Could be lack of High Sierra firmware update that complicates installing newer SSDs.)

It's still weird that you are able to get into Recovery Mode, which uses the drive (unless you are using a bootable USB Installer). Can you show what Disk Utility looks like in Recovery Mode - or open Terminal from Utilities in the menu bar and enter

diskutil list

and show the results?

 

[lrnzmr]

Well, you can try P/NVRAM reset to test the same theory I was offering for why the battery change worked last time.

If that fails: Your OP never mentioned, what is the latest version of OS that you had installed on the previous drive? (Could be lack of High Sierra firmware update that complicates installing newer SSDs.)

It's still weird that you are able to get into Recovery Mode, which uses the drive (unless you are using a bootable USB Installer). Can you show what Disk Utility looks like in Recovery Mode - or open Terminal from Utilities in the menu bar and enter

diskutil list

and show the results?

Thanks for the quick reply.

I just did the P/NVRAM reset, to no avail.

I'm not using any external drives. I thought it would be fine without, since the previous drive was running Mojave...

The attached image shows what disk utility looks like in recovery mode. Just like last time (before replacing the battery), it doesn't show the SSD...

 

[brianmowrey]

Hm - I had the same thing happen once, except the drive did show in Disk Utility (but as unmounted). Still, I would head to Terminal from the Utilities menu and see if the drive shows up in "diskutil list". If it does, you can try to mount it from there.

 

[lrnzmr]

Hm - I had the same thing happen once, except the drive did show in Disk Utility (but as unmounted). Still, I would head to Terminal from the Utilities menu and see if the drive shows up in "diskutil list". If it does, you can try to mount it from there.

Doesn't look like it's accessable via terminal either

 

[brianmowrey]

Well, there's my pointless curiousity satisfied. I should have thought ahead to further suggestions, rather than force you to post back.

First if firmware password is on, I would turn that off just to see if it helps anything. (It should have already been off before P/NVRAM reset attempt since it prevents that from working.)

If you want to keep the drive on the logic board, I would try either getting another Mac and trying to boot the problem machine in target disk mode, or booting into any external USB drive that has OS X or a bootable USB installer and seeing if Disk Utility recognizes the drive. If the drive shows up via either of those attempts, erase/format it to APFS from there and everything should be solved. You can go further and clone OS X from the original drive before restart if you want, or just do normal install from the bootable installer or from Internet Recovery.

Otherwise, take the new drive out and try to format it as an external drive (either with another Mac or with the problem machine booted into OSX / Installer via a second USB drive, then put it back in. (You didn't mention if you already did that to this new drive before installing it). If that doesn't work, something is presumably wrong with the new drive, though that wouldn't rule out the MacBook Pro also having something-wrong-with-it-ness.