erasing hard drive

[pspdfppdfxhd]

Okay, my Mac is sick (startup problems, font problems), it's still working but what a headache. I updated the OS to Catalina last friday over Mojave and man is it buggy.

We really have not done a complete re-install here. Always, with a new Mac, migrating from time machine.

I really am afraid of wiping out the drive and re-installing everything but I am afraid that's the only way to get things back to normal.

I know with CC it should not be a problem, I have all activation codes for Pitstop etc. and know all IP addresses and passwords (I hope) in the network. Should I take the big plunge and pull the trigger on this? I don't see any other option at this point.

[scottrsimons]

If you really don't want to, I would try the utility Onxy first. See if that clears up some of the systems issues, as it will force the running of daily, weekly and monthly tasks to be done now. That may help.

We have done the same thing here at our shop, and every once in awhile run into this. And run this utility usually cleans them up.

[Foozball]

Onyx ... now THAT'S a time trip, I remember getting my supervisor onto that when I first joined B4P ... we were both more PC operators (experienced) and Onyx blew his mind!

[Joe]

Another thing to try if Onyx doesn't help is to create a new admin account and work out of that for a few hours. You would still have all of your apps without the excess baggage of possibly corrupt preferences or other files from the old user account. You wouldn't have access to your files stored in the other account unless you moved the important ones to the public folder first and your email wouldn't be setup on the new account but you could still access it using webmail until you find out if a new account would solve your problems.

I can tell you from my experience that Mojave was one of the most bug riddled OS's from Apple in a long time. Catalina, Big Sur, and Monterey are pretty solid. I hated Mojave from day one.

[pspdfppdfxhd]

I have onyxed this thing to death to no avail. About a year ago we had a new SSD put in, a tech suspected that might be the problem and we did a fresh install of Mojave and he apparently used time machine to carefully restore my Mac. This Mac was purchased in 2018 and I see files in my drive from as far back as 2005. The process to restart is this: Startup in safe mode. Shutdown, unplug for a few minutes, start up. Usually it will stop at about 1/3 progress and just stay there. Next step take the power off and watch again. It might take 3 or 4 tries but so far it eventually boots up. I think files are in here from the first Imac we had from about 2005 or so. We always migrated and did regular updates.

[Joe]

Do you really need files going back that far? You can do a clean install and then manually bring files and emails back from a TM backup. But not the apps. If you choose that route sign out of Creative Cloud and de-activate Pitstop before doing it and it will make your life easier when you go to re-install the apps. You will also have to re-install in extensions you might have added into CC apps and you won't have any custom actions you might have made in Pitstop but you can bring those back from the TM backup. It is a lot more work this way but it will keep bad/corrupted files and settings from migrating back with everything else.

One question. Where did you get the SSD from? If it is from Mac Sales (OWC) their drives do have a warranty and they will replace it. If it not from Mac Sales it is probably an SSD that doesn't have trim built into it and supposedly those do not work as well as SSD's from Mac Sales (OWC) which has trim built into the SSD firmware which could cause issues. On a PC you turn trim on but I don't think you can on a Mac.

[pspdfppdfxhd]

it was installed by an Authorized Mac repair place here...its a Samsung SSD 860 EVO. But the issue was happening years before we changed the drive.

Is resoring apps from Time Machine as simple as copying them back into the applications folder? Is a clean install erasing the drive and then installing?

[Tracy]

If I can do it you can do it!!!
you might want to read the thread about updating to Big Sur, just for info

you can get the link to the info to get your OS on a flash drive, start there and you will be ready when your ready!!
there is text you copy into terminal and it puts your OS on three I do believe I saw the Catalina option 

and the when you want to install you will install from the flash drive make sure it's big enough
also I had to do mine twice because I didn't follow directions to erase, so just take your time
get all your stuff backed up for when your ready

[Joe]

it was installed by an Authorized Mac repair place here...its a Samsung SSD 860 EVO. But the issue was happening years before we changed the drive.

Is resoring apps from Time Machine as simple as copying them back into the applications folder? Is a clean install erasing the drive and then installing?

Oh of course it isn't that easy to just copy them back into the applications folder. That won't work. That is why using migration assistant is needed if you want to restore applications as it puts all of the bits and pieces back in all of the different locations they need to be.

You can do as Tracy mentioned. Make sure you have a current Time Machine backup, make an installer disk, boot into the installer disk, partition your hard drive as one partition and then let the installer re-partition as it deems necessary during the install. After the install is done it will give you the option to bring back everything from your time machine backup (Restore from another Mac or backup using migration assistant - make sure the external drive with the time machine backup is hooked up and on before getting to that point and it will see it.). Have it bring back your old user account, all applications, files, and computer settings...everything. Once that is done you'll be flying high. If it still behaves as before then you probably have some kind of hardware issue. Usually corrupted files won't cause what you are seeing.

[pspdfppdfxhd]

Graphics card maybe?

[pspdfppdfxhd]

It always boots up in safe mode.

Here's what i found:

If you can boot Mac in Safe Mode, indeed, the problem is software or firmware related. To find out the problem, you'll now need to restart Mac in Verbose mode. To achieve this, follow the steps below:

• Restart Mac and press Command + V at boot time.
• Once you see Apple Logo release both the keyboard keys

This will boot Mac into Verbose mode, and here you can get the live report of the software that is not allowing Mac to boot normally. This means once the culprit is identified, you need to boot into Safe Mode and uninstall the program that is creating a problem.

So i can see where it hangs up where it stalls and it's some dang thing about a graphics firmware thingy, i will have to take a pic with my phone and blow it up because it's about 2 point type on my screen. Oh boy.

[Joe]

So a firmware related setting is hardware related because as far as I know there is no way uninstall-reinstall firmware on the iMac graphics adapter which is I believe is on the iMac logic board. Try Either:

Try Ubuntu before you install it

Download Ubuntu and create either a Boot from DVD or a Boot from USB flash drive. Once you have that boot disk created, whichever you create run Ubuntu on your Mac. If the problem is with your graphics card/firmware then you should see the same kind of issue with Ubuntu that you are seeing on your Mac. If Ubuntu doesn't show the same issue then I would try a fresh install of Catalina. If it is the graphics driver in Mojave that is corrupted in some way it will install the graphics driver for Catalina and should solve the issue.

or 

Use Apple Diagnostics to test your Mac Hardware

[pspdfppdfxhd]

Thanks Joe, I will persevere with this.

When you are starting up in verbose mode and reading 2 point type on your screen.. you are definitely in pretty deep!

Another thing after installing Catalina, my email messages come in invisible. Obviously a font issue, so now to see the type, i have to copy and paste into a text editor to see it. That's a new one! 

[pspdfppdfxhd]

I was on the phone with apple about a year ago for about 3 hours and i am sure they did all the diagnostic tests and all seemed good. But I will look into your other suggestion.

[scottrsimons]

Another option, that I use quite a bit, is to keep a couple of external drives loaded with base OSes. I have a 1TB drive partitioned multiple ways, and then each partition has a different OS installed. So I can boot from any number of versions of OS to test with, or install from (as I have the same installer on that partition too).
You can then also throw some utilities besides Apple's on there too. I have Onyx, and on one of them DiskWarrior, which I don't use very often but come in handy when I need them.