Macbook Pro can't recognize internal SSD, can't install OS

Happy Hopping

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I know almost nothing on MAC OS. I was following thru this video, I have a brand new SSD inside this mac, as the last one could be dead. I press the Option button as it boots up w/ that music sound



I then see the symbol of Install Sierra OS. But I don't see the icon of MAC HD, so I thought it's a bad sign, it looks like the MAC Book pro can't see the drive. Does that mean the controller fails? As even w/ a blank SSD, the laptop should still shows the MAC HD icon, should it not?

what can I do?
 
put the old one back in

put it into another machine, or if it's one of those M.2 ones, get an M.2 usb adapter that works with the type of m.2 that it is, NVME or SATA.
 
It’s been a long time since I had a Mac, but iirc, the screen you’re talking about only shows the names of the volunes the firmware can boot from.

New SSD means there’s no bootable volume. The video you linked is installing on a drive that already has an OS installed, so some things you’ll have to adjust for that difference.
 
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It's the ribbon flex cable, they're utter garbage and break where the right angled bend is. Replace the cable and all will be good.

You usually find that when you fit the old HDD with a broken cable the old HDD is recognized fine, this is because the cable sits slightly higher with the old mechanical HDD than with a new and slimmer SSD, which tends to close up the broken track on the ribbon flex. It's for this reason I never replace the SSD on ~2012 MacBooks without replacing the cable at the same time.

I bet you'll be able to install the OS if you stick the SSD into a SATA to USB dock.
 
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put the old one back in

put it into another machine, or if it's one of those M.2 ones, get an M.2 usb adapter that works with the type of m.2 that it is, NVME or SATA.

I need more details, if I put the old SSD back in to this mac, what then? It's a 2.5" Kingston ssd
 
It’s been a long time since I had a Mac, but iirc, the screen you’re talking about only shows the names of the volunes the firmware can boot from.

New SSD means there’s no bootable volume. The video you linked is installing on a drive that already has an OS installed, so some things you’ll have to adjust for that difference.

so how do you get the bootable vol. on to the new SSD then? I have a bootable Sierra OS USB stick from a friend
 
so how do you get the bootable vol. on to the new SSD then? I have a bootable Sierra OS USB stick from a friend

Follow his directions, skipping anything related to "Macintosh HD" and disk utility. The installer will do everything necessary to make the new drive bootable.
 
What model of SSD is it? A lot of newer Samsung SSDs are having issues with Macs.
 
Does the installer recognize the SSD when it is mounted in a SATA to USB dock? If it does than replace the SATA flex cable.
 
Does the installer recognize the SSD when it is mounted in a SATA to USB dock? If it does than replace the SATA flex cable.


I don’t think he’s gotten that far. I think he just saw the missing Mac HD boot option that shows up in the video he’s following and panicked.
 
This is all looking overly complex.

You put a new SSD in. You power on, hold CMD-OPT-R (internet recovery). It boots to the recovery stuff. Disk Utility > select the new disk, partition it (which they ALSO make overly complex but you'll figure it out). Quit back to installer menu, Install macOS, Next Next Next -> Grab a Snickers(tm), about a half hour later start Macintoshing.
 
This is all looking overly complex.

You put a new SSD in. You power on, hold CMD-OPT-R (internet recovery). It boots to the recovery stuff. Disk Utility > select the new disk, partition it (which they ALSO make overly complex but you'll figure it out). Quit back to installer menu, Install macOS, Next Next Next -> Grab a Snickers(tm), about a half hour later start Macintoshing.

If it's ~ a 2012 model, it doesn't always work that easily due to the abovementioned flex cable.

I don’t think he’s gotten that far. I think he just saw the missing Mac HD boot option that shows up in the video he’s following and panicked.

Than he's running an old version of OSX and needs installation media or another mac running a newer version of MacOS with internet recovery to install the OS to the SSD via a USB dock.
 
Does the disk show up in Disk Utility?

If I recall, when booting off remote media, you can cancel the OS X Install and it drops you to a limited GUI, where you can get at some basic tools - Disk Utility being one of those.
 
Hold down the option key when you hear the chime and select the USB boot device. Install from there.
 
guys, we have a mis communication, let's start from the beginning

1) the bootable Sierra OS USB stick is created from a friend on his MAC, that stick is IN the USB slot

2) THe SSD is Adata SU630 240GB SSD

3) Boot up the MAC, if I press Option R, or Command R, or Option Command R, all I get is a white screen and eventually a circle w/ a diagonal / on it, essentially the digital 0 symbol

4) but if I press the Option Button like what the video says, I get the mesg. Install mac OS Sierra (but the MAC HD icon is also missing)

HOWEVER, I do NOT get the macOS utilities screen

this is the mac model

https://www.ebay.com/p/Apple-MacBoo...09LL-A-October-2006/98843026?iid=311772864377

I think the "Install macOS Sierra" should bump me to mac OS utilities except that it does NOT
 
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guys, we have a mis communication, let's start from the beginning

1) the bootable Sierra OS USB stick is created from a friend on his MAC, that stick is IN the USB slot

2) THe SSD is Adata SU630 240GB SSD

3) Boot up the MAC, if I press Option R, or Command R, or Option Command R, all I get is a white screen and eventually a circle w/ a diagonal / on it, essentially the digital 0 symbol

4) but if I press the Option Button like what the video says, I get the mesg. Install mac OS Sierra (but the MAC HD icon is also missing)

HOWEVER, I do NOT get the macOS utilities screen

this is the mac model

https://www.ebay.com/p/Apple-MacBoo...09LL-A-October-2006/98843026?iid=311772864377

I think the "Install macOS Sierra" should bump me to mac OS utilities except that it does NOT

Oh wow.... that model is FAR too old to run Sierra (10.12). I don't even think you can run Lion (10.7) on it. You'll probably have to find Leopard (10.5) or Snow Leopard (10.6) for that one.


And I sure as hell hope you didn't pay $900 for that. It's worth MAYBE $100...
 
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what if I get a boot El Captian mac OS, would that work? is that the reason I didn't get the macOS util. screen?
 
Lion is the last-supported OS X available for a 2006 MacBook Pro. With that said, you can apparently hack later versions of macOS install media to get it on that machine (up to El Capitan listed) but YMMV.

I have access to a 2008 early model MacBook Pro that has Mavericks installed and it allowed me to download the El Capitan installation media (which I used to update the 2010 Mac Pro I have access to; now running High Sierra). I had El Capitan on this laptop before going back to Mavericks, which still runs like crap, but it's less crappy than El Capitan.
 
I have a very similar model and I think this is the latest version you can run on it,
IMG_1159.JPG
 
what if I get a boot El Captian mac OS, would that work? is that the reason I didn't get the macOS util. screen?

The newest version of macOS you can run natively on that system is Lion (v10.7). [ I was wrong about that earlier. Mountain Lion (v10.8) was the when it changed. ]

To run anything from v10.8 to v10.11, you have to modify the bootloader with one that translates between the 32-bit firmware and the 64-bit OS kernels in those newer versions. Anything newer than v10.11 will not run at all because the CPUs do not have SSE4.1 instructions.
 
2006 was the crossover. Early 2006 = No go, late 2006 = El Capitan at best (not that there's anything wong with El Capitan).
 
2006 was the crossover. Early 2006 = No go, late 2006 = El Capitan at best (not that there's anything wong with El Capitan).

Yep. The early '06 only had 32-bit Core Duo processors. Anything newer than Snow Leopard requires a 64-bit processor.
 
Jeez that is horribly old. I have a couple collecting dust that were to be scrapped at work. What were you planning to do with this thing?
 
So Is El Captian 32 bit or 64 bit OS? I have a friend whose MAC is running El Captian right now. Let me find a way to install that to a USB flash drive

SuperSubZero, I plan to put in a SSD, get this working so I can sell it
 
I have an old iMac about the age of that laptop, 2007 model. It will not let you install anything newer than Lion on it but it boots happiy using High Sierra as long as it's installed ready on the SSD using another (newer) mac.

So if you really want to use that ancient laptop (I wouldn't), use a USB enclosure and install OSX on the USB using your friends computer. THen install the SSD to the laptop and boot normally.

I'm using the old iMac in my garage as a platform for my acoustic measurement tools and to stream music, it boots from an SSD that is in a USB enclosure. The iMac only has USB2 but it's surprisingly good to use. Starting programs and booting take relatively long but otherwise it's completely useable.
 
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So Is El Captian 32 bit or 64 bit OS? I have a friend whose MAC is running El Captian right now. Let me find a way to install that to a USB flash drive

SuperSubZero, I plan to put in a SSD, get this working so I can sell it
I hope you understand that the SSD is probably worth as much or more than the laptop itself at this stagee.
 
I have an old iMac about the age of that laptop, 2007 model. It will not let you install anything newer than Lion on it but it boots happiy using High Sierra as long as it's installed ready on the SSD using another (newer) mac.

So if you really want to use that ancient laptop (I wouldn't), use a USB enclosure and install OSX on the USB using your friends computer. THen install the SSD to the laptop and boot normally.

I'm using the old iMac in my garage as a platform for my acoustic measurement tools and to stream music, it boots from an SSD that is in a USB enclosure. The iMac only has USB2 but it's surprisingly good to use. Starting programs and booting take relatively long but otherwise it's completely useable.

2007 iMacs can have their CPU upgraded to allow Sierra to run (which it seems yours has been). His MBP cannot.

a cheap SSD is only $32
Most working 2006 MBP's have been selling on on ebay for less than $60
 
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2007 iMacs can have their CPU upgraded to allow Sierra to run (which it seems yours has been). His MBP cannot.

I've had this iMac from new and it has never been touched inside.

IMG_2960.JPG
 

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I've had this iMac from new and it has never been touched inside.

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What CPU is in it? Everything I've seen is that 2008 iMac (which came with Penryn CPUs) could run SIerra (and up), but 2007 iMacs (which came with Merom CPUs) only could after an upgrade. If you have a Merom CPU, I'd be curious to see how you got High Sierra to boot.
 
Generally speaking, I believe Core 2 uses a 32bit EFI end is incompatible with newer generations of OSX. Anything from the i5/i7 generation onwards should be good up to High Sierra.
 
Generally speaking, I believe Core 2 uses a 32bit EFI end is incompatible with newer generations of OSX. Anything from the i5/i7 generation onwards should be good up to High Sierra.

Every thing from 2007 and up except for the first MBA has a 64-bit EFI. Models released in 2008 and up with at least a Penryn Core 2 can run High Sierra, though it may not be straightfoward to install it.
 
Here is mine when it was working, it died all of a sudden a couple of months ago while doing an update.

 
Every thing from 2007 and up except for the first MBA has a 64-bit EFI. Models released in 2008 and up with at least a Penryn Core 2 can run High Sierra, though it may not be straightfoward to install it.

Ah, OK.
 
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