Newest MacBook Air won't boot from previous 10.8.4 image

[brussell]

I tried to boot the newest MacBook Air from a standard 10.8.4 imaged external drive (thunderbolt, and USB) and it got the universal "no access" symbol. So back to the drawing board creating a new image from scratch. Anyone else experience this? I guess there is some internal significant change in architecture that prevents the booting from previous hardware.

[bajones · Accepted solution]

The standard 10.8.4 kernel doesn't support the new Haswell architecture. You'll need to capture an image created on the new MacBook air and use that until Apple unforks us with 10.8.5.

[JPDyson]

Business as usual. This is always how it goes, I'm afraid.

Usually, you can create your new base OS image from the newest device and use it for your older devices. In the case of several new products released at once, the highest build number sometimes covers them all.

Sometimes.

[mm2270]

Yeah, I'm working with one of the new MBAs now, and finding the same. *sigh* Apple seems intent on just making our lives difficult don't they. I'm all for the advancement of the hardware, but this repeated forking of the OS for new hardware is getting very tiresome.

I'll be looking to see if the new MBA image will boot and work when applied to the older hardware. Keeping my fingers crossed.

[stevewood]

Folks, this is nothing new. This has been the case for as long as OS X has been out (I can't remember back to OS 7/8/9 to recall). If you've been supporting Apple long enough, you just know that when new hardware comes out in the middle of a version, you have to wait for the next version to have a unified OS. I don't know why this is a surprise every time it happens.

[krichterjr]

No surprise here. Let us know what you find out Mike. I don't have my hands on a new air yet to test.

[#7]

The build number of the OS preinstalled on the new MacBook Air is newer that that of the base OS used in your image. Even if the versions are the same, your existing OS will never boot. Boot into restore partition, restore the OS and build a new base OS from this.

[mm2270]

@steve, yes, its been this way and apparently will continue to be this way forever (or until OS X is no more). I can only speak for myself, but I think what I find annoying is that Apple seems to talk out of both sides of their mouths. When we and others have meetings with them on "enterprise" support, they claim up and down they are making strides and will continue to improve in this area. Then they turn around and continue their SOP consumer practice and fork the OS with each new hardware rev. Forcing us to have to update our whole imaging workflow each time is certainly not at all enterprise friendly.
I guess its my own fault for believing that they actually care. Its really just lip service because Apple continues to show us which side their bread is buttered on.

[mm2270]

So just to report, I was able to successfully capture an unbooted image of the drive from the new Air and restore it back to a much older Late 2010 11" MacBook Air (MacBookAir3,1) successfully. The older model booted up just as if it had shipped from the factory and I went through the Apple setup. No issues so far but its too early to tell for sure. However, from initial tests it seems the build from the new Airs may work on older hardware just fine, so that's something. That isn't always the case.

The new Air ships with 10.8.4 build # 12E3067
My Mac running 10.8.4 shows build 12E55

[krichterjr]

Thanks for the update. As long as this process continues to work as it has in the past it's at least an option. Cheers!

[nessts]

we have installed it on a couple of different MBP 13" 15" and the 15"Retina model, it seems quite happy on all of them.

[CasperSally]

Good news if the 2013 air base OS works on other models. Thanks for posting.

[hkim]

So I've used the 12E3067 and tested it on several models, and WiFi was a concern on some models, some of the time. It seem to connect but the performance dramatically affected.

Apple won't officially support 12E3067 on anything but the 2013 MacBook Air, 12E55 for everything else so buyer beware if you plan to use 12E3067 across all models in your infrastructure.

I'm hosting two seperate configs now and waiting until 10.8.5 merges again.

[CasperSally]

You saw problems outside the new Macbook airs with wireless? This is good info, thanks. Reading this yesterday I thought that the wireless issue may be more hardware than software.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2013/06/new-macbook-airs-may-suffer-from-wi-fi-connectivity-issues/

[nessts]

i had the 15" Retina drop of the gig-E network last night a couple of times, running an rsync over wifi now getting ~14MB/s so it wifi looks stable, i have to play more with the gig-E network adapter today.

[jhalvorson]

As of June 21, 2013 at 1:31PM CDT, you can't obtain the 10.8.4 (build12E3067) InstallESD.dmg via the App Store. Attempting to purchase ML via the MBA Mid 2013, the App Store says "this device is not compatible with Mountain Lion".

So I am moving on to method number two of capturing it via Internet Recovery. It's usually a 60 minute process due to our throttled guest Internet network. The process fails while trying our internal network with a fast Internet connection; results in chunklist verification failure. I think it's due to our NAT'ing???

[gachowski]

FYI, If you make an installer of 12E3067. I did not work for me on old hardware, I received an unsupported message.

[gachowski]

The question is when is Apple going to update the MBP and the MBPr. It looks like we might have to go thought this a few times this year, back to back to back. I don't mind once or twice thought the year but I am stress about the possibility 3 times back to back.

This is good reason to move to factory image+ quick add.pkg and let Capser do it's magic :) However with network accounts this is very tricky.

C

[nkalister]

the funny thing is, apple used to be better about avoiding forking than they are now . . . releasing 10.8.4 a week before a new model comes out without support for that model almost seems like trolling.
thank goodness for thin imaging, and the fact that 12e3067 boots the old hardware.

[WhyNot]

OK - OK all the above is correct but why is it not possible to put a 10.8.3 12D78 Image onto the MBA (via target mode) and then use the recovery Partition with 12E3067 on it to upgrade it to 10.8.4 ???

This is called upgrade installation and should be supported, it did sometimes work in the past with previous systems ?!?

The funny thing is, when I put a 10.6.8 image onto the MBA and do exactly what I described above it WORKS, the recovery partition can "upgrade install" the MBA to 10.8.4 12E3067 ?!?!

But if I try the same with 10.7 or 10.8 it fails - the installation works but on reboot I get the universal "no access" symbol, the funny thing again is that all the necessary files are actually on the HD but it can not boot ?!

Can anyone explain why this is so ?

[hkim]

@WhyNot

I did exactly what you are describing, but I did not use the plain vanilla recovery partition, rather I captured the InstallESD.dmg for 12E3067 using the various methods described earlier (usually some combination of using the Internet Recovery, and then having something open like Terminal so it doesn't force reboot so you're able to then put it into Target Disk Mode to grab the InstallESD.dmg). It's nice to just have the InstallESD.dmg anyway, and using that I had no issues taking a 10.8.3 build then boot off the InstallESD.dmg to upgrade it to 10.8.4 12E3067

[franton]

Nope, we're just recon'ing these builds in through the web interface after the appropriate manual configuring. It just means I have to try and break my record for 10.8.5 OS image and netboot again.

[JPDyson]

Apple, if you're watching, the right way to do this is to release an integrated, publicly-available build with each new hardware rev. Rolling out new MBP and MBPR this Fall? Ship them with a new point release (likely 10.9.1).

I'd be all to happy to accept the mantra "stop imaging the base OS, just do Recovery, blah blah" if they'd only make Internet Recovery work from behind a proxy.

[rtrouton]

@JPDyson,

With some work, you can replicate the installation experience with createOSXinstallPkg and the Internet Recovery-provided InstallESD for new Airs.

I've documented the pieces you would need here:

http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2012/07/25/installing-mac-os-x-10-8-x-on-an-erased-hard-drive-using...

http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/downloading-lion-os-installers-for-your-specific-mac-mod...

The general idea being the following:

1. Get the Air's InstallESD (since you're behind a proxy, you'd need to go outside.)
2. Use createOSXinstallPkg to create an OS installer using that InstallESD.
3. Wipe your drive and then install the createOSXinstallPkg-generated OS installer.

After installation and the following restart, you're back to a factory-fresh install of the Air's custom build.

[david_yenzer]

Yeah, we just got his with this awesome "bug" with the latest shipment of Airs. Thanks Apple.

To clarify the workaround, we turned one on and built it the way we want it. Then (re)boot to the recovery drive or an external USB (or thunderbolt) drive. Then open Disk Utility, click on the Macintosh HD drive, and then click on the "New Image" button and save it on the external drive.

Then upload that image to your JAMF, build a config profile that includes your new image, and image your external USB/Thunderbolt drive with the new OS, then sync it (or copy over all your packages/scripts manually if you want it done faster). Now when you option boot to the external drive it will recognize the device and you can image the new Airs with the new and apparently unique OS 10.8.4 that can't be used for MBPs.

Good Bob.

[Efren]

First... What up Richter?!?!

Second, the OS from the new Airs does work on iMac and older Airs in my tests... However, I'm still "testing." We'll report back if I find anything different.

A big thanks to rtrouton just what I needed....

"E"

[ClassicII]

Has any one tried manually setting the proxy using networksetup before kicking off the internet recovery ?

[Chris]

You can use networksetup as long as you have a recovery partition.
Without one, i don't think it's possible to do a "pure" internet recovery.
I usually use Internet Sharing from another Mac to get around this if there's no non-proxy network connection available...

[kellydenadel]

Problem solved !!!!

See LAST POST here:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5297672?start=15&tstart=0

Now for the first time, the new macbook Air 2013 can boot from USB (it could not do so before). The specifics of the Haswell Air build did not allow same, as both the original poster any myself discovered!

Oddly nobody else has tested this since the 10.8.5 update, so Ive been testing same for hours now with a Mac Mini clone as booted thru USB to the Macbook Air 2013 Haswell

specifics of the Haswell Air build not being able to be USB bootable are discussed here:

https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=7589

Screenshot below proving same, I have a 1TB MAC MINI HD clone fully booted and working on the 2013 Air! with OSX 10.8.5 , formerly not possible in 10.8.4

[folewar]

If you just erase the drive but do not reinstall Lion and you cannot recover data from Macbook Air, then you will return the computer with a blank drive, not as if it were new.

However, the computer you are returning will only be resold as a refurbed unit, so Apple will install whatever software needs to be installed on it. You are not obliged to do that yourself unless you want to.

If you follow the drive prep procedure I provided all your data is essentially securely erased. That is what the one pass Data Recovery option does.

[RobertHammen]

Hmmm. I smell spam.