(rant) If Apple ruled the computer world, I would have a different career

[mikeymikec]

The thought just occurred to me while attempting to fix a customer's Macbook Air. I already made it clear to them that I'm not an expert when it comes to Macs and I gave them a contact with another company, but they wanted me to look at it.

This customer's Macbook won't boot. To begin with, it was stuck in a boot loop that evidently powered the screen but nothing came on the screen. Forcibly shutting it down got me as far as the Apple logo (no progress bar) and then it started bootlooping again. I've tried at least three keyboard combinations that do various things like recovery mode, reset PRAM/SMC, no difference. I ordered a USB-C to A adapter because - guess what - no normal USB ports on this laptop, found an ISO for Catalina on archive.org because Apple apparently absolutely refuse to let people download OS images in any sane way except through the App Store (no other Macs here), told it to boot from USB (it was nice to see something other than the Apple logo on the screen for a change), but that also started a bootloop.

Finally I made it do something else, an Internet recovery mode. It asked me to connect to wifi, so I did and then it dumped me back on the wifi selection screen with an animating globe. After three or four attempts to get it to connect to wifi, I decided to leave it for a few minutes on the wifi selection screen and it finally - after like 2 hours of working on this computer - gave me an error code I could look up. Apparently it doesn't like my ISP's DNS servers, fine I'll configure my router to use Google DNS. For about 20 minutes it's had a progress bar on the screen with a time estimate that looks like 0:06 which means.... what? That's not minutes my sweet.

But it's the same old Apple problem that never ceases to irritate me. I've been working on this laptop for like two hours and only once have I been given an error code (that I still need to look up on the Internet, and that's not even an error code for the actual problem that this laptop thinks it's having). I swear, if my formative computer experiences were with Apple computers, there's no question about it, I would not be into computers at all.

Update: The progress bar has finally completed, and now has given me another error code (apparently blaming the Internet connection again, 2003F). I think I had better stop working on this computer for today.

 

[Captante]

Looks to me like all you need to do to get a bootable image of the OS is know somebody with a mac that's running at least the "El Capitan" version?

 

[lxskllr]

"Your shit's broken, and you have debian now. Good day sir"

 

[Captante]

Create a bootable installer for macOS (support.Apple.com)

If you have not tried the listed steps to make a bootable Mac OS installer USB drive shown here I'd give it a shot.


This might also be helpful:

How to Clean Install macOS the Easy Way (HowtoGeek.com)


I also used to have a fantastic Mac software repair utility suite back when I had to maintain my daughters Macbook Pro for college which saved my/her bacon a couple times but I can't seem to recall it's name for the life of me! (or find the order in Gmail)

If it comes back I'll post the information. (getting old sucks lol)

 

[Captante]

THIS might be your answer! (never tried it myself so no promises!)


HOW TO QUICKLY CREATE A MACOS BOOTABLE USB ON WINDOWS 10 (pureinfotech.com)

TransMac utility download ~ trial version (acutesystems.com)

 

[BoomerD]

I have an elderly neighbor whose Macbook apparently got hacked/malware/something. I simply told her, "Sorry. I don't know a damned thing about Apple computers. Can't help."
I think this is the third time something like this has happened.

 

[Torn Mind]

Closed system, tighter control of the supply chain, better QC, fashionable brand, JUST WORKS FOR NON-PROS. /sarcasm

 

[KMFJD]

I probably wouldn't hate computers and end users as much if that were the actual case

 

[Captante]

To be fair Mac OS IS a lot harder for users to break.

Conversely Apple laptops in particular are FAR more of a pain to fix IME.

 

[KMFJD]

if it's a major failure then windows is easier to fix because of how often we have have to fix the damn thing's, for mac's i have found the majority of issues are easily fixed by a reset, no worries about having to hunt down the solution, now if it's a hardware issue though you are most likely sol.

/i don't really fix a lot of apple stuff since it just works (or a reset does the job)

 

[MrSquished]

I haven't had any real issue with a Windows personal computer in ages. Shit just works. On my self built desktop and my Dell laptop.

The bsod days have been long gone for me.

Windows 11 on my desktop and 10 on my laptop

Microsoft is certainly no benevolent corporation and has tons of flaws. But it doesn't try to be a super walled garden like everything apple with things like their anti consumer iMessage platform that they insist is pro consumer.

Fuck apple

 

[mikeymikec]

THIS might be your answer! (never tried it myself so no promises!)


HOW TO QUICKLY CREATE A MACOS BOOTABLE USB ON WINDOWS 10 (pureinfotech.com)

TransMac utility download ~ trial version (acutesystems.com)

I had already tried what you've suggested A Catalina install USB stick just results in another step in the bootloop.

There's also allegedly a diagnostics feature on Macs (hold down D or opt-D immediately after switch-on), but I haven't managed to get that to start.

My feeling is that I really need to get some basic diagnostics done such as if the SSD actually is working, test the RAM etc. If this were a Windows box, stuck in a bootloop for this long and was failing to boot from another device then I'd assume that something is very wrong indeed. I've tried booting from a memtest86 7.4/4.3.7 disc and Debian 11, but got as far as I did with Catalina.

 

[lxskllr]

How about installing linux to an ssd in another box, then trying to swap out ssds? It's not 100% if that would work, but there's good odds of it assuming the machine doesn't have more drastic problems. That would at least let you poke around, and explore the components to check for failures.

 

[DigDog]

have you tried

?

 

[Exterous]

It's even worse in the enterprise management space where Apple has actively hobbled their already limited fleet management abilities. Giant PITA to push software updates, limited enforced controls and, oh everyone has to be an admin to install updates which is just amazing when you have thousands of Macs. Because no one would ever use admin rights to install something stupid or get phished....

 

[Red Squirrel]

At my church we had a windows 7 PC and a Linux PC, the Windows 7 PC was to play powerpoint, audio etc over the PA system and the Linux one was to record and store sermons. I set that up with raid. Then covid happened and they needed a solution to stream meetings. Someone else who already knew about Zoom kind of took over and set that up, and long story short we got a whole sound room remake and we have two Macs now and nobody knows how to do anything anymore. I've kind of let him take over the sound room from this point since everything does seem to work fine but any time I have to run it or anyone else does when he's away we have no idea how to do anything. The mac mouse and keyboard are so physically unintuitive as well which makes things harder, it's so danty to type on and totally not ergonomic or comfortable to use. It almost seems like it was made for someone with really tiny hands. The lack of scroll wheel on the mouse is super annoying too, you don't realize how much you use that until it's gone and you have to keep moving the mouse to click the scroll bars, and sometimes they vanish so you need to play around until they show up again. Overall terrible experience. The issue with Macs is they focus more on looks than usability.

 

[mikeymikec]

@Red Squirrel doesn't the Mac mouse respond to a scroll 'gesture' (ie. run your finger on the mouse in the same way as if there was a mouse wheel)? It's been a while since I've used one but I'm pretty sure that was the case.

 

[BurnItDwn]

I once bought a used old powerbook 3400c and played around with it for a while to get familiar with macos, then installed yellowdog on it and kept it for a number of years. It was pretty neat to play with. Anyhow, I think Current Macs are probably quite a bit different from how they were in the late 90s, but i dunno as thats the newwest mac i've ever used.

 

[HoleInTheEarth]

At my church we had a windows 7 PC and a Linux PC, the Windows 7 PC was to play powerpoint, audio etc over the PA system and the Linux one was to record and store sermons. I set that up with raid. Then covid happened and they needed a solution to stream meetings. Someone else who already knew about Zoom kind of took over and set that up, and long story short we got a whole sound room remake and we have two Macs now and nobody knows how to do anything anymore. I've kind of let him take over the sound room from this point since everything does seem to work fine but any time I have to run it or anyone else does when he's away we have no idea how to do anything. The mac mouse and keyboard are so physically unintuitive as well which makes things harder, it's so danty to type on and totally not ergonomic or comfortable to use. It almost seems like it was made for someone with really tiny hands. The lack of scroll wheel on the mouse is super annoying too, you don't realize how much you use that until it's gone and you have to keep moving the mouse to click the scroll bars, and sometimes they vanish so you need to play around until they show up again. Overall terrible experience. The issue with Macs is they focus more on looks than usability.

You realize you can hook up any mouse or keyboard you want, right? I use Macs at work, but windows at home. I have no problem using a Logitech mouse with my Mac and MacBook pro.

Also, as mentioned, read up about gestures. I will say, the laptops have the best trackpad of any laptop.

I will also say, Finder is hot garbage and I loathe it, lol.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Didn't realize PC stuff worked on a mac, I may have to try that.

 

[Geekbabe]

I actually love Apple products, my mid 2014 MacBook Pro is still serving me well, my iPhone XR works beautifully and so does my iPad….I will see myself out now 😂

 

[Captante]

I actually love Apple products, my mid 2014 MacBook Pro is still serving me well, my iPhone XR works beautifully and so does my iPad….I will see myself out now 😂

Aside from the price-tag Apple sells/designs some nice hardware and the "locked-down" software ecosystem is a plus in many ways for people who like not having to worry about "how the damn thing works" lol.

IT people OTOH tend not to like Apple because they (intentionally?) make life difficult for us.

 

[Torn Mind]

IPhones are better than whatever garbage Google or Samsung tries to ejaculate out of their excrement hole, except emulating SNES and other systems.

 

[Captante]

IPhones used to be made BY Samsung and still contain Samsung designed chips.

Current IPhones are built mainly by Foxconn. (also used by many other companies including Nvidia)

Apple lays out the specs BUT they don't actually build any hardware. All they are responsible for really is the OS.

 

[mikeymikec]

How about installing linux to an ssd in another box, then trying to swap out ssds? It's not 100% if that would work, but there's good odds of it assuming the machine doesn't have more drastic problems. That would at least let you poke around, and explore the components to check for failures.

Unfortunately the storage is apparently soldered to the board.