A strange tale of Monterey installation, data recovery, and target disk mode

[neilw]

This was an interesting experience, and I learned some things. Hopefully others can learn from it as well. Spoiler: it has a happy ending.

My wife initiated a Monterey upgrade on her 2018 Macbook Air. It hung partway through. She was able to then boot into recovery mode, but not accomplish anything useful from there. I was called in to help. So in recovery mode, I attempted "Reinstall Monterey". Once again, it hung before completing. So I went back into recovery mode and now it said "There are no users on this volume to recover". Well that didn't seem good. I also tried internet recovery, no joy.

At this point I was afraid of touching the machine any further and possibly losing all the data. Did I mention no backup was done before attempting this upgrade? Also, it turned out that it had been a good long while since the last backup. That said, there was not much critical, irreplaceable data on the machine, so losing it all wouldn't have been catastrophic, but it was certainly not desirable.

Anyway: at this point we made a Genius bar appointment for my wife for the next day. Hardware diagnostics showed the machine was fine, but the Apple guy could not recover the data, and didn't know if there was any data to recover. He suggested a nearby shop that did data recovery, but no guarantees especially since it's a T2-equipped Mac.

The data recovery shop said they couldn't get anything off it, but that we should try the Best Buy Geek Squad. I confess to a very high degree of skepticism, but at this point anything was worth a try. The Geek Squad guy took the machine, and then brought it back out a few minutes later booted to the recovery mode screen (again, "There are no users...") and said the data is gone, nothing they could do.

Feeling almost but not quite resigned to needing to wipe the machine, I remembered one other thing I wanted to try. While fiddling around with safe mode and recovery mode and everything I looked at Startup Disk app and saw the option to boot in Target Disk mode, using a TB3 cable. I didn't have one of those, so before I left the Best Buy mall I grabbed one from the Apple Store and figured I'd give it a shot.

So I got home, booted the Air into Target Disk mode, and hooked it up to my iMac. Many seconds later, the Air drive mounted on my iMac... and all data was there and intact. I dumped it all onto an SSD, wiped the machine and reinstalled Monterey successfully, and restored the data. Nothing lost.

Here is why this is crazy:

1) Why did the Mac say "There are no users to recover" when, apparently, the entire contents of the drive were fine?
2) How did neither Apple, nor a dedicated data recovery business, nor Geek Squad think to try Target Disk Mode? I am still blown away by this. I really just tried it on a lark, figuring for sure that if the data were there then Apple would have gotten it. But no.
3) I did some Googling at the beginning of this adventure, and none of discussions I saw regarding this problem mentioned data recovery via Target Disk mode.

And so, I shout from the rooftop: ALWAYS TRY TARGET DISK MODE BEFORE YOU GIVE UP AND WIPE YOUR MACHINE. I don't assume it'll always work, but here at least is one instance where it saved our bacon. The machine has been running fine since then.

Hope someone finds this useful.

 

[mbnaumann]

Hi. I've run into the same problem. (I'm the "wife.") I've got the computer in recovery mode. If I get the cable you are talking about, how do you boot the Air in Target Disk Mode? I can't seem to get it to boot into anything except for this Recovery mode or a restart of the OS installer? Thx! MB

 

[Fishrrman]

mb --

I'm not sure if you can get into target disk mode from the recovery partition.
Hmmmm.... see "another way" below (if you can open the Startup Disk pref pane).

One way to get there (may not work on newer Macs):
a. Shut the Mac down -- all the way off.
b. Press the power on button and immediately hold down the "T" key and keep holding it down.
c. In a few moments you should see the "floating icon" that indicates target disk mode is on
d. You can now connect the Mac to another (booted up) Mac using either a USB or (perhaps) a thunderbolt cable

Another way to get there.
a. Mac needs to be up-and-running
b. Open the Startup Disk preference pane
c. There is a button "target disk mode" (you might be required to click the lock icon and enter your password before it works)
d. I've never tried it, but I believe you can click this button and the Mac will reboot to target disk mode
e. At this point, connect a USB cable (may need to be USBc, not sure) and connect it to a "booted-up-nomally" Mac.

 

[Linalee]

I just had this happen when updating Big Sur because my MBP suddenly slowed down out of nowhere and I decided updating all the software was probably a good idea since I had plenty of space left on the drive and never used much memory either. I worked with so many techs and no one could get my machine to work again or help me get my data off the drive. On the 3rd day of this madness I ordered the thunderbolt adapter cable to complete this transfer. On the 4th day after it arrived, my computer was in worse condition with all the steps the Apple techs were taking me through. I should've stopped seeking their advice but I was desperate. One tech told me I could connect this cable to my iPad to perform this Target transfer - and I was gullible enough to believe them before the senior tech told me my drive was dead and I finally gave up. I ended up trying to erase the drive but it wouldn't even erase!!

I should've seen that as a sign but on the 5th day I bought a new Macbook Air and set it up while I kept tinkering with the old Macbook Pro and guess what came back to life??? I could've saved all my data and not lost 6 weeks of work. But guess who all never mentioned this option? NONE OF THE MAC TECHS!!! They were in such a rush to erase and reinstall but I kept trying to find alternatives and I HAD TO ASK THEM about the thunderbolt transfer option. I would've visited a friend with a Mac so I could do the transfer but once the "senior" tech told me my drive was dead, I believed him. And of course they offered several times to "recycle" my computer for me since it supposedly wasn't worth anything if it wasn't working... when in reality - if the battery held charge it'd be worth $480.

I hope this helps someone. Don't always believe the techs who say it's impossible. Always try Target Disk Mode! GRRRR

 

[neilw]

One way to get there (may not work on newer Macs):
a. Shut the Mac down -- all the way off.
b. Press the power on button and immediately hold down the "T" key and keep holding it down.
c. In a few moments you should see the "floating icon" that indicates target disk mode is on
d. You can now connect the Mac to another (booted up) Mac using either a USB or (perhaps) a thunderbolt cable

This is what I did.

I hope this helps someone. Don't always believe the techs who say it's impossible. Always try Target Disk Mode! GRRRR

This whole thing still blows my mind. Target Disk mode is amazing and has been around forever... yet it's almost like a secret. 🤷‍♀️

 

[MrAverigeUser]

This is what I did.

This whole thing still blows my mind. Target Disk mode is amazing and has been around forever... yet it's almost like a secret. 🤷‍♀️

yes, indeed!

I did use target-mode to transfer a whole 99% full SSD to a much bigger one. T-Mode is just fantastic to transfer huge amounts of data well-controlled to another Mac oder at least a new SSD.

cheers

 

[DHagan4755]

Good job! The target disk mode is always the way to roll in these situations. It's a mystery why no one at Apple thought of this. It's tech 101.

 

[Mmg509]

This was an interesting experience, and I learned some things. Hopefully others can learn from it as well. Spoiler: it has a happy ending.

My wife initiated a Monterey upgrade on her 2018 Macbook Air. It hung partway through. She was able to then boot into recovery mode, but not accomplish anything useful from there. I was called in to help. So in recovery mode, I attempted "Reinstall Monterey". Once again, it hung before completing. So I went back into recovery mode and now it said "There are no users on this volume to recover". Well that didn't seem good. I also tried internet recovery, no joy.

At this point I was afraid of touching the machine any further and possibly losing all the data. Did I mention no backup was done before attempting this upgrade? Also, it turned out that it had been a good long while since the last backup. That said, there was not much critical, irreplaceable data on the machine, so losing it all wouldn't have been catastrophic, but it was certainly not desirable.

Anyway: at this point we made a Genius bar appointment for my wife for the next day. Hardware diagnostics showed the machine was fine, but the Apple guy could not recover the data, and didn't know if there was any data to recover. He suggested a nearby shop that did data recovery, but no guarantees especially since it's a T2-equipped Mac.

The data recovery shop said they couldn't get anything off it, but that we should try the Best Buy Geek Squad. I confess to a very high degree of skepticism, but at this point anything was worth a try. The Geek Squad guy took the machine, and then brought it back out a few minutes later booted to the recovery mode screen (again, "There are no users...") and said the data is gone, nothing they could do.

Feeling almost but not quite resigned to needing to wipe the machine, I remembered one other thing I wanted to try. While fiddling around with safe mode and recovery mode and everything I looked at Startup Disk app and saw the option to boot in Target Disk mode, using a TB3 cable. I didn't have one of those, so before I left the Best Buy mall I grabbed one from the Apple Store and figured I'd give it a shot.

So I got home, booted the Air into Target Disk mode, and hooked it up to my iMac. Many seconds later, the Air drive mounted on my iMac... and all data was there and intact. I dumped it all onto an SSD, wiped the machine and reinstalled Monterey successfully, and restored the data. Nothing lost.

Here is why this is crazy:

1) Why did the Mac say "There are no users to recover" when, apparently, the entire contents of the drive were fine?
2) How did neither Apple, nor a dedicated data recovery business, nor Geek Squad think to try Target Disk Mode? I am still blown away by this. I really just tried it on a lark, figuring for sure that if the data were there then Apple would have gotten it. But no.
3) I did some Googling at the beginning of this adventure, and none of discussions I saw regarding this problem mentioned data recovery via Target Disk mode.

And so, I shout from the rooftop: ALWAYS TRY TARGET DISK MODE BEFORE YOU GIVE UP AND WIPE YOUR MACHINE. I don't assume it'll always work, but here at least is one instance where it saved our bacon. The machine has been running fine since then.

Hope someone finds this useful.

This seems to be exactly what I’m experiencing with Monterey. Unfortunately, I don’t have another Mac to offload the data on. Is there a workaround for that?

 

[neilw]

This seems to be exactly what I’m experiencing with Monterey. Unfortunately, I don’t have another Mac to offload the data on. Is there a workaround for that?

I think you need another computer. Is there someone you can borrow from? Maybe even take it to a Genius bar, except make sure to explicitly ask them to try TDM. I imagine you'll want to have a USB drive to offload your data.