Mac AirBook A1466 EMC3178 -The Installer Information On The Recovery Server Is Damaged- Error

[Michale32086]

Be gentle with me.. MAC virgin here.. I know my way around MAC Hardware to a certain extent, but I usually work with Windows OS and OS Installs and such.. MAC OS installs are like voodoo magic..

Anyways, I have a MAC AIRBOOK I am trying to resurrect..

When doing the normal CMD-R bootup, I connect to the internet then follow the prompts to re-install SIERRA..



This is what my disk setup looks like:




I get a -The Installer Information On The Recovery Server Is Damaged- error



I have tried the MAC CMD-OPT-R bootup which takes me to a MONTEREY install screen, but I can't install that because it says I need to be connected to the internet and there is no option to do so.



I have read all I can find about booting/installing from a thumbdrive, but the AirBook in question won't let me boot from a thumbdrive.. When I try (Hold the OPT Key) it only gives me an INSTALL FROM INTERNET option.. I have a MAC INSTALLER ThumbDrive and a MACOS SIERRA ThumbDrive.. But I can't figure out how to deploy them..

So I am kind of at an impasse here.. It's real important to get this MAC installed, but I don't know enough about MACs to know how to proceed..

Any assistance, hints or tips would be most appreciated.. Thanx in advance...

 

[Wokis]

How did you prepare your thumbdrive? Is that what you're showing in the 2nd picture? A 2GB drive/partition seems a bit small to house the entire MacOS installer.

Basically I don't think your install media is valid, and rather than possibly re-dowloading and going through the excess steps (especially if you don't have access to another mac?) to make a valid USB-installer I'd advise you to skip that and let the Mac re-download the OS by itself instead. That way it becomes very easy

Is it important to have Sierra on it? Monterey is not ok?

If Monterey is OK the quickest way to get it installed would be to hold Option-Command-R on boot and choose network recovery.

The feature can be a bit iffy if you need to install an older version of MacOS, but it should be doable by holding Option-Shift-Command-R. That way it will attempt to download and install Sierra instead.

 

[Fishrrman]

Try this.

Can you boot to INTERNET recovery?
Command-OPTION-R
at boot
??

This is NOT THE SAME as "booting to the recovery partition".
NOTE. Only Macs from 2011 and later can do internet recovery.
You didn't tell us WHICH MB you have and how old it is (I realize you might not know).

You'll need a wifi password, and the internet utilities will take a while to load up as the globe spins.

When you get to the utilities, open disk utility.
IMPORTANT STEP: if there is a "view" menu, choose "show all devices".
(if there is NO view menu, you can ignore this)

Look at the list on the left.
The topmost item is the physical drive inside.
Click on it and ERASE it to "Mac OS extended, journaling enabled, GUID partition format".

THIS WILL ERASE THE ENTIRE DRIVE, so be forewarned.

Now quit disk utility and open the OS installer.
Start clicking through.
The MacBook should restart one or more times and the screen will go dark for a minute or longer with no other indications of activity. Just be patient.

When done, you should see the initial setup screen "choose your language".
Does this work for you?

Some other thoughts.
You need an 8gb flash drive to create a bootable installer.

I would recommend trying either "DiskMaker X" or "Install Disk Creator" to make them.
Much easier than trying to do it using terminal.
Both are free, google them.

 

[Michale32086]

How did you prepare your thumbdrive? Is that what you're showing in the 2nd picture? A 2GB drive/partition seems a bit small to house the entire MacOS installer.

I used TRANSMAC and MacOS formatted a thumb drive then again used TRANSMAC to set up with the InstallOS.dmg...

Bootable USB with InstallOS.dmg? - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

Basically I don't think your install media is valid, and rather than possibly re-dowloading and going through the excess steps (especially if you don't have access to another mac?) to make a valid USB-installer I'd advise you to skip that and let the Mac re-download the OS by itself instead. That way it becomes very easy

Is it important to have Sierra on it? Monterey is not ok?

If Monterey is OK the quickest way to get it installed would be to hold Option-Command-R on boot and choose network recovery.

The feature can be a bit iffy if you need to install an older version of MacOS, but it should be doable by holding Option-Shift-Command-R. That way it will attempt to download and install Sierra instead.

It doesn't really matter which OS gets on it, as long as an OS is installed..

I tried going the MONTEREY route but got tripped up because I couldn't get the MacBook hooked to the internet...

Thanx for the reply....

 

[Michale32086]

Try this.

Can you boot to INTERNET recovery?
Command-OPTION-R
at boot
??

This is NOT THE SAME as "booting to the recovery partition".
NOTE. Only Macs from 2011 and later can do internet recovery.
You didn't tell us WHICH MB you have and how old it is (I realize you might not know).

You'll need a wifi password, and the internet utilities will take a while to load up as the globe spins.

When you get to the utilities, open disk utility.
IMPORTANT STEP: if there is a "view" menu, choose "show all devices".
(if there is NO view menu, you can ignore this)

Look at the list on the left.
The topmost item is the physical drive inside.
Click on it and ERASE it to "Mac OS extended, journaling enabled, GUID partition format".

THIS WILL ERASE THE ENTIRE DRIVE, so be forewarned.

Now quit disk utility and open the OS installer.
Start clicking through.
The MacBook should restart one or more times and the screen will go dark for a minute or longer with no other indications of activity. Just be patient.

When done, you should see the initial setup screen "choose your language".
Does this work for you?

Unfortunately not.. I got to where I click on macOS Sierra. Click on CONTINUE and I get the INSTALLER INFORMATION RECOVERY SERVER DAMAGED error..

Some other thoughts.
You need an 8gb flash drive to create a bootable installer.

I would recommend trying either "DiskMaker X" or "Install Disk Creator" to make them.
Much easier than trying to do it using terminal.
Both are free, google them.

I'll check those out.. Thanx for the reply.. Much appreciated...

 

[Wokis]

I used TRANSMAC and MacOS formatted a thumb drive then again used TRANSMAC to set up with the InstallOS.dmg...

Bootable USB with InstallOS.dmg? - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

It doesn't really matter which OS gets on it, as long as an OS is installed..

I tried going the MONTEREY route but got tripped up because I couldn't get the MacBook hooked to the internet...

Thanx for the reply....

Oh ok. If it's an issue of it not recognising your wifi-password, do note that the macbook keyboard usually defaults into thinking it's US layout by that point during the recovery process. So special characters like "_" and "-" are in different places than they are physically if you have a non-US MBA. The solution to this is to lookup the US keyboard layout on a picture and match your keypresses to that, or temporarily change wifi-pass to something simple

Just a shot, very unsure if that's the issue you ran into but thought it would be worth mentioning!

 

[Michale32086]

Oh ok. If it's an issue of it not recognising your wifi-password, do note that the macbook keyboard usually defaults into thinking it's US layout by that point during the recovery process. So special characters like "_" and "-" are in different places than they are physically if you have a non-US MBA. The solution to this is to lookup the US keyboard layout on a picture and match your keypresses to that, or temporarily change wifi-pass to something simple

Just a shot, very unsure if that's the issue you ran into but thought it would be worth mentioning!

Nope. I get connected to the wifi just fine...

As near as I can tell the APPLE DISK IMAGE (2.01GB) built into the AirBook is damaged.. At least that's what I assume.. That's why I tried to create my own installer ThumbDrive...

Maybe TRANSMAC is not creating the installer properly??

I am looking at the alternatives suggested by Fishrrman.... Unfortunately they seem to be MAC programs.. And the only mac I have is the one I need to install the OS.. :^/ heh

 

[Wokis]

Nope. I get connected to the wifi just fine...

As near as I can tell the APPLE DISK IMAGE (2.01GB) built into the AirBook is damaged.. At least that's what I assume.. That's why I tried to create my own installer ThumbDrive...

Maybe TRANSMAC is not creating the installer properly??

I am looking at the alternatives suggested by Fishrrman.... Unfortunately they seem to be MAC programs.. And the only mac I have is the one I need to install the OS.. :^/ heh

The "Apple disk image" seems to be your thumb drive, not something internal. In the description it says "external volume". Yes I think transmac hasn't made a valid installer.

But what exactly is failing if you do a network recovery? (Option-Command-R on boot, not just Command-R) If you can access the internet you should be golden with that option.

 

[diego.caraballo]

Be gentle with me.. MAC virgin here.. I know my way around MAC Hardware to a certain extent, but I usually work with Windows OS and OS Installs and such.. MAC OS installs are like voodoo magic..

Anyways, I have a MAC AIRBOOK I am trying to resurrect..

When doing the normal CMD-R bootup, I connect to the internet then follow the prompts to re-install SIERRA..

View attachment 2118402

This is what my disk setup looks like:

View attachment 2118403


I get a -The Installer Information On The Recovery Server Is Damaged- error

View attachment 2118404

I have tried the MAC CMD-OPT-R bootup which takes me to a MONTEREY install screen, but I can't install that because it says I need to be connected to the internet and there is no option to do so.

View attachment 2118401

I have read all I can find about booting/installing from a thumbdrive, but the AirBook in question won't let me boot from a thumbdrive.. When I try (Hold the OPT Key) it only gives me an INSTALL FROM INTERNET option.. I have a MAC INSTALLER ThumbDrive and a MACOS SIERRA ThumbDrive.. But I can't figure out how to deploy them..

So I am kind of at an impasse here.. It's real important to get this MAC installed, but I don't know enough about MACs to know how to proceed..

Any assistance, hints or tips would be most appreciated.. Thanx in advance...

Hi!
After you get to the 4 items recovery menu, click en the top menu: Utilities > Terminal.
Type Date and hit enter.
Check if you have the correct date on the machine.

 

[Michale32086]

The "Apple disk image" seems to be your thumb drive, not something internal. In the description it says "external volume". Yes I think transmac hasn't made a valid installer.

I don't think so...

I get that from the DISK UTILITY, even when the ThumbDrive is not plugged in..

But what exactly is failing if you do a network recovery? (Option-Command-R on boot, not just Command-R) If you can access the internet you should be golden with that option.

Yea, that's what I don't get...

 

[Michale32086]

Hi!
After you get to the 4 items recovery menu, click en the top menu: Utilities > Terminal.
Type Date and hit enter.
Check if you have the correct date on the machine.

Thanx for the reply.. Yea, I got a Credential Trust error initially which lead me to correcting the date.. That's when this current issue cropped up..

From what I have read about the problem, it could still be a Credential issue. But damned if I can figure out exactly what..

Thanx again..

 

[diego.caraballo]

Thanx for the reply.. Yea, I got a Credential Trust error initially which lead me to correcting the date.. That's when this current issue cropped up..

From what I have read about the problem, it could still be a Credential issue. But damned if I can figure out exactly what..

Thanx again..

Turn OFF the Mac.
Turn it ON and immediately press and hold the D key.
It should ask to connect to internet.
Let's see if you can run the diagnostics successfully.

 

[Michale32086]

Turn OFF the Mac.
Turn it ON and immediately press and hold the D key.
It should ask to connect to internet.
Let's see if you can run the diagnostics successfully.

The screen stays black for about 60 secs, then I get the flashing '?' Folder...

 

[okkibs]

You can't use a USB thumbdrive as you'd need an actual working Mac to create it. Since you created it on Windows it is likely damaged.

Hold Option-Shift-Command-R when turning on the Mac, then connect your Wifi at the globe symbol. It is important you use that combination to start it up. Whatever it boots into is very likely the only MacOS you'll be able to install - after that is installed you can then upgrade to whatever.

Before installing, open the Disk Utility, and in the menubar at the top go to "view" and make sure that "show all devices" is checked. Now in Disk Utility select the entry starting with "APPLE SSD..." and then click the "Erase" button. Accept the defaults, you can name the disk whatever you want, and wait for this to complete. Now close Disk Utiility and start the installation.

At this point if you cannot start the installation because the Mac says it isn't connected to the internet, go to the top right corner of the menubar where you also have the keyboard layout selector. You should find a Wifi symbol where you can connect your Wifi again. After this the installation should complete.

Once you are booted into MacOS you can upgrade to the latest supported version via the download links provided by Apple here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211683 This will likely be Monterey. Download Monterey in the "Or use the App Store or your browser" section of the linked article. The rest of the upgrade will be more or less automated, just click the next button etc.

It is important you do an upgrade to Monterey because it is the only way to get the newest firmware. If you do an installation with a USB thumbdrive instead, the firmware will not get upgraded and the installation might fail. Also make sure it's plugged into power the entire time, otherwise the firmware might also not get upgraded.

 

[diego.caraballo]

The screen stays black for about 60 secs, then I get the flashing '?' Folder...

View attachment 2118479

This is normal, no finding the boot system.
You need to press and hold the D key immediately after turn the Mac ON.

 

[Michale32086]

You can't use a USB thumbdrive as you'd need an actual working Mac to create it. Since you created it on Windows it is likely damaged.

Hold Option-Shift-Command-R when turning on the Mac, then connect your Wifi at the globe symbol. It is important you use that combination to start it up. Whatever it boots into is very likely the only MacOS you'll be able to install - after that is installed you can then upgrade to whatever.

OK I am going to "live blog" this..

OK I held OPT-SHIFT-CMD-R and powered up.. (almost sprained my wrist.. ) I have the spinning globe and the countdown timer...

OK Now I have the MAC/APPLE logo...

OK At the macOS Utilities..

Before installing, open the Disk Utility, and in the menubar at the top go to "view" and make sure that "show all devices" is checked. Now in Disk Utility select the entry starting with "APPLE SSD..." and then click the "Erase" button. Accept the defaults, you can name the disk whatever you want, and wait for this to complete. Now close Disk Utiility and start the installation.

Open up DISK UTILITY and see this... NOTE There is no USB drive in the Airbook...

At this point if you cannot start the installation because the Mac says it isn't connected to the internet, go to the top right corner of the menubar where you also have the keyboard layout selector. You should find a Wifi symbol where you can connect your Wifi again. After this the installation should complete.

I confirm I am connected to my wifi....

I go to the macOS SIERRA screen and click CONTINUE...

I get the TO DOWNLOAD AND RESTORE macOS, YOUR COMPUTER'S ELIGIBILITY WILL BE VERIFIED WITH APPLE message...

I click on CONTINUE and the cursor spins for a few and then I get the THE INSTALLER INFORMATION ON THE RECOVERY SERVER IS DAMAGED error..

Is it possible that this airbook is blacklisted (I got it from a pawnshop)??? But I can't imagine that being blacklisted would produce a SERVER IS DAMAGED error...

 

[diego.caraballo]

What happens if you run diagnostics?
Option CMD R is the way to go, but first you need to troubleshoot the Internet connection issue.

I don't think that you will able to install Sierra, time ago some digital certificates from Apple installers expired.
They issued new ones but only for the most recent versions of macOS.

If you want, try to change the date of the Mac (using Terminal) to September 9, 2019 and see if you get the same damaged installer message.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote:
"Open up DISK UTILITY and see this... NOTE There is no USB drive in the Airbook..."

First off, it's called a "MacBook".

I don't think you're doing this correctly.
Ignore that "base system" you see above.

First, you must reboot to INTERNET recovery, as okkibs told you to do in reply 14 above (I also told you to do it, earlier).

When you GET to internet recovery, and see the utilities, open disk utility as you did before, I will assume you see what is in the image above.

NOW YOU MUST BE CAREFUL ABOUT WHAT YOU DO.

See "that list on the left"? (in the image above)
You want to go to the VERY TOP LINE, the one that reads:
"Apple SSD SM02..."

Click on that to select it.

THEN, click the "erase" button up above in the tool bar.

There will appear a dialog with several choices.

NAME -- doesn't matter for now (use any name you like)

Format, etc. -- you want to select "Mac OS extended (journaling enabled)" and also select "GUID partition format".

With those selections made, click the erase button to proceed.

When done, the internal drive is erased, gone, there's nothing on it.

Now, you need to PUT SOMETHING onto it.

Quit disk utility and open the OS installer, and start "clicking through".

Does this work?

 

[YoitsTmac]

THE INSTALLER INFORMATION ON THE RECOVERY SERVER IS DAMAGED error..

I know this error all too well, as someone who deploys a ton of "old OSes to either old Macs or virtual machines. Let me walk you through this.

When you do the internet recovery (the globe with the progress line before getting to the installer), you're downloading it into RAM. This is awesome because ifs it was hosted locally (IE a built-in recovery partition), you wouldn't be able to reformat the entire internal hard drive...because you'd be running the OS off it. So that Disk Image you're seeing is how the OS interprets the internet recovery booted onto the RAM. At an OS level, the computer wants to interpret the internet recovery as being on some physical drive, so that's what you're seeing. The "Internal" section with the "Apple SSD" is your boot drive. So for a computer with no USB installed that booted on internet recovery, this all looks great.

Now here's the part I'm shocked no one has mentioned. Apple has some internal checks on their OS installers to try to prevent you from installing an older OS. Before the installer even shows you a window, it checks the computer's reported current date. If the computer date (perceived as the actual date) is too far from the OS release date, then it says it's corrupted. Yes, seriously. I had this issue installing MacOS High Sierra on my 2012 Mac mini. If you change the computer date to be within x time from the creation of the installer, it will magically no longer be corrupted/damaged.

Why the corruption/damaged label comes up on working installers:

I suspect Apple's installer has some internal "check" to determine the probability of a newer OS existing and if your computer will support a newer OS. I assume it first checks the date. Is it likely a newer OS is out (probably 12mo check from initial release)? Yes, no. If yes, then I believe it checks Apple's servers to see if you support it. If you set the date close to the initial OS release date, then it just assumes there can't be anything newer and lets you proceed. When it fails these checks, it says the installer is corrupted instead of saying "we don't want you installing an older OS like on iOS, so this is the best we got." Of course, this is all hypothesis based on the struggles I've had with older OSs. The fact that Apple does call perfectly fine installers corrupted based on some relation to the date, that always seems to resolve itself when the computer's reported current date is close to the release date of said OS, is true.

The fix:

Before opening the installer (or after being disappointed it doesn't work), hit the utilities at the top and open terminal. Type the following:
date -u 1111111119
Make the last two numbers the year the operating system was released. Don't worry about the rest, the date will re-sort itself when you set up the computer post-install. If you must know, the format is: {month}{day}{hour}{minute}{year}. You can verify it worked by then typing "date".

Now you can quit terminal and re-open the installer and you should be able to go. One small note: you are using internet recovery, not a local installer on a USB since you're having issues. I have only performed this with local USB installers and don't connect it to wifi. As long as the installer doesn't try to pull the date from the internet when you open it, this will work. I have always done this without the internet, and can only hope it only pulls the date on first boot.

Best of luck!

 

[okkibs]

Yup wrong date prevents from installing - repeat my steps again and do the mentioned date fix in Terminal. Maybe it is enough to set the date to the actual current date, format is [MM][DD][HH][MM][YY] so try date -u 1125110022 for today as well.

 

[YoitsTmac]

It's not "wrong date" that prevents an install, it's a date too far from the OS original release date that prevents install. Example. When I install high Sierra, I run:
date -u 1111111118

If it has the current date, it fails.

 

[Michale32086]

Apologies for not getting to this.. I was away for the weekend..

Let me ask one question... Would I be seeing this THE INSTALLER INFORMATION ON THE RECOVERY SERVER IS DAMAGED error if the macbook was blacklisted??

It appears I CAN get on the internet, but the afore mentioned error comes up after the macbook says it needs to confirm that the macbook is valid..

If it IS a blacklisted problem, then there doesn't seem to be any reason to continue as I am pretty sure that THAT is something that can't be fixed...

 

[Michale32086]

OP wrote:
"Open up DISK UTILITY and see this... NOTE There is no USB drive in the Airbook..."
View attachment 2118520
First off, it's called a "MacBook".

I don't think you're doing this correctly.
Ignore that "base system" you see above.

First, you must reboot to INTERNET recovery, as okkibs told you to do in reply 14 above (I also told you to do it, earlier).

When you GET to internet recovery, and see the utilities, open disk utility as you did before, I will assume you see what is in the image above.

NOW YOU MUST BE CAREFUL ABOUT WHAT YOU DO.

See "that list on the left"? (in the image above)
You want to go to the VERY TOP LINE, the one that reads:
"Apple SSD SM02..."

Click on that to select it.

THEN, click the "erase" button up above in the tool bar.

There will appear a dialog with several choices.

NAME -- doesn't matter for now (use any name you like)

Format, etc. -- you want to select "Mac OS extended (journaling enabled)" and also select "GUID partition format".

With those selections made, click the erase button to proceed.

When done, the internal drive is erased, gone, there's nothing on it.

Now, you need to PUT SOMETHING onto it.

Quit disk utility and open the OS installer, and start "clicking through".

Does this work?

No, it doesn't...

I followed the above step by step, as I outlined in comment #16...

I hold CMD-R, put in the wifi password and get the spinning globe for a few secs/mins...

Then I get the APPLE LOGO for a few...

macOS Utilities comes up. I open TERMINAL and confirm that the DATE is set correctly...

Close TERMINAL and I select DISK UTILITY

Select APPLE SSD SM0256G Media. Click ERASE

Name it MACOS, select MAC OS EXTENDED (Journaled) and GUID Partition Map then click on CONTINUE..

Get this:

Click on DONE and exit out of DISK UTILITY

Select REINSTALL MacOS and click on CONTINUE

MacOS SIERRA box comes up and I click on CONTINUE

This pops up:

I click on CONTINUE. It says LOADING INSTALLATION INFORMATION for a few secs and then this:

And that's where I am at right now..

 

[Michale32086]

What happens if you run diagnostics?
Option CMD R is the way to go, but first you need to troubleshoot the Internet connection issue.

I don't think that you will able to install Sierra, time ago some digital certificates from Apple installers expired.
They issued new ones but only for the most recent versions of macOS.

If you want, try to change the date of the Mac (using Terminal) to September 9, 2019 and see if you get the same damaged installer message.

Can't CTRL-D at all..

I'll try changing the date and see what happens.. Stand by...

OK Date set..

Crossing fingers..

OK.. Didn't work.. BUT.. It did something different..

"Anything different is good."
-Bill Murray, GROUNDHOG DAY

Let me adjust the date to some of the other suggestions..

OK I used 'date 1111111119' and I get the same UNTRUSTED error..

Using 'date 1111111120'... Same error...

Year 2021... Same error..

Going the other way to year 2018.. Same error...

Well, carp...

 

[Michale32086]

So, now I am thinking is the best way to proceed is to create an actual working macOS installer thumbdrive and try to install from a thumbdrive rather than the internet installer..

There is some info on creating a mac USB installer here:

Create a bootable installer for macOS - Apple Support (IN)

Use an external drive or secondary volume as a startup disk from which to install macOS.

support.apple.com

I think I tried that once before...

Would I run into the same problem that way??