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User profile for user: sheafromme
sheafromme Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

MBP Early 2015, blinking folder with question mark, drive in unknown condition.

MBP 13-inch Retina Early 2015 | 2.7 GHz i5 | High Sierra 10.13.6

My MacBook has been freezing randomly lately and then finally today seems to have broken completely. It won’t boot up and is flashing the folder with a question mark. I was able to boot to recovery mode and successfully run First Aid on the drive (which is still visible) but I can’t seem to get it to boot up even though I can see the drive listed. Any suggestions? I figured the drive went but First Aid didn’t seem to notice anything wrong, which is strange to me. Thank you all in advance!

MacBook

Posted on Mar 10, 2020 3:28 PM

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User profile for user: HWTech
HWTech
User level: Level 9
59,816 points

Posted on Mar 10, 2020 6:03 PM

While in Recovery Mode you can try reinstalling macOS over top of itself. This shouldn't affect the data on the drive assuming the SSD is functioning properly and the SSD still has the partitions and data intact.


If the above does not work, then you can erase the whole physical drive as GUID partition and APFS (top option). You may need to click on "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical drive appears in the left pane of Disk Utility. Then you can reinstall macOS or restore from a backup.

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User profile for user: HWTech
HWTech
User level: Level 9
59,816 points

Mar 10, 2020 6:03 PM in response to sheafromme

While in Recovery Mode you can try reinstalling macOS over top of itself. This shouldn't affect the data on the drive assuming the SSD is functioning properly and the SSD still has the partitions and data intact.


If the above does not work, then you can erase the whole physical drive as GUID partition and APFS (top option). You may need to click on "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical drive appears in the left pane of Disk Utility. Then you can reinstall macOS or restore from a backup.

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MBP Early 2015, blinking folder with question mark, drive in unknown condition.

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