You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

david3_1415 Author

Level 1

5 points

Mac Mini M4 will not boot from external HD

I purchased a Mac Mini M4 the day they were released and tried to set it up so that it booted from an external SSD with a Crucial 4TB HD and dock. Using 15.1 for all OSs. I struggled to get it to boot and so called Apple Support, got escalated, then told me to go to Apple Store. I did and the rep at the store verified my experiences and said "I have bad news - looks like you have found an unresolved bug. I suggest you return the product and wait for the bug to be resolved". So I did. Wonder if any others have had similar experience.

David

Details below.

Minisopuru Mac Mini Dock & Stand with M.2 NVMe SSD Enclosure, Upgrade 8 in 1 Mac Mini hub Support 10Gbps USB C/A, TF& SD Card, Audio Jack, Mac Mini Accessories for Mac Mini M2/M2 Pro/M1(2018 & Later)

Crucial P3 Plus 4TB PCIe Gen4 3D NAND NVMe M.2 SSD, up to 5000MB/s - CT4000P3PSSD8

Mac Mini M4 - 256 GB HD

Bootable SSD will boot with iMac and Macbook running 15.1.

Mini recognizes the bootable SSD but when I try to restart I get error message from mini says: "OS needs to be updated".

Changed security settings for as Apple suggested (Reduced Security).

Posted on Nov 12, 2024 9:14 AM

Top-ranking reply

tbirdvet

Level 6

14,471 points

Posted on Nov 12, 2024 6:31 PM

I have an external boot drive for my new Mini M4. I use a WD NVME in a TB enclosure. I use carbon Copy Cloner(CCC) to clone the data, then I booted into recovery and installed 15.1 on the external and it works fine. I did not use the CCC legacy bootable tool as that does not work most of the time with Silicon Macs.

View in context

23 replies

Nov 22, 2024 11:59 AM in response to Luis Berrios

im In this same exact situation.. all the videos I’ve watched just show people using new drives / ones they’ve erased. I have so many important programs on my external which i need.. hoping something comes up on resolving it

Nov 13, 2024 12:41 AM in response to Ronasara

When you format the SSD make sure you format the Physical Disk and not a Volume.

I made that mistake a year ago and wondered why it would not boot.

tbirdvet

Level 6

14,471 points

Nov 14, 2024 7:55 AM in response to david3_1415

I use WD either Blue or Black series NVME. The fastest is the WD SN850X in my Acasis TB enclosure

Nov 14, 2024 10:39 AM in response to tbirdvet

This is the same enclosure and drive I have, how did you make it work? Can you please help me !

david3_1415 Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 15, 2024 1:59 PM in response to tbirdvet

Did you change the Security Policy and can you give a screenshot of what you selected.

thanks

david

tbirdvet

Level 6

14,471 points

Nov 15, 2024 5:01 PM in response to david3_1415

I did not change any security policy.

david3_1415 Author

Level 1

5 points

Nov 17, 2024 12:37 PM in response to Servant of Cats

They are both Intel based so I think that is the issue.

thanks

Nov 22, 2024 12:46 PM in response to david3_1415

I’ve been fighting the same issue all day and realised I have a crucial ssd.. like you say - worked fine with my m2 so thought that wouldn’t be an issue. Ball ache

Mac Mini M4 will not boot from external HD