Frozen recovery screen on Mac mini with M4 chip after HD erase

Following Macintosh HD erase and restart, my Mac Mini with a Silicon Chip displays a recovery screen but appears to freeze.


The MM does not connect to a Bluetooth mouse or Bluetooth keyboard. Thus, I cannot access any of the recovery options. MM sits there with the (frozen) recovery screen showing.


I have tried the power cord out/press and hold power button to cause the orange flashing light to display on the MM, but nothing changes with that. Because the keyboard is not connected, I cannot try other suggested power-up schemes such as left, control, option/right command, and power buttons.


The attached screen shot demonstrates whis displays on the screen.



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Posted on Jan 30, 2025 01:48 PM

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Jan 31, 2025 11:17 PM in response to Robbbwpb

Disconnect all unnecessary external devices including any that are connected to the display.


More than likely you will need to perform a DFU Firmware Revive which resets the security enclave chip & system firmware. If this still does not solve the problem, then you will need to go with the last & most drastic option of a DFU Firmware Restore which does the same thing as the "Revive" except it also resets the internal SSD resulting in the internal SSD being erased as well as pushing a clean copy of macOS onto the internal SSD. Unfortunately the DFU Firmware Revive and Restore process requires access to another Mac (most likely running macOS 15.x Sequoia).

How to revive or restore Mac firmware - Apple Support


If none of this helps, then you most likely have a hardware issue of some sort (most likely a Logic Board failure) that will require a hardware repair.


I hope you have a good backup of the data on the internal SSD because you won't be able to access the data unless one of the first two suggestions fixes the problem since the last two suggestions (Firmware Restore & hardware repair) will result in the loss of data.

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Frozen recovery screen on Mac mini with M4 chip after HD erase

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