Revive failure during installation on 2019 Intel MacBook Pro

my macbook is not responding, i tried reviving in dfu mode but it fails while installing, i had some important files on the mac so is there any other ways by which i can revive the mac or recover the files


the mac is 2019 intel model

this is the issue i get


[Edited by Moderator]

Original Title: Revive not working

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 15.6

Posted on Aug 22, 2025 11:36 PM

Reply
2 replies

Aug 23, 2025 01:12 PM in response to csharpp

csharpp wrote:

my macbook is not responding, i tried reviving in dfu mode but it fails while installing,

First, Your host Mac must be running macOS 15.x Sequoia. It will fail otherwise.


Second, you must be using a quality USB only cable. That cable must not support the Thunderbolt protocol.....Thunderbolt cables tend to have a lightning bolt on their USB-C connectors. Apple's own USB-C charging cable is the safest option to use for this process. Try using a different USB-C cable.


It is best to have both the host Mac and the "broken" Mac which is in DFU Mode connected to their power adapters.


Make sure you have the USB-C USB-only cable connected to the DFU Port on the "broken" Mac. See this article to identify the DFU Port for various Macs:

How to identify the DFU port on Mac - Apple Support


I find that the USB-C ports on the Macs tend to become damaged, there is always a possibility the DFU Port on your "broken" Mac is partially bad (it happens a lot).


When a DFU Firmware Revive is unsuccessful, then the next step is to perform a DFU Firmware Restore, but that will destroy all data on the internal SSD. You can try several times to perform the Revive if you wish.

How to revive or restore Mac firmware – Apple Support


You never mentioned the reason why you resorted to a DFU Firmware Revive in the first place. My guess from personal experience is that the Logic Board on your 2019 laptop has a hardware failure.....especially if it is the 16" model.


i had some important files on the mac so is there any other ways by which i can revive the mac or recover the files

If those files are important, then you should have made backups of the computer before anything went wrong.


With the T2 Macs (2018-2020).....many times if there are any problems, it can be impossible to access the data on the internal SSD due to all of the hardware, software, and security changes. Without knowing the specific issues with your laptop, it is impossible to say whether it is possible to access the data on the internal SSD. If Filevault is enabled, then that can greatly complicate things. I'm assuming you are unable to boot your laptop normally, so probably your best and only option is to try putting that laptop into Target Disk Mode so you can attempt to access the data using another Mac (requires connecting them together using a Thunderbolt cable).


The only other two options would be to use the Terminal command line while booted into Recovery Mode/Internet Recovery Mode (tricky if you are familiar with the command line, impossible if you are not), or contacting a professional data recovery service to see if they can recover any data (expensive).


In the future make sure to have frequent and regular backups of your computer and all external media (including the cloud) which contains important & unique data. The more important the data, then the more copies you need. It is wise to use two different backup methods if the data is critical, just in case one backup methods has a problem. Unfortunately this is a lesson most people learn the hard way.


Revive failure during installation on 2019 Intel MacBook Pro

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