macOS update best practices?

[PSGimages]

So of late I've had a few issues performing macOS updates on my iMac (2017).

BACKGROUND

My system is pretty loaded, I have:

• three TB2 attached drives
• one USB 3.1 attached external drive running Timemachine
• a wacom tablet
• a USB 3.1 hub
• Lexar card reader stack
• colormunki device
• an external boot SSD (samsung T5) which is a clone of my mac's boot drive

So that's the background.

FIRST PROBLEM: doing the update to 10.13.5 I left the room for a minute, came back, and the machine had tried to boot off the "external boot SSD" listed above, in the middle of the update. The update was in limbo, so I detached the TB2 stuff and the external SSD and the machine just completely died. Fortunately the Applestore/Applecare fixed it but the motherboard had failed. It may have been related to a slight movement of the USB-C to TB2 adapter, I don't know. But it scared me. (I've read stories about bad USB-C cables causing shorts, but I didn't have a USB-C cable, only the Apple USB-C to TB adapter)

SECOND TIME NOT A PROBLEM: updating to 10.13.6 now. It worked this time but I had removed the "external Boot SSD" so the update could not mistakenly try to boot off that in the middle of the update. I didn't change anything else.

MY QUESTION IS: is there a recommendation or best practice to disconnect all your external "Stuff" when doing updates? I have never had any issues in the past.

 

[PhilDunn]

So of late I've had a few issues performing macOS updates on my iMac (2017).

BACKGROUND

My system is pretty loaded, I have:

• three TB2 attached drives
• one USB 3.1 attached external drive running Timemachine
• a wacom tablet
• a USB 3.1 hub
• Lexar card reader stack
• colormunki device
• an external boot SSD (samsung T5) which is a clone of my mac's boot drive

So that's the background.

FIRST PROBLEM: doing the update to 10.13.5 I left the room for a minute, came back, and the machine had tried to boot off the "external boot SSD" listed above, in the middle of the update. The update was in limbo, so I detached the TB2 stuff and the external SSD and the machine just completely died. Fortunately the Applestore/Applecare fixed it but the motherboard had failed. It may have been related to a slight movement of the USB-C to TB2 adapter, I don't know. But it scared me. (I've read stories about bad USB-C cables causing shorts, but I didn't have a USB-C cable, only the Apple USB-C to TB adapter)

SECOND TIME NOT A PROBLEM: updating to 10.13.6 now. It worked this time but I had removed the "external Boot SSD" so the update could not mistakenly try to boot off that in the middle of the update. I didn't change anything else.

MY QUESTION IS: is there a recommendation or best practice to disconnect all your external "Stuff" when doing updates? I have never had any issues in the past.

Best case scenario is to not have any drives connected, and certainly not any kind of boot drive, even a Time Machine backup.

I also wouldn’t buy any cheap unknown brand cables these days, if that applies to you. Probably best not to disconnect or connect such cables when powered on either.

 

[PSGimages]

So of late I've had a few issues performing macOS updates on my iMac (2017).

BACKGROUND

My system is pretty loaded, I have:

• three TB2 attached drives
• one USB 3.1 attached external drive running Timemachine
• a wacom tablet
• a USB 3.1 hub
• Lexar card reader stack
• colormunki device
• an external boot SSD (samsung T5) which is a clone of my mac's boot drive

So that's the background.

FIRST PROBLEM: doing the update to 10.13.5 I left the room for a minute, came back, and the machine had tried to boot off the "external boot SSD" listed above, in the middle of the update. The update was in limbo, so I detached the TB2 stuff and the external SSD and the machine just completely died. Fortunately the Applestore/Applecare fixed it but the motherboard had failed. It may have been related to a slight movement of the USB-C to TB2 adapter, I don't know. But it scared me. (I've read stories about bad USB-C cables causing shorts, but I didn't have a USB-C cable, only the Apple USB-C to TB adapter)

SECOND TIME NOT A PROBLEM: updating to 10.13.6 now. It worked this time but I had removed the "external Boot SSD" so the update could not mistakenly try to boot off that in the middle of the update. I didn't change anything else.

MY QUESTION IS: is there a recommendation or best practice to disconnect all your external "Stuff" when doing updates? I have never had any issues in the past.

Best case scenario is to not have any drives connected, and certainly not any kind of boot drive, even a Time Machine backup.

I also wouldn’t buy any cheap unknown brand cables these days, if that applies to you. Probably best not to disconnect or connect such cables when powered on either.

Noted. I only have good cables. But will avoid leaving everything connected next time.

 

[johnbandry]

Of course, it's impossible to diagnose after the event from a brief description of final state, but what you describe could be explained by a hardware failure during the update which caused the machine to reboot. I.e., the MB failure may have been cause, not effect, in which case nothing to do with the update process.

--
John Bandry
“Reason is poor propaganda when opposed by the yammering, unceasing lies of ... self-serving men” - Robert A. Heinlein

 

[PSGimages]

Of course, it's impossible to diagnose after the event from a brief description of final state, but what you describe could be explained by a hardware failure during the update which caused the machine to reboot. I.e., the MB failure may have been cause, not effect, in which case nothing to do with the update process.

 

[bmoag]

If all it takes is pulling the plug on a USB hub then it would not hurt to isolate the machine during updates but it should not matter. The OSX bootloader does not randomly choose which drive to boot from.

You do not specify your cloning protocol. I have learned the hard way to clone the system drive in my OSX machines rather than rely on Time Machine.I suffered a catastrophic failure with a recent High Sierra update on a Macbook Pro but with the clone downtime was minimized.

Despite my experience I would recommend all OSX users install all OSX updates as that is the only way Apple addresses the many issues, particularly related to security, that are inherent in any operating system. Apple is much worse than Microsoft about supporting older versions of their OSes so sticking with an older iteration of OSX might not always be a wise choice even though the changes in new versions of OSX may only seem cosmetic.

It is best practice NOT to have the clone attached to the machine at all times to prevent it being impacted by software or hardware issues. The clone really only needs to be updated after operating system updates have proved to be stable and optionally after new software or software updates are installed.

In a worst case scenario a clone not attached can not be locked out by ransomware.

Cable problems tend to be all or none, they work or they don't. Cables may be deceptively mislabeled, not uncommon with HDMI generations. Given how USB works it is difficult to envision a scenario where a defective cable causes an electrical burn out of a system. I suppose anything is possible but more than just the cable would have to be involved.

 

[robgendreau]

Just went through a big hassle with updating, although turned out it wasn't related to the update itself. Moral: make sure your machine is in good shape before doing the update. And maybe even disable kexts you don't need just in case.

In my scenario the culprit is Xrite's POS software. I've had trouble with it before, esp a process it uses for confirming the license, called hasplmd. It prevented a restart, which of course the update needs to get going.

I'm not the only one who has had issues with it; https://medium.com/@howdytom/hasplm...-and-causes-random-kernel-panics-e96763d8612a

I think it's also used by Avid, and maybe some others, software that works with dongles to verify you can use it.

And see here for the update:

Loading…

www.xrite.com

 

[Andy Hewitt]

MY QUESTION IS: is there a recommendation or best practice to disconnect all your external "Stuff" when doing updates? I have never had any issues in the past.

Over time the updating of macOS (or OS X) has evolved. However, there are some things worth doing for each update.

As others have mentioned, make sure your system is in good order, my observation is that more often than not OS update failures are due to something wrong with an individual system.

• Run Disk Utility on the install drive, or some other if you prefer (TechTool Pro for example).
• Make sure your backups are up to date - let Time Machine finish if it's updating, or even instigate a 'Backup Now' to make sure it's completely updated. Run any cloning operation if you have such a copy.
• Disable any antivirus software and/or similar other stuff (Little Snitch perhaps).
• Disable as many third party background tasks as you can.
• Reboot if necessary (to clear any third party background tasks).
• Download and run the macOS updater.

That's more or less all I do now, however, there are many answers to that question, and none/all of them could be right.

• If you find an update hasn't worked as expected, try downloading the 'Combo' updater directly from Apple (a normal Google search should find it). This rewrites a lot more files to the OS install, and sometimes has been found to contain fixes of older updates that hadn't otherwise been released.
• Try rebooting in Safe Mode (hold down 'Shift' at startup).
• Disconnect all external devices.

There is no real evidence that these actually help, but do no harm to try - sometimes a dicky USB hub can cause troubles (for example).

Personally, these days, I just run the updater, and make sure I've got backups.

I also have a cloned copy drive running (I just leave it connected as SuperDuper is set to update it on a schedule).

It might be worth trying a PRAM reset - hold down Command+Option+P+R at startup, let the bong go off at least twice (or reboot at least twice if you don't have a bong), then release the buttons. When you reboot the final time, hold down the Option key, and you'll see all your bootable drives appear, you can see the one that's set as default, select the correct one if that's wrong. When it's rebooted go to the Startup Disk preference panel and check it's set OK there too.

But, all said, usually if anything goes wonky with an OS update, it's because something is corrupt faulty, or causing conflict somewhere, you can eliminate them from causing trouble with an OS update bu disconnecting or temporarily disabling, but in the end the fault is still likely to exist after the update, and can rear it's ugly head later on, maybe in a more catastrophic fashion.

For example, I was having bother with OS performance, and after a tip was given, I installed DriveDX, which enabled Smart capability on my external drives. Turns out I had multiple failing drives. Once replaced, the problems stopped.

 

[Goggs]

Don't update via the App Store. Instead, go to Apple & download the "Combo Update".

https://support.apple.com/downloads/combo

 

[PhilDunn]

Don't update via the App Store. Instead, go to Apple & download the "Combo Update".

https://support.apple.com/downloads/combo

Never had issues with updating from the App Store.

 

[Goggs]

Don't update via the App Store. Instead, go to Apple & download the "Combo Update".

https://support.apple.com/downloads/combo

Never had issues with updating from the App Store.

Neither had I, until yesterday. The latest update did to me exactly what the OP experienced. I Googled a link somewhere (sorry, lost it) and the author was explaining how the update you get through the App Store is specifically for your own machine. The problem with that is that something installed & then uninstalled in the past might have damaged some files that you might not need but the update does. Or something like that. Either way, the combo worked &my Mac mini does genuinely feel snappier today than it has in a long time.

AS ever, YMMV.

 

[Goggs]

I found the link.

Loading…

www.macworld.co.uk

 

[graybalanced]

I like downloading the combo update because I keep it around. More than once I've had a Mac start to act funny, and while I know a number of troubleshooting tricks, sometimes a problem was only solved after I re-ran the most recent combo updater. I guess it reset the system to some extent and put some things in order.

You can't do that with the Apple Store updater.

 

[PSGimages]

If all it takes is pulling the plug on a USB hub then it would not hurt to isolate the machine during updates but it should not matter. The OSX bootloader does not randomly choose which drive to boot from.

I agree, but it's happened to me on more than one machine.

You do not specify your cloning protocol. I have learned the hard way to clone the system drive in my OSX machines rather than rely on Time Machine.I suffered a catastrophic failure with a recent High Sierra update on a Macbook Pro but with the clone downtime was minimized.

I used CarbonCopyCloner to create the boot drive clone. The clone generally works perfectly if I choose to boot off it (if that matters).

Despite my experience I would recommend all OSX users install all OSX updates as that is the only way Apple addresses the many issues, particularly related to security, that are inherent in any operating system. Apple is much worse than Microsoft about supporting older versions of their OSes so sticking with an older iteration of OSX might not always be a wise choice even though the changes in new versions of OSX may only seem cosmetic.

I'm with you.

It is best practice NOT to have the clone attached to the machine at all times to prevent it being impacted by software or hardware issues. The clone really only needs to be updated after operating system updates have proved to be stable and optionally after new software or software updates are installed.

In a worst case scenario a clone not attached can not be locked out by ransomware.

I generally do disconnect. I do have other protections against ransomware but I will default to disconnecting.

Cable problems tend to be all or none, they work or they don't. Cables may be deceptively mislabeled, not uncommon with HDMI generations. Given how USB works it is difficult to envision a scenario where a defective cable causes an electrical burn out of a system. I suppose anything is possible but more than just the cable would have to be involved.

Read this: https://www.pcworld.com/article/300...-google-engineer-warnswhile-naming-names.html

 

[PSGimages]

I like downloading the combo update because I keep it around. More than once I've had a Mac start to act funny, and while I know a number of troubleshooting tricks, sometimes a problem was only solved after I re-ran the most recent combo updater. I guess it reset the system to some extent and put some things in order.

You can't do that with the Apple Store updater.

Good discussion. I will try the combo updater for sure at som epoint. I have a mini as well that has misbehaved during a few updates too so I'll try the combo update with that device.

Thanks folks.