Home Forums Hardware Mac Desktops & Notebooks iMac thinks it is new machine

I have a serious problem.

I was using the Mac but my wife needed to deal with mail, so we used change user and logged out. When I tried to log back in, the computer wants to go through an initial setup. I forced a shutdown using the power button and disconnected all backups - CCC and Time Machine.

Prior to my wife using the machine, I had a number of apps open and Malware Bytes was running a scan, although it seemed to be hung up as it had been scanning for about 15 minutes without anything new.

So, where do I go from here?

Update: It appears things are getting somewhat back to normal. I restarted the machine, just to see what might happen, and it booted with...mostly.... my stuff. The Dock was totally different, as though just new.... so I've started putting stuff back. The biggest issue appears to be my Quicken...which is empty.

Abby Roade is pushing me for her walk so I'll be gone quite a while.

I have no clue what happened and there are numerous scenarios, but given the apparent hang at the beginning of this exercise, I would run Etrecheck Pro and see what, if anything, it reported before going further.

As to any data loss, since you have Time Machine, and assuming you running it as designed, you could either...

• Restore your Quicken files or
• Recover all your files and settings or
• Reinstall macOS and recover all your data.

Again, assuming you are running Time Machine as designed the most you should lose is the last hour's work.

/

Well, it appears the Gods are smiling on me, sort of, as I did a shutdown (forced) while the machine was trying to take me through an initial set-up. When I rebooted everything was almost back to normal.

Almost means:

• I've had to reregister some of my apps (put in the registration code provided by the developer)
• Quicken files weren't there, but I recovered them using Quicken function
• The menu bar was not the same (i.e. it didn't show Stage Manager) but I put it back using 'drag and drop'
• The dock had a lot of apps missing, which I've been putting back using 'drag and drop'
• Cookie (V 6.9.4) is broken, which seems to be related to loss of access


I have one problem I can't seem to solve. My dock used to have a section with Applications, Documents and Downloads but I'm unable to fix it with 'drag and drop'. If I could get this sorted out, I'd be happy.

There is one weird thing with trying to put the Applications folder into the Dock. When the Dock wouldn't accept it, the machine put an Applications folder on the desktop. It's a folder with a little black arrow bottom left corner. I tried to get rid of it using "move to Trash" but then got a message "Finder wants to make changes". When I authorized the Finder change, the Applications folder re-appeared on the desktop.

The little black arrow means that your folder is an alias, which is expected behavior when you drag your apps folder to your desktop. Control-clicking on it should give you an option to "Move to Trash..." or is that what you've already tried? (I just experimented on my end and had no trouble trashing the alias.)

Were it me, I'd reinstall Ventura, but I think you ought to go with joe mike's suggestion to run EtreCheckPro before oyu do anything else. This whole episode has been so weird and made so little sense that I wouldn't bet on anything that sounds sensible being sensible.

1. everything on the dock is an alias
2. The Dock is divided into three segments separated by thin vertical lines.
3. The left most segment contains application aliases that have been placed there by the user, no files or folders are accepted.
4. The next section contains aliases to applications that launched but do not otherwise appear in the Dock, items are placed here by macOS only.
5. Folder aliases may only appear in the rightmost section of the dock
6. A black dot under an application alias IN THE DOCK indicates the application is currently open and running
7. A black dot under an icon on the desktop or in Finder indicates the icon is an alias (this does not apply in the dock)
8. To remove an alias from the Dock, Control+click on the icon and select Remove from Dock on the popup menu

Something went badly astray, I have no idea what. Personally, I would feel more comfortable knowing what went astray and Etrecheck Pro provides a convenient analysis tool, but the more you do on your computer, the less likely you will find anything useful. I also strongly concur with Artie's suggestion to reinstall Ventura as I suspect there is hidden damage to system data and settings that could cause future failures. I would have reinstalled Ventura and recovered all my data and settings from Time Machine and it isn't too late to do that now, just be sure you recover the data from a time prior to the original crash.

That worked. Thanks.
I have run EtreCheckPro a few times but the major issues are unsigned files. I’ve looked through them and don’t see any names I don’t recognize, so I’m assuming they are from when signing wasn’t needed.

There were some 32 bit Apps and I’ve trashed those.
I’m sure I have all of my data files back and so I’m also thinking a reinstall of Ventura but am not crazy of the idea of using Time Machine. It’s acted strange the last while (e.g. would have nothing available at a selected time) and I’ve recently been thinking that I’d wipe the Time Machine drive and start it anew.

Given my weird occurrences, what's the recommended way to reinstall Ventura without Time Machine?

Ruling out Time Machine means all you can do is get back to where you are right now today. Simply follow Apple's Instructions. All settings and any lost data from before the crash will be permanently lost.

With Time Machine all of the data and settings that existed prior to the crash could be restored.

Recovery always confuses me...too many options.

Personally, I'd just download "macOS Ventura" from the App Store.

Same difference, and depending upon how long it takes you to get into Recovery, possibly even faster.

(From your sig: OS Venture 13.6.1. I think it may be appropriate to change that ADVenture! )

Or maybe MISADVenture?

:groan: this thread is getting PUNishing

It appears the trick now is getting the machine to boot into Recover. It took several tries and when Recovery finally did boot up, any attempts to select an option were met with: com.apple.Buildinfo.preflight. error error 21

Here is what Apple says you should do if you get this error, some of which you may have already tried, but…

Under the circumstances and just in case all else fails, before following Apple's suggestion I would strongly urge you to create a bootable thumb drive installer and hang onto the Time Machine backup, it may be your only way to recover our data.

Well, I'm back. Caught something nasty and have been bedridden for past few dates. Anyway, my problem, not yours.....

Given MalwareBytes was hung-up at the start of this saga, I first used FindFile to get rid of all MalwareBytes stuff - some of which was a bit stubborn. Then I tried Ira's suggestion (Thank you Ira), which allowed me to get past that "....error error 21" thing right at the start and to a point where I could run Disk Utility. DW was run on both the data and the system separately. DW found something corrupt in Data and fixed it.

I did a Shutdown and rebooted with Command-R.

When I selected reinstall Ventura, I was presented with images of my Macintosh HD and my two backup disks but not Time Machine. An attempt to install on Macintosh HD got, you guessed it, "com.apple.Buildinfo.preflight.error error 21"

Just to widen the information base, I tried an install on one of the backups and the response was "Let's boogie" but I didn't proceed. Does this present any opportunities for restoration?

As I suggested earlier, download the macOS Ventura installer from the App Store and see how it goes.

If I am understanding you correctly, at this point you should not be presented with your Time Machine drive. I think you are being asked where do you want to install Ventura, and your TM drive should not be an option. The fact that you selected your Macintosh HD and it was a no go (same error message as before) seems to indicate a hard drive problem. My suggestion would be along the lines of Artie's—try installing with an installer downloaded from the App Store. Failing that, and here is where it is very easy for me to suggest other people screw up their own setup , do an erase of your Mac HD via Command-R and reinstall the System from there too, then bring over all your stuff from your (very good) Time Machine backup. This last suggestion is also what Apple recommends as the last resort if the previous stuff (my link in the previous post) does not work.

Hmm, maybe your problem is really hardware related. Try running Apple's Diagnostic Tests and see if anything shows up.

At the least, the failure pop-up, if any, will be interesting to see.

And in the end, it may come down to erase & install as oyou've noted.

I don't recall ever having seen ryck's situation arise in the 20+ years I've been around MFIF/FTM.

I agree, very unusual. That's what leads me to suspect a hardware issue, although ryck's setup is not that old.

I'm no expert, but I can't imagine any type of hardware issue that might be at the root of ryck's issue.

I'm more inclined to think "horribly corrupted macOS installation," but neither can I imagine what may have caused that.

So where’s the challenge if I just bring simple problems? Anyway, given the inability to get anything done through the Recovery process, I thought I'd give the AppStore option a try but it’s also puzzling.

I am Ventura 13.6.1 and the App Store confirms that that’s the latest version, however the store wants to download 13.5.2.

I just looked at the App Store, and ran into the same 13.5.2 download despite the fact that it offers 13.6.1. (I'm running Sonoma 14.1.2.)

I guess it's an App Store glitch, so why don't you just take what it offers and update afterwards if the installation is successful?

I ran into that. It appears that when a new version of macOS is released, the App Store no longer "stocks" updates to the now previous version. It is why I abandoned my practice of keeping a bootable thumb drive installer of the previous OS.

Your option would be to install macOS 13.5.2, boot into that, then install the update, but since you already have 13.6.1 the 13.5.2 installer will not want to run. The work-around to that is to

1. as a test launch the Time Machine app and see if there are copies of your data, etc. there. If NOT, see if you can capture a screen shot of what you see and post it so we can see it. Don't do anything until we get back too you.
2. If Time Machine appears normal, boot from the recovery drive or a bootable thumb drive installer
3. launch Disk Utility from there and erase the Macintosh HD volume on your internal drive
4. Run the installer and when prompted by the installer run Migration Assistant and recover your applications, settings, and data from Time Machine. It isn't that hard unless you overthink the process.

That seems shortsighted of Apple. I guess they're assuming that everyone in ryck's position will use Recovery, but why inconvenience plain old upgraders?

Oops! Good point.

OSXDaily has a link to download the MacOS Ventura 13.6.1 Full Installer from Apple's servers.