Well, my "project" of installing V11.2 of Big Sur onto my Mac Mini did not go 100% as well as I expected, and I am actually back on Catalina. Here is what I did:
1. As usual, ran Onyx and Tech Tool Pro (V13.0.2, the latest one).
2. Did 2 SuperDuper! backups to my two separate Samsung 850 Pro 512 gig SSDs.
3. Restarted the Mini from one of those backups.
4, Used Disk Utility there (the version that comes with Catalina; may have some bearing on my issue that I'll mention below) to Erase and Format (as APFS) the 256 gig internal SSD inside the Mini.
5. Migrated to the latest version of the Big Sur installer, OS 11.2, and proceeded to do a fresh, clean installation of Big Sur onto that internal SSD.
6. At the completion of the installation, was offered, as usual, the ability to migrate files, folders, applications, settings, etc. from a choice of 3 sources. I (of course) chose the latest SuperDuper! backup that I had just completed, and as expected, all went well.
7. Restarted the Mini, and again as expected, started up without a hitch "into" V11.2 of Big Sur.
8. Granted Fill Disk Access to Onyx and Tech Tool Pro (along with some other system preference settings).
OK, so far, so good. Tested a few apps, and no issues. Launched Tech Tool Pro, and chose to create an eDrive. Once again, no issues with that. But when I selected "Restart eDrive", the eDrive did not show in my choice of startup devices. Only the one for OS 11.2. (I did verify that the eDrive had files on it). Tried again, but no go. When I restarted the Mini and held down the Option key, the eDrive did show up as a choice. After I selected it, the boot up process continued, but when it got to using the eDrive, could not do anything at all. Nada, Not a thing.
Checked the Micromat forums, and some folks were having an issue that they could not create the eDrive (seems most of them had to do with space issues, although not in all cases). Also, at least one person had the issue I had, ie, could not do anything with the eDrive. I have subsequently sent an EMail to the "help" area of Micromat, but with it being the weekend, of course am not expecting an answer right away.
When I first tried to "move" back to Catalina, and after re-starting the Mini from the SuperDuper! backup, I used Disk Utility there (again, version that comes with Catalina) to Erase and Format (as APFS) the internal SSD. But after doing a restore, etc., restarting the Mini (now on Catalina), launched Tech Tool Pro, but it would not let me create an eDrive, as there was not enough ?space? available. Even tried to do all that by doing a SuperDuper! restore. Same issue. What I finally did was a 3 step process:
1. Restart my Mac from my other external SSD that had Big Sur on it.
2. Launched Disk Utility from there to Erase and Format (as APFS) the internal SSD inside the Mini.
3. Followed Steps 3 through 8 above), except for step 5, migrated to the latest version of the Catalina installer, OS 10.15.7. And then of course for step 7, restarted the Mini into OS 10.15.7, ie, the latest version of Catalina.
All is well, and I was able to create the eDrive.
So, it seems there is at least one anomaly: to fully Erase and Format a drive that already has Big Sur on it, one must use the version of Disk Utility that comes with Big Sur (this has never happened to me before). Also, from previous versions of the Mac OS, I remember reading that when one does a clean fresh installation of the new Mac OS, it will first Erase and Format the drive one is trying to install the OS on. One question I have is that if the device has already been Erased and Formatted "properly" (ie, in the case of Catalina and Big Sur, formatted as APFS), when one launches the full installer, will it do another Erase and Format?
And the other unknown right now is the Disk Utility issue. Given that I erased and formatted the internal SSD with the Catalina version of Disk Utility, could that possibly be the reason why I could not create a usable eDrive? Will have to wait to hear from Micromat about that.
Last edited by MartyByrde; 02/08/21 02:08 AM.
