Gigabyte Z390 M Gaming build with working NVRAM

[tedyun]

Boot Sequence:

The PNY USB is the Install macOS Catalina

When my internal NVMe card was not recognized, out of curiosity I decided to see if I could install Catalina to the Lexar USB is 64Gb device. So, the BIOS knows it’s there, but Catalina does not.

View attachment 506123

When I restart, this appears after the GIGABYTE splash:

View attachment 506125

Choosing either the PNY USB or OpenCore, I get:

View attachment 506126

It goes by quickly so there isn’t much chance to do anything. Also, not sure Macintosh HD is the NVMe card or the HFS SSD that I have reused from the previous build. What is Reset NVRAM?

After this screen is:

View attachment 506127

About 8 to 10 minutes into the installation to the Lexar USB the installation crashed and left a HUGE log file...

@flatlander48 : Out of curiosity, can you check the name of the "Install macOS Catalina" app in your Applications folder and on your flash drive. Can you make sure there isn't a space at the end, ie it should be ""Install macOS Catalina" and not ""Install macOS Catalina " (note the space at the end of the second option)

 

[flatlander48]

The highlighting looks exactly the same, so I would guess there are no extra spaces...

 

[pastrychef]

No, Catalina\ .app

Backslash AND a space...

Now at the point where:

Select the disk where you want to install macOS

However, it shows the Install USB device and my original HFS SSD (both grayed out). It is not seeing my NVMe card in M2Q that I want to use for my boot device...

I don't know why macOS doesn't see your NVMe SSD. If it's formatted as HFS, macOS should have no problems seeing it.

Can you try booting in Linux or Windows to see if the NVMe drive is detected?

 

[gameboyforever]

the BIOS ver. F9m had released, you guy had updated?

 

[pastrychef]

View attachment 506161
the BIOS ver. F9m had released, you guy had updated?

I haven't tried yet.

 

[Armoured]

Boot Sequence:


View attachment 506123

I'd suggest you trying putting the NVMe in the other M.2 slot to see if that helps.

I have almost the same startup but M2P is where the NVMe lives - I don't know if there's some firmware issue or what, and I haven't tried moving mine - but it is possible that for whatever reason macOS isn't seeing that slot.

That's probably the easiest thing to try right now, anyway.

(Side note, I found it much easier to work with to install macOS in testing/tweaking regime on an SSD in an external portable housing - that way I could attach it to another mac to work with whenever needed. Once it was fully stable, I carbon copied to the NVMe drive where it lives ever since.)

 

[flatlander48]

I don't know why macOS doesn't see your NVMe SSD. If it's formatted as HFS, macOS should have no problems seeing it.

Can you try booting in Linux or Windows to see if the NVMe drive is detected?

Actually I never did any formatting to the NVMe card. I just installed it. I don’t have Windows, but I can probably download a Linux distribution somewhere. That would probably be more interesting anyway. The question then is how the process should go to install it.

 

[flatlander48]

I'd suggest you trying putting the NVMe in the other M.2 slot to see if that helps.

I have almost the same startup but M2P is where the NVMe lives - I don't know if there's some firmware issue or what, and I haven't tried moving mine - but it is possible that for whatever reason macOS isn't seeing that slot.

That's probably the easiest thing to try right now, anyway.

(Side note, I found it much easier to work with to install macOS in testing/tweaking regime on an SSD in an external portable housing - that way I could attach it to another mac to work with whenever needed. Once it was fully stable, I carbon copied to the NVMe drive where it lives ever since.)

That is an option of last resort as that would be significant work. The graphics card and the WiFi/Bluetooth card have to come out. The NVMe card is also partly covered by my be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 CPU Cooler. The Cooler obscures access to the mounting screw for the card. Nearly all the cables have to be released as they are all tied down and then everything reinstalled and tied down again. Anyway, not a trivial activity...

 

[tedyun]

That is an option of last resort as that would be significant work. The graphics card and the WiFi/Bluetooth card have to come out. The NVMe card is also partly covered by my be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 CPU Cooler. The Cooler obscures access to the mounting screw for the card. Nearly all the cables have to be released as they are all tied down and then everything reinstalled and tied down again. Anyway, not a trivial activity...

If that's the case, in order to rule out a faulty NVMe, you might have to try to install the system on a separate SATA drive, like a SATA SSD or a hard drive.

If you don't have that option available, then you might have to do the work to move the NVMe. After all, at this point, your rig is not useable.

 

[pastrychef]

Actually I never did any formatting to the NVMe card. I just installed it. I don’t have Windows, but I can probably download a Linux distribution somewhere. That would probably be more interesting anyway. The question then is how the process should go to install it.

You can easily boot off of a Linux "Live" bistro and see if the NVMe SSD is detected. Those Live distros can run off of USB flash drive.

For what it's worth, I have two NVMe SSDs in my system and macOS has no issues seeing or using both.