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I have a MacBook Pro with Intel CPU where it's impossible to recover the OS. CMD+R, CMD+Option+R processes don't work. After downloading the OS from internet the process starts again rebooting.

I have a MacBook Air with M3 also by which I have been able to backup my MB Pro data booting it by "Start+T" option.

I downloaded MacOS Sonoma for Intel Arch thanks to a friend and tried to create a bootable flash USB drive following this solution (sorry, it's in Italian): https://support.apple.com/en-lb/101578

Unfortunately, "Start+Option" doesn't work. After selecting the USB drive to install the OS, the system reboots again.

I would try to install the OS on external drive following this procedure: https://support.apple.com/en-lb/111336

using my MacBook Air. It's a M3 architecture and my MacBook Pro is an Intel architecture. Do you think is it possible to install MacOS on my MB Pro (using it as external drive) from a M3 architecture?

Thanks.

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No, don’t do this. Something is wrong with how your bootable installer was made, go back and focus on that. (Consider your Intel Mac might have a hardware failure if two different install methods failed.)

The boot process is radically different on the two. Apple doesn’t even suggest or support running a different model in the same architecture from an external drive with OS.

This macOS installation will be specific to your Mac model. You should not expect it to start up other Mac models.

The best you can do is make a bootable installer USB drive from any Mac and then use that to install the specific OS choices needed on the machine of your choice.

The reason why you can’t do this is the target is just a hard drive, the installer assumes there is no processor on the target and uses the processor on the source to make decisions how the OS will boot.

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  • What if I use this solution: support.apple.com/en-lb/101578 using my MB Pro as UBS drive?
    – samuelj
    Commented Nov 24 at 15:15
  • Yes - you can make a bootable installer with the entire OS image that then downloads and installs the specific choices for your hardware. I'll edit that link into the answer where I mention "the best you can do"
    – bmike
    Commented Nov 24 at 17:16
  • Thanks a lot. I think I have understood why I can't recover my OS with USB external drive. My MB Pro has the Apple T2 security chipset and I secured my HD when I settled up it. Any suggestions?
    – samuelj
    Commented Nov 24 at 21:34

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