Can't power off my Macbook, it turns itself right back on

Question

I tried to reinstall my Macbook, so I rebooted it into recovery mode and cleared my disk.

I then rebooted, at which point it prompted me to connect to Wi-Fi for "Remote Recovery". I've been trying for hours, but no matter what I do, it will spin for a while then exit with an error. I've tried every boot keyboard shortcut in the book for alternative recovery modes, but it always boots into remote recovery mode.

Connecting an Ethernet cable doesn't work, it still just prompts me to connect over WiFi. Other people with this issue recommended setting DNS servers to 8.8.8.8, with guides for how to do this on the Macbook, which makes no ****ing sense when I'm stuck in remote recovery mode. I updated my router to use 8.8.8.8 but it made no difference.

Worse yet, it's not possible to power off my Macbook. If I shut it down by holding the power button, it turns itself back on after a few seconds, no matter if the lid is down and I'm not connected to power. And to make things better, it's running hot as hell, to the point where I almost can't touch the touch bar.

I am actually losing my &#(/"%#ing mind here. What do I do.

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I believe it's the latest generation of Macbook Pro with touch bar before the M1 chip came out, so it's an Intel machine.

Answer 1

Sounds like you have a 2018-2020 macbook pro (touch), which have the T2 security chip. Because of this, when you erased your hard drive, you locked yourself into only restoring with internet recovery, because an admin account is needed to change the boot security settings. CMD+R on boot will bring you to your last installed OS, you can also use CMD+Option+R for the newest OS your machine will hold (Ventura), or Shift+CMD+Option+R for the OS that your mac was shipped with.

As far as the turning itself back on goes, I've had a very high success rate fixing this by replacing/reseating the battery data cable (The one that runs over the top of the battery screw)

An alternative you may also want to try (if you have access to a secondary mac) is using Apple Configurator 2 to perform firmware reset on your mac by selecting "restore" once your computer is connected to a secondary mac using a USB-C cable, and in DFU mode (by holding Left Option + Left Command + Right Shift + Power while it is powered off)

Of course, as I'm sure you already have, please make sure all of your data is backed up using time machine or an alternate method before performing any of these steps. Best of luck.

Restore your mac using internet recovery

https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/use-macos-recovery-on-an-intel-based-mac-mchl338cf9a8/mac

(step 10 for visual of battery cable)

https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Touch+Bar+2018+Battery+Replacement/133172

Performing reset using AC2 + DFU mode

https://support.apple.com/guide/apple-configurator-mac/revive-or-restore-an-intel-based-mac-apdebea5be51/mac