spidey123 Posted October 18, 2016 Share Posted October 18, 2016 Hi guys, just wondering is it possible to run macOS Sierra from an external drive. I can get it to install but once it reboots to the Clover screen my external drive doesn't show up to allow me to complete the second phase of the installation. It does work though if I run it on my internal drive. I had toomany issues and went back to El Capitan for the internal but I want to keep testing Sierra on an external source. I've always been able to do this in the past with Yosemite and El Capitan. I even tried booting with the lastest Clover via usb stick, clover loads but USB External drive not shown on Clover boot screen. No Idea why I can't get it to work this time. Any suggestions? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Hervé Posted October 18, 2016 Administrators Share Posted October 18, 2016 It's always been possible to boot OS X off an external HDD (unlike Windows). But with El Capitan onwards, you have to make sure all your USB ports are operational since Apple modified USB ports management in EC and beyond. Hence the frequent requirements to patch DSDT and rename EHCx devices (USB2.0 controllers) to EH0x devices; this is then followed by the use of a USBInjector kexts to declare all USB ports under the SMBIOS profile used on the computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Bronxteck Posted October 18, 2016 Administrators Share Posted October 18, 2016 you can try adding XhciDxe-64.efi driver to clover from the clover installer or clover configurator app Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spidey123 Posted October 19, 2016 Author Share Posted October 19, 2016 Ok thanks Herve and Bronxtech, I thought those changes were for USB 3.0? My E6420 only has USB 2.0 ports and they all work in El Capitan when I insert USB's into the ports. I will try Bronxtech's suggestion first I guess since its easier to do. Thanks guys. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Bronxteck Posted October 19, 2016 Administrators Share Posted October 19, 2016 oh sorry. XhciDxe-64.efi is for usb3 I believe. you did not specify it was your machine in your sig. you can try different USB ports when booting the external. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spidey123 Posted October 19, 2016 Author Share Posted October 19, 2016 Ah ok. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Jake Lo Posted October 19, 2016 Moderators Share Posted October 19, 2016 Boots off USB fine on my end. Please upload your Clover folder. Probably just need to enable USB: inject, Add ClockID, and FixOwnerShip in the Config file. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spidey123 Posted October 20, 2016 Author Share Posted October 20, 2016 Hi Jake Lo thanks for your response, I figured out why I couldn't see it. First, Herve was correct, I can only use one USB slot during the boot up, which is why I could never get it to work while booting from a USB stick Plus the external drive. Second, my EFI drive wasn't getting updated by clover. It was just installing an EFI folder in the root of the mac osx, instead of my EFI partition. Fixed that though by "showing all files" then copying the EFI folder and then mounting my EFI partition and pasted it there. Now I finally have the latest 3811 Clover running internally. Before I still had 3330. Anyhow after that, I attached just my external and there was the Boot macOS Sierra but I still had to get rid of the VoodooPS2 controller to avoid kernal panic. So I just removed it, installed, fooled around a bit and then added the kext back in for El Capitan. It would be much easier if I could run more two usb ports, that way I could just use my stick EFI for testing and loading Sierra and my internal for EL Capo. My config though definitely needs to be updated. I'm still using the one from Yosemite. Haven't updated it in a long time. Don't really know how to do it correctly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Bronxteck Posted October 20, 2016 Administrators Share Posted October 20, 2016 well you can always just get a cd rom- hdd caddy adapter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Jake Lo Posted October 20, 2016 Moderators Share Posted October 20, 2016 Why not just install Clover to the external drive and update the EFI/Clover files there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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