[How to] install High Sierra updates on mbr partition

[Alex009988]

Hello. I have fully-working system on my old laptop. I used that patch(manual method) to do the installation of last system 17G66 from appstore https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/files/file/762-high-sierra-mbr-and-firmware-check-patch/

 

However, if your try to install security updates from appstore you'll faced the error. Disk doesn't use GUID partition scheme if you have MBR.

Searching some internet I found only one thread about that problem https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/328471-how-to-install-supplementary-update17a405-using-mbr-for-1013？/

 

 

And I checked it. I tried to copy my partition via R-Drive Image to my external disk. But the system didn't boot. So I used this way as I didn't want to format completely external hdd too(GPT scheme):

1) Under windows use AOMEI Partition Assistant to shrink partition and get free space for mac partition on external hdd;

2) Use rufos to install ubuntu Live image to your usb stick. https://rufus.ie/downloads/ ;

3) In ubuntu, install hfsproogs via terminal sudo apt-get install hfsprogs. If it doesn't find, install it manually from there. https://pkgs.org/download/hfsprogs ;

4) format partition to hfs+ on your external disk via gparted:

5) prepare usb key with installation image with macos or restore it via Rdrive(link coming soon) and installed it:

6) Boot from external drive. You may found a problem that the system doesn't boot on your external hdd. In this case, try to use that config and kext.

USB Installer Sierra.High Sierra.zip ;

7) Download the update on your main system and put pkg to the desktop of external drive system https://support.apple.com/downloads ;

8) Install the update from the external drive to the partition on main system(internal);

9) At the end of the process, you'll get message failed-update, but indeed it's not;

10) you may need to update clover(For example Clover 5115 version doesn't patch kexts on 17G12034, but 5117 do);

11) That's all. You've got last update of MacOS

I've done that tutorial for people who has old legacy bios PC and who doesn't want boot windows in UEFI mode  by clover as without it windows won't ever boot in GPT partition and(or) format whole disk. So saving mbr scheme may have some sense for old pc.

I guess this  way should work on Mojave and Catalina too.