Update woes

[mudge]

Hello all,

I’m happily running Mojave, no interest in “updating” to Catalina or whatever it’s called.
Last night, following a Software Update pompt, I attempted the most recent “security update”.

All seemed to be going well, but after a while I got an impressive error message: “macOS could not be installed on your computer / ERROR_7E7AEE96CA / quit the installer to restart your computer and try again.” Beneath that text is a Restart button which is greyed out, and the cursor is frozen at top left corner of the screen, so there’s no way to even try to hit that Restart button.

I’ve tried unplugging the machine (a pretty new iMac) and plugging in later and starting up, but all I get is that same error message.
so, typing this inquiry to you all from my iPad.

Help please!! How do I get my iMac back up and running??

TIA!! Ch.S.

 

[oldscribe]

Hi,

Have you tried a restart in Safe Mode and run disk utility’s first aid?

 

[mudge]

trying to start in Safe mode I get the Apple logo and progress bar, showing maybe 10% progress, then the screen goes black :-(

 

[oldscribe]

Hi,

How old is the Mac, and have you tried using the built-in Mac OS recovery system?
If not have a look here to save me writing a long post.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello,

Sometimes you can download the Security Update manually from Apple's site and install it that way, instead of going through Software Update.

What is the Security Update called?

C

 

[mudge]

Hi,

How old is the Mac, and have you tried using the built-in Mac OS recovery system?
If not have a look here to save me writing a long post.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314

Thanks for this link!
Trying to start in Recovery mode I get the “macOS Utilities” window offering 4 choices:
- Restore From Time Machine Backup
- Reinstall macOS
- Get Help Online
- Disk Utility
I‘d love to restore from a Time Machine backup, BUT the “Continue” button is grayed out and I have no cursor or other means to select one of the 4 alternatives.
Now what? Again, many thanks for help!!