Big Sur and AppleThunderboltNHI.kext

[admiralali]

Installed the latest Big Sur update 11.7.3 on my MacBook Pro (2014 model) a few minutes just before posting this, and still worked for me. sorry for my typo in my previous post. My OS volume is "MACOS" so make sure you change that in the steps below:

Reboot in rescue mode (CMD + R)

Open TERMINAL app, and type the following (in exact order):

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$ csrutil disable

$ csrutil authenticated-root disable

$ mount -uw /Volumes/MACOS

$ cd /Volumes/MACOS//System/Library/Extensions

$ rm -rf AppleThunderboltNHI.kext

$ rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/*

$ cd /Volumes/MACOS/System/Library/Extensions

$ kmutil install -u --force --volume-root /Volumes/MACOS

$ kmutil clear-staging

$ kextcache -i /

$ bless --folder /Volumes/MACOS/System/Library/CoreServices --bootefi --create-snapshot
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Then just restart the device and you're good to go.

 

[MerCrow]

Installed the latest Big Sur update 11.7.3 on my MacBook Pro (2014 model) a few minutes just before posting this, and still worked for me. sorry for my typo in my previous post. My OS volume is "MACOS" so make sure you change that in the steps below:

Reboot in rescue mode (CMD + R)

Open TERMINAL app, and type the following (in exact order):

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$ csrutil disable

$ csrutil authenticated-root disable

$ mount -uw /Volumes/MACOS

$ cd /Volumes/MACOS//System/Library/Extensions

$ rm -rf AppleThunderboltNHI.kext

$ rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/*

$ cd /Volumes/MACOS/System/Library/Extensions

$ kmutil install -u --force --volume-root /Volumes/MACOS

$ kmutil clear-staging

$ kextcache -i /

$ bless --folder /Volumes/MACOS/System/Library/CoreServices --bootefi --create-snapshot
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Then just restart the device and you're good to go.

Thank you, man! This worked perfectly for the latest Big Sur 11.7.9. And no need to remove IOThunderboltFamily, btw.

 

[O.K.79]

The most elegant (and weird at the same time) solution I found after dozens of attempts at solving this problem is this: open Settings>Sound>Input. This lets the microphone be activated continuously. You can decrease the volume to zero, it doesn't matter. Just don't forget to change the input to the internal microphone while pairing headphones. That's it. No shutdowns. The only problem is when you close the lid, mbp will switch off...

Here, in 2025 this works perfect for the Big Sur 11.7.10. The best and easiest solution for me vs. python script running or all those stuff with thunderbolt files (have tried both options).
Thanks a lot to leowich!