Constant Crash

[LtColFalcon]

Hey guys, my MacBook Pro (13-inch, 2016, Four Thunderbolt 3 Ports), bought in 2018 has been crashing since Catalina was installed. I'm not very technically skilled so I'm not sure if there is a Kernel Panic or other issues like some other threads I've read have faced. The issues started around 10.15.3, was solved in 10.15.4, and now continues in 10.15.5 & 6. The unexpected crashes seem not to have caused any damage or memory wipes so far. Since my hopes of Apple fixing this issue through further updates are way down the drain, how would a tech-savvy guy approach this issue? Please guide as it'll be such a pity to have to use this beautiful machine as a cutting board, not to mention the agitation when my work in Photoshop, Chrome is lost.

 

[Honza1]

Routine crashes are not that common for later versions of Catalina, so Apple is unlikely going to fix them. They may simply not be aware of them. Also, this is likely the last Catalina release and if you think Big Sur will fix your bugs, keep dreaming.
There seem to be some lingering issues with crash while sleeping, as you can figure out from this forum in few minutes, but I think those are specific to the latest MBPs. So this is likely something related to either your hardware or software. Just checking - would you have some antivirus/protection suite installed? Some of those are famous for being source of issues.
Here are few steps I would take to try to identify what to fix (in this order):
0. use Disk Utility.app and check the disk. May be there is some issue?
1. Create a new user on the system and try running there, without adding any software or customizations other than what is installed already. May be you have some old crud from prior systems which causes that. If that helps, you need to clean up some your "private" customization stuff.
2. Remove all kernel extensions which are installed for "all users". If that helps, see what those are doing and if there are some obsolete or suspicious. Basically, install (if needed at all) only Catalina certified stuff.
3. Reinstall macOS "in place". This can sometimes fix system installations failures. It is unlikely to help here, but is "cheap".
4. Wipe the disk and install clean macOS Catalina. This is major work and time effort.
If it still crashes with plain vanilla Catalina, it is likely issue with hardware.
Before you do anything, make sure you have one or better two independent, verified, backups. Ideally a bootable backup on external USB drive.
Most of these steps are described on various web sites, so just google them. Good luck.

 

[Taz Mangus]

Hey guys, my MacBook Pro (13-inch, 2016, Four Thunderbolt 3 Ports), bought in 2018 has been crashing since Catalina was installed. I'm not very technically skilled so I'm not sure if there is a Kernel Panic or other issues like some other threads I've read have faced. The issues started around 10.15.3, was solved in 10.15.4, and now continues in 10.15.5 & 6. The unexpected crashes seem not to have caused any damage or memory wipes so far. Since my hopes of Apple fixing this issue through further updates are way down the drain, how would a tech-savvy guy approach this issue? Please guide as it'll be such a pity to have to use this beautiful machine as a cutting board, not to mention the agitation when my work in Photoshop, Chrome is lost.

Need more info such as what external devices are attached? Have you looked in the Console logs to see what type of crash happened?

 

[LtColFalcon]

Routine crashes are not that common for later versions of Catalina, so Apple is unlikely going to fix them. They may simply not be aware of them. Also, this is likely the last Catalina release and if you think Big Sur will fix your bugs, keep dreaming.
There seem to be some lingering issues with crash while sleeping, as you can figure out from this forum in few minutes, but I think those are specific to the latest MBPs. So this is likely something related to either your hardware or software. Just checking - would you have some antivirus/protection suite installed? Some of those are famous for being source of issues.
Here are few steps I would take to try to identify what to fix (in this order):
0. use Disk Utility.app and check the disk. May be there is some issue?
1. Create a new user on the system and try running there, without adding any software or customizations other than what is installed already. May be you have some old crud from prior systems which causes that. If that helps, you need to clean up some your "private" customization stuff.
2. Remove all kernel extensions which are installed for "all users". If that helps, see what those are doing and if there are some obsolete or suspicious. Basically, install (if needed at all) only Catalina certified stuff.
3. Reinstall macOS "in place". This can sometimes fix system installations failures. It is unlikely to help here, but is "cheap".
4. Wipe the disk and install clean macOS Catalina. This is major work and time effort.
If it still crashes with plain vanilla Catalina, it is likely issue with hardware.
Before you do anything, make sure you have one or better two independent, verified, backups. Ideally a bootable backup on external USB drive.
Most of these steps are described on various web sites, so just google them. Good luck.

Hey Honza, I'm trying each of these steps one by one!
0. Did First Aid on both Machintosh HD and Machintosh HD - Data, seems there is no issue.
Will update on the rest, thanks mate!
[automerge]1595189045[/automerge]

Need more info such as what external devices are attached? Have you looked in the Console logs to see what type of crash happened?

Hey Taz, there are no external devices attached, except the charger ?. The crash logs reveal several crashes from each below:

/Applications/Utilities/Adobe Application Manager/*/UpdaterStartupUtility
/Applications/Evernote.app/Contents/PlugIns/EvernoteSpotlight.appex/Contents/MacOS/
/Applications/Dashlane.app/Contents/Library/LoginItems/P72E3GC48.com.dashlane.DashlaneAgent.app/
/System/Library/CoreServices/ControlStrip.app/Contents/MacOS/ControlStrip

By the way, the Control Strip stopped displaying too, had this issue since Catalina 10.15.3 update and it repaired itself after a few restarts. Now with the latest update 10.15.6, it's gone dark ?

 

[Taz Mangus]

Hey Honza, I'm trying each of these steps one by one!
0. Did First Aid on both Machintosh HD and Machintosh HD - Data, seems there is no issue.
Will update on the rest, thanks mate!
[automerge]1595189045[/automerge]

Hey Taz, there are no external devices attached, except the charger ?. The crash logs reveal several crashes from each below:

/Applications/Utilities/Adobe Application Manager/*/UpdaterStartupUtility
/Applications/Evernote.app/Contents/PlugIns/EvernoteSpotlight.appex/Contents/MacOS/
/Applications/Dashlane.app/Contents/Library/LoginItems/P72E3GC48.com.dashlane.DashlaneAgent.app/
/System/Library/CoreServices/ControlStrip.app/Contents/MacOS/ControlStrip

By the way, the Control Strip stopped displaying too, had this issue since Catalina 10.15.3 update and it repaired itself after a few restarts. Now with the latest update 10.15.6, it's gone dark ?

Looks like the crash is happen with Evernote and Dashlane. Maybe focus on 2 apps first, maybe contact the developer and report the crashes to them.

One thing you could try to further what @Honza posted, is create a new Container partition on your internal drive and clean install Catalina to the new partition. Restart to the new partition and start using it, and see if the crashes still happen.

 

[Honza1]

I am living under impression (= hoping) that applications should not be able to crash system. And for some significant time I personally did not have application take down system (well, except may be Finder). Applications themselves crash all the time, but system should survive and simply generate report.
Kernel extensions sometimes do crash system and that is why (again, I suspect, assume, think...) Apple is moving to a new model on kexts and we all get these wanirngs about it. But Evernote and Dashlane - hopefully - do not use kernel extensions. There is really no good reason why those applications should need them.

 

[matram]

Could this be a cascading fault? I.e. a fault in Evernote causes a fault in the control strip handler which has kernel access?

Could you try removing the control strip by switching the TouchBar to function key mode (no control strip) and see if that makes a difference.

 

[LtColFalcon]

Hey guys, I wanted to wait a few days with the changes I made. Appreciate your time in advance. Here's what I did before I do any major and permanent changes as Honza1 suggested:

1. Uninstalled Dashlane through AppCleaner.
2. Uninstalled Evernote through AppCleaner and reinstalled through the file from the website.
3. The Control strip is still dark and just came on for a few minutes after a restart and then went off again.
4. SMC Reset
5. NV/PRAM Reset
6. Several soft shutdowns and restarts in between.

The crashes have reduced to a bare minimum. At this point would you guys suggest that since this is a 2016 (bought in 2018) machine, that I go back to High Sierra, the firmware that this laptop came with? Also, it would be simply my life as I have Autodesk Alias which only runs on High Sierra and VRED that runs on Sierra, and hence I have to Bootcamp currently for it to work.

Conclusion of issues concurrently happening after the first Catalina update:

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1. Light grey continuous horizontal lines at the bottom near the menu dock after a few hours of usage, darkening through time, sometimes new lines developing near the bottom 1/3rd section as time passes and returns to normal when left to sleep or shut down for a few hours, but sometimes remnants remain from the previous day if the usage was heavy. Photos in chronological order through an hour or two after the system was ON for about 3 hours.​

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https://imgur.com/a/OKkQUCU

​

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I have been reading about this and I see there is a Service Program for this: https://support.apple.com/en-sa/13-inch-macbook-pro-display-backlight-service. Does this program cover the issue above?​

​

Some users on the web have reported using TGPro to increase fan speed to solve this issue. I'm very skeptical of overriding system defaults.​

​

2. TouchBar not working. I never had the TouchBar issue before the first Catalina update.

3. Intermittent crashes and now crash logs not appearing in Console.

Thanks,
LtColFalcon

Could this be a cascading fault? I.e. a fault in Evernote causes a fault in the control strip handler which has kernel access?

Could you try removing the control strip by switching the TouchBar to function key mode (no control strip) and see if that makes a difference.

Hey Matram, sometimes, the Keyboard menu in Settings won't even display the TouchBar options, sometimes, there is touch but no display, sometimes well nothing, nada - no touch, no display. At the time I received your suggestion, there was no TouchBar option to try it out. Thanks.

 

[Honza1]

With the service program: it is likely they will fix it for you, but only Apple can say for sure. If you can get to open Apple Store, they should tell you on spot. You may be able to call them and send them these pictures. What I suspect is happening here is the backlight in some areas not working well when light (whitish) colors are used. Clearly hardware problem, especially since it takes time to develop.
It is possible Apple may fix other issues at no cost at the same time, they have done it here and there. But this is old computer, so may be not. Surely they can tell you if they could fix TB and at what cost.
And finally, if after Apple repair the computer still does not work right on Catalina - and if High Sierra works for you, use that. I have HS on one of my older computers since it is required by specific software and I have no issues.

 

[LtColFalcon]

Hey guys, thought I'd put in an update.

• Crashes are way fewer. I'm on 10.15.6 (19G73).
• Crashes are mostly caused by the Control strip, even though now Control strip is actually functioning.
• Some crashes caused by Evernote Spotlight, Wacom Tablet Touch Driver.
• My Photoshop CC2019 keeps getting the message "Scratch Disk are full". Can you direct me to a solution for this? By the way, I have 45 BG free on Macintosh HD, but a Bootcamp volume almost full. Is there any connection?

Overall, the OS is not snappy and is laggy though. Do you think it'd make it better to upgrade to 10.15.7?

Looks like the crash is happen with Evernote and Dashlane. Maybe focus on 2 apps first, maybe contact the developer and report the crashes to them.

One thing you could try to further what @Honza posted, is create a new Container partition on your internal drive and clean install Catalina to the new partition. Restart to the new partition and start using it, and see if the crashes still happen.

Do you mean to create a partition in disk utility and run a Catalina installation on it somehow? Is there something I need to do to clean or purge this existing free space before the partition and install?