Q: Mac Pro Freeze/Display glitch on start up

I call Apple Care today (France).

The answer from Apple is "make the update",... but 1.9.4 as the same problem.

For my interlocutor this is not a technical problem (of the machine) but firmware... "Be patient, Apple know this problem..." I don't know what to do.

Any other experience and return from a Apple technical center ?

My 2013 Mac Pro developed some issues as well.

I run brand new dual DELL U2414H displays using displayport - each using it's own port since daisy chaining doesn't work with OS X.  Since the day I got them and the Mac they have been perfect. 

Last Saturday I restarted the Mac and one monitor wasn't receiving a signal.  I restarted and then the other wasn't.  Restarted again and then the system would hang. This became extremely aggravating. At one point one monitor was working and at the grey Apple logo I got all kinds of weird text across the screen over the Apple.  All kinds of weird.  I unplugged everything and let it sit all day. Tried a restart hours later, one screen comes up fine but the other is black - but it's receiving a signal because the cursor is there. I tried zapping the PRAM and that seemed to fix it.  Both monitors come up and all is well. 

I set up a date to bring it into Apple. I left the machine on all week.  I tried a restart this morning and same weirdness.  Zapped the PRAM again and it came up fine.  I'm taking it into Apple tomorrow morning.  I hope they figure it all out. The machine is less than 2 months old.

I am experiencing this same issue on 4 of the 8 Mac Pros that I deployed recently.  Initially I thought it was related to an accessory/drive that was installed but I can't seem to find the commonality on the machines that are having the problem.  What accessories/devices/drivers do you have installed on your machines?  We have Promise SANLink2, Promise Pegasus, AJA Io XT and Wacom Intuos tablets along with 2 displays connected to most of these machines.

By the way, I should point out that if you ssh into the machine while it is in this state you can kill the login window process and then the machine will become responsive.  The unit is not crashed, but login window is hung.

Originally I was blaming the terrible Wacom driver but now I am not sure as I have other environments with Wacom, Pegasus, and SanLink connected and they are not exhibiting the issue.  Granted, these are single 4K display environments so the comparison is not there.

I Believe this only happens when you have two displays connected, and are not using automatic login.

Often ften you can get it working again by unplugging all the displays, waiting several seconds, and plugging them in again.

Two other work arounds are: 1, unplug all but one display before turning the machine on; or two, enable automatic login.

I had thought that the Apple aluminum full sized USB keyboard was a contributing factor; I unplugged mine and it worked great for several weeks. Then it suddenly started misbehaving again. I too have a Wacom tablet and its drivers installed. If I get a few spare moments I'll experiment with those drivers.

Correction: (and it's too late to edit my last post)

...two or more displays...

Im experiencing the same issue with my 2013 Mac Pro with 2 displays, one Dell U2413 and one ASUS P246Q. This is a PITA that this bug is not solved in about 6 months since I bought my Mac.

This thing is supposed to be the fastest boot on earth but I need to manually disconnect / reconnect cables behind my desk...

I can't autologin at work and disconnect + reconnect is getting me crazy !

Dimitri

I'd like to add my experience to this mire. I'm running a Mac Pro 6 core with Mav 10.9.4. Dual displays = Dell 2312HM (thunderbolt through adapter into its HDMI port) and HP2211x (thunderbolt through adapter into its DVI port). I'm experiencing exactly what the photos depict further up this thread.

I have to avoid 'autologin' as I'm in a work environment too but am presently working round the issue by leaving the Mac on full time and only turning it off at weekends. Monday mornings start with me booting the Mac Pro with just one monitor plugged in; I add the second after login. I definitely don't want to go the route of a replacement as reading above there's the rigmarole of reinstalling everything and scant guarantee of that being a solution anyhow.

Just hanging on here for a firmware fix or something of that ilk.

Apple - please take note.

We have 12 new Mac Pros experiencing the same issue with two Dell 24 DVI monitors.  All running 10.9.4 .  I have escalated this to Apple engineering through Apple Care.  They say they will be back to me in about three days or so with some info.  Until then I found this work around fixes it mostly, the problem still happens on occasional restarts.  What we did was replace one of the passive Apple DVI to Mini Display adapter with a 3rd party active DVI to Mini Display adapter.  This allows us to boot and reboot 90% of the time with no issue.  Hope this helps and hopefully they come through with a fix.

Experiencing the same problem here on startup. Mac Pro (late 2013, 6 core, D700, OS 10.9.4) dual cinema display (23"/20").

Well welll well, i have the same issue.

And its my second Mac Pro. Here's my thread to my story with my first Mac : Mac Pro 2013 keep freezing..

First one was freezing (and at the end i started to have the glitch problem, but i didn't have that at first)

I got my second one in June. At first it was perfect, but for the last month or so, glitch problem started appearing. And now I have glitch problem on startup like 50% of the time (but no more freezing). Though it was my cable, but it wasn't.

I have 2 Dell screen too HP2211H connected via DVI - minidisplay.

I'm on 10.9.4.

Honestly for the price of that Mac, I must say i'm disappointed. I previously had a Mac Pro (2006) and never had any problem.

I won't ask for a new one, because as I see, second or third machine can still be problematic.

Could Dell screen be the problem ??? Because until now almost everyone here have Dell Screens.....

I had the same problem again last night. I don't think it is Dell monitor's fault. I have a Dell monitor and a Samsung monitor. The Samsung monitor is the one that has the problem.

How are we going to make Apple take ownership of the problem?

We're having this issue with all of our Mac Pros.  Though we mainly have Dell 24" DVI monitors, I also have one with two Apple DVI monitors and it has the same problem.  I spoke to AppleCare again yesterday and they say they are still looking into it and should be getting back to me this week.  I'm still hopeful for a fix.

Calling in to report same issue with 4k tearing on the right side too.

Spec:

6-core 2013 Mac Pro, D700, 32bg ram.

display 1: NEC EA244UHD via dp/mini-dp

display 2: NEC 2690WUXi2 via dvi/mini-dp adaptor

Can only startup with display1 connected and display2 disconnected, once I have log-in prompt (after a flicker or two), I can connect display2 and we are good to go in the dual display part. If startup is done with both displays connected, after flickers display1 gets no signal but display2 is active (but acting display2 so no log-in prompt). If I try to un-plug and plug display1, still no joy.

Apart from that I have also the widely report tearing/artifacting on my 4K display1 on roughly 5% of the right side of the screen.

These two problems are very disappointing, and combined is even worst for a system that frankly should be considered a natural environment for the Mac Pro. Lets hope they get fixed soon.

PS: Also coming from a Mac Pro 2006 which was heavily upgraded and had solid 8 yrs of non-stop service.