Catalina constantly crashing when Sleep

Hi GavinFoo,

Thanks for posting! I understand you might be having an issue with waking your MacBook Pro from sleep, and I'm glad to help.

To troubleshoot, I recommend starting with this resource: If your Mac doesn't sleep or wake when expected

"If your Mac doesn't wake when you expect

Your Mac might pause a few seconds before it wakes up. If it doesn't seem to wake at all, check for these possibilities:

• Your screen brightness might be turned down.
• If you're using an external display, your display might be turned off. 
• Your Mac might be in safe sleep. To wake from safe sleep, press the power button.
• Check for a sleep indicator light, if applicable, and make sure that your Mac isn't turned off."

If this doesn't seem to apply to what's happening, try these troubleshooting steps below. Safe mode and the test user account in particular may be helpful in narrowing down the issue:

"If the previous steps don't work

These additional steps may help identify or resolve the issue: 

• Reset the SMC.
• Reset NVRAM.
• Disconnect external devices other than your Apple keyboard, mouse, and display. If that resolves the issue, gradually reconnect your devices, testing each time, until you find the device that is interfering with sleep. Then check the documentation that came with the device, or contact the device manufacturer.
• Start up in Safe Mode to see if the issue is related to non-Apple startup items, login items, or kernel extensions. 
• Try to isolate the issue by using another user account."

Cheers!

... Just adding an update to my post above, I am no fairly confident that my system hanging is caused by either Catalina (v. 10.15.2) or Google Chrome (v. 79.0.3945.130 (Official Build) (64-bit)).

I can reliably reproduce system hang by opening Google Chrome. Sometimes it freezes my Catalina already on very first Chrome tab when I navigate to a web page such as Udemy.com (this page seam to consistently lead to freeze). Other times it takes 3 or 4 tabs navigated to some web pages.

• As already explained, I can reliably reproduce this issue if using Google Chrome version above. I have removed every single extension from Chrome, tried uninstalling and reinstalling it, nothing helped. It freezes the system and the only way out is either (a) Power button or (b) waiting for about 4 minutes until system reboots by itself.
• I tried same using Firefox and Safari and was unable to reproduce it.

For full list of attempts to solve the issue, refer to https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251071845?answerId=252047344022&page=1

I was having this problem on a 15" MBP 2019 with the Pro Vega 20, then again on the 16" 2019 MBP with the 8GB Radeon I swapped it for.

Basically, your Catalina install comes with a bunch of extensions for running RAID hard drives (most users won't ever do this). Something about at least one of them is broken. I haven't worked out exactly which ones cause the problem, but they can all be safely removed if you don't use RAID HDDs.

They can be found in MacintoshHD>Library>Extensions. Make sure you're looking the right right Library folder, you want the one on in Macintosh HD, NOT the one under your username. I made a backup of them just in case, then cleared out the following .kext files:

ACS6x

ArcMSR

ATTOCelerityFC8

ATTOExpressSASHBA2

ATTOExpressSASRAID2

CalDigitHDProDrv

HighPointIOP

HighPointRR

PromiseSTEX

SoftRAID

Since I was on a very fresh install, I expect these are all the ones which come with Catalina as standard. My machine has since been waking from sleep successfully and quickly every time, even with multiple displays and USB-C devices plugged in.

I've tried to fix this by installing Amphetamine https://apps.apple.com/us/app/amphetamine/id937984704?mt=12. This prevents the mac from sleeping but allows the screen to turn off still.

I'm not certain it's working but I allowed the screen to turn off for over 20 minutes with no crash. I'll test it overnight tonight.

This is what I found. There are a number of postings on the internet about problems with AFP and SMB (Service Message Block) for attaching network attached storage using Catalina. Try using Google to search for "MacOS afp catalina" and "MacOS smb catalina".

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/280511

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/catalina-wont-let-me-connect-to-afp-fileserver.2195290/ States that SMB is preferred over AFP since version 10.8. AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Filing_Protocol was originally designed for AppleTalk

Repeating the Google procedure for NFS (Network File System) also indicates some problems with Catalina. CIFS (Common Internet File System) is an open source implementation of SMB and may be more friendly for some systems.

https://appleinsider.com/articles/13/06/11/apple-shifts-from-afp-file-sharing-to-smb2-in-os-x-109-mavericks In 2013, Apple started moving from AFP to SMB2.

I applied the latest Catalina update last night. This morning my 2019 iMac is again recovering from yet another crash. I have no clue what the crash log means, but I do see "BSD process name corresponding to current

thread: com.symantec.mes" at some point. Does this mean that Norton might be the cause behind this? The logs are as follows:

I also have the same/similar issues as described in this thread.

After upgrading to Catalina my Mid 2015 MBP started to crash after waking up from sleep:

Neither Safari nor Chrome seem to be able to load new sites, as if there's no internet connection, while sites that were already open before going to sleep still work normally (e.g. Youtube still playing videos in the current tab, but opening a video in a new tab will result in endless loading). Mail does launch, and I can browse the list of emails, but cannot open any of them. Other apps (e.g. Word, Excel) still work normally (opening, editing, saving files).

When trying to reboot, I have to force-quit any frozen apps. Then Finder also freezes and has to be restarted forcefully. Then the reboot begins as you'd expect, with all the icons disappearing from the Desktop, but then I get an endless loading circle. No matter how long I wait, the MBP won't reboot on its own, I have to kill it holding the power button.

After the reboot, everything works fine, until the system goes into sleep mode again.

My local Apple retailer did a complete system check, hardware seems totally fine. EtreCheck also says that everything's okay.

Which it obviously isn't.

I tried every file-related suggestion mentioned here, but nothing worked.

Amphetamine had no effect on the issue either.

Tried with a new user account. Worked for a day or two, before the issue returned without me having changed any settings or installed any new software.

Did a clean install of Catalina, which at first seemed to solve the issue. No crashes for three or four days, but yesterday the issue came up again, and is now happening constantly, every time my MBP goes to sleep.

I would be really grateful for any further suggestions.

Also Apple, please fix this, it is really annoying and proves to be quite an obstacle for my work.

I'm currently considering downgrading to High Sierra (where I had no problems of that sort) or even installing Windows 10 via Bootcamp to finally be able to work properly again.

I had solved the issue for 10.15.1 by following Tony Jefree's advice of Dec 6, 2019 2:42 AM  (move a set of extension files to a quarantine folder).  

Upgraded to 10.15.2 and the problem came back.  (The quarantined extension files came back, of course).  After quarantining the set of extension files again the problem has been gone for almost a week (fingers crossed).  I am using an external hdmi monitor;  if I use Apple's external Thunderbolt monitor, which I prefer, the problem re-occurs. 

Catalina has not been pleasant.  I am seriously considering Ubuntu. (Frying pan, fire?)

Having followed this thread for months now and with my iMac 2019 crashing at least once a week still (its not connected to anything, as is the case with some other people reporting the same issue), I am truly amazed about the lack of response by Apple. For a machine that costs more than 2k this is truly unacceptable and this is the first time I'm seriously thinking of selling it.

I am pasting the latest report here in case anyone is listening.

There are a combination of things going on from hub to display. But much of what's happening seems related to Catalina's handling of non-Apple external devices.

Here, I think my issues included an OWC Thunderbay enclosure and how the MBP dealt with sleep on external drives. Setting the computer and drives to never sleep helped there, but it was really just a kludge. However, it did help focus the troubleshooting on the drive sleep problem. I'm pretty sure now that the enclosure was a piece of the problem - I can at least rationalize the external monitor problem as being related to the enclosure too, since the monitor was connected through the enclosure.

OWC had recently posted a firmware upgrade, so I upgraded the firmware on the OWC external device. Probably helped - at least with any issues that were caused as a result of drives or monitor going to sleep.

However, the crash problem really vanished the week before when I downloaded the 10.15.2 Combo Updater (not from Software Update or App Store) directly from Apple. An earlier removal of kext files related to drive enclosures likely wasn't a factor because the Combo Updater replaced those files. But that fix (for some) did point out that something related to external enclosures may have been a piece of this problem.

Originally reinstalling Catalina and then adding supplementary updates on top of that didn't really fix anything; I'm kind of thinking now that the Combo Update may have included some files (or removed some files) that the direct installation of Catalina and supplemental upgrades didn't. Because I applied the Combo Update and the system worked as expected for a week before I upgraded the external device firmware, I can at least say that upgrading the firmware did not affect system software fix.

I remain pretty well convinced that it was the application of the Catalina 10.15.2 Combo Update that "Fixed" my problem - however others say that it hasn't fixed theirs. https://support.apple.com/downloads

I have MacBookPro 2015, never had any issue until sometime mid January, 2020. I installed Catalina before that, as soon as it came out and had no issues. But in January, I started noticing that daily, my MBP will freeze for 3-4 minutes, then restart with that screen saying it crashed.

The things that changed is that I got latest Catalina and XCode

Catalina 10.15.2

XCode 11.3.1 (11C504)

So, I suspect one of these is the cause of this issue. My issue does not occur when going to sleep mode, nor do I loose WiFi connectivity or anything like that. After more observation, I notice it happen regularly when using Google Chrome. However, it happened also with Brave browser. I dont recall happening with Firefox.

Here is more info on my issue https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251071845?answerId=252047344022#252047344022

Same issue on MacBook Pro 2019" ...

I have an external display connected USB-C to DisplayPort 1.2 on a Philips Monitors 4K Ultra HD LCD Monitor 276E8VJSB. Computer will sleep (energy savings begin, computer rests), upon wake OSX crashes.. Mac reboots and I need to setup the session all over again.

I tried two types of USB-C cables with same results thinking the official Apple supported USB-C cable would resolve, but this didn't work:

1) Cable Matters USB C to DisplayPort Cable https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B01J6DT070/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

2) Moshi USB-C to DisplayPort Cable

https://www.apple.com/ca/shop/product/HLR62ZM/A/moshi-usb-c-to-displayport-cable

Still crashes... The only way to circumvent the issue is to disable "Prevent computer from sleeping automatically when the display is off" under Energy Saver... but this isn't a good solution. I use external display quite often with my MacBook and don't want to crush the battery and it always be on.

Same on my brand new 16" MacBook Pro.... Pretty much on every sleep. I hate Catalina! The worst software from Apple ever... I also have this problem = And after having spend since November with Apple support, and countless Tests, they sent me to the Genious Bar - not so genious, as it happens on all my macs that run catalina, and covid 19 has genious bars closed... https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250726535

Day 1 Updated:

My MBP16 is back to operating as if brand new (the good new). When I open the cover from sleep, it is on and logged in (via Apple Watch) before I can get the cover fully opened. Photos is running and synchronizing properly again. I downloaded about 2GB of photos from my Nikon and made some edits without any issue.

I can't quantify it, but it appears that the photo library sync is much slower than it used to be. It seems that there is some throttling going on between iCloud and the MBP-16. I used to feel the case heating up above the keyboard when it was making these transfers before, today it is remaining cool.

The Photos library on the MBP-16 is updating, but it is slow to complete compared to before.

My suspicion is that there is a data transfer issue that is going on between Catalina and the iCloud infrastructure. This would correlate with others investigations toward large file transfer issues. To address it, I believe Catalina and iCloud are getting throttled. Interestingly it seems that iOS and iPadOS are immune. Of course iOS grew from a communication centric system, where MacOS grew from processing centric system toward communication.

Here is how I got my MBP-16 working again: (Done in this order per Apple Support)

1) How to reset the SMC of your Mac

2) Reset NVRAM or PRAM on your Mac

3) How to reinstall macOS from macOS Recovery

Best of luck to you.

I'm having the same problem when my 16" Macbook goes to sleep.

Configuration

2,3 GHz 8-Core Intel Core i9​

64 GB 2667 MHz DDR4​

AMD Radeon Pro 5500M 4 GB​

Intel UHD Graphics 630 1536 MB​

external LG 34UM94 Monitor​

external Keyboard​

external Mouse​

USBC->HDMI Adaptor for the monitor. USBC->HDMI Adaptor​

After updating to 10.15.5 (19F101) each time I want to wake it up it was crashed with kernel panic.

It seems as if I could solve it: 

I removed the Monitor from the HDMI-Adaptor and plugged it to an USBC to Thunderbolt adaptor from Apple.

Now the LG is connected to Thunderbolt not HDMI, with a nice side effect: I can adjust the volume from the Keyboard now.

Maybe this helps someone.

P.S.

Disabling PowerNap, HDD Sleep did not make any difference on my system.

Anyway: It is a shame that Apple makes no effort to fix this! This high price machines MUST work perfectly!