Catalina constantly crashing when Sleep

After some experiments, I think I have narrowed down the cause of my nightly crashes. I have two NASes (network attached storage). I made sure to disconnect them before I go to sleep. The crashes seem to not be happening.

So until Apple fixes this problem, you can try to disconnect external/network drives before you go to sleep. Leaving them connected during the daytime doesn't cause crashes for me.

Good luck.

Sure, but it’s stopped my iMac crashing while I’m trying to work remotely so it’s definitely better than nothing.

I’d still appreciate if Apple could release usable software that doesn’t require workarounds but that’s not the situation right now...

I have had the same problem with my brand new iMac 2019 which replaced a trusty and reliable old Mac mini on Mojave.

Tried the SMC reset and safe mode routines multiple times but no joy. And disconnected all peripherals. The Mac would appear to wake from sleep but apps would all be non responsive and a full reboot was always necessary.

I have progressively disabled and reinstalled apps which I think may be causing a problem on wake up - just in case. A full deletion and reinstall of Dashlane (password manager) using the manufacturers version NOT the one on the Mac Store seems however to have reduced the problem. At least I think that is what helped but in desperation I was trying so many things it may have been something else

However what happens now on wake up is that non of Apple's own document software works properly. Preview, pages and Numbers all report that random documents "could not be opened" . This sometimes relates to doc's recently created but also older ones too. The docs however all open fine with other apps!

And mail has taken to losing the connection with my gmail accounts. It continually demands password re-entry in a loop with the password not being recognised and being asked for again - and again - and again!

I'm using Kiwi for Gmail now as a work around

General non Apple apps all seem to work

A full reboot is required after each sleep wake cycle to get the apps to work again. Bizarre!

Clearly a major Catalina problem

I'll try Amphetamine and see if that cures it for now until hopefully Apple issue a new update. Many thanks timtjim for the tip

Totally rubbish customer care from Apple

Some update from my experiment to stop the crashes:

My NAS offers connection through different network protocols. My Macs connect to it with AFP on default. This was when it was crashing nightly. I tried using SMB and left it connected overnight. It hasn't crashed for 3 nights straight.

Just something to try if you have similar setup as me.

Good luck.

Experiencing a similar issue. 2015 Macbook Pro. Upgraded to Catalina.

Anytime I try to click the "File" menu in iMovie, it crashes the entire machine. Tried first aid on the drive, tried updating. Also getting random reboots when I try to select the little apple icon in the upper-left of the operating system.

What a mess...

My only suggestion for those posting here is to send Apple lots of crash reports.

An update on my problems. The iMac is a brand new 2019 one and this is a fresh Catalina install with files and settings migrated over from a Mac mini running Mojave.

After the iMac is awoken after an overnight sleep the embedded apps (Preview, Pages, Numbers etc) will not open stored files. The native apps appear to work if you start a new file but you cannot save them. Other non Apple apps work ok with the same files

I have spent over 3 hours on the phone with different Apple Agents. The problem has been isolated as only happening with my profile. Safe mode and a vanilla test environment are ok. We're still battling through the various processes though to see if we can flush out the issue. No luck so far though. An engineer's review is now booked and hope they can find a way forward. I will post the solution if it is obvious in due course

Is there any fix in sight for this? Almost every single day since I installed Catalina (about a month ago), when I switch on my new 27 iMac, I find out that it has crashed with error reports much like those mentioned above. Can this seriously be going on since Oct 11, when this was posted, and there is still no fix?! Needless to say that none of the recommended solutions mentioned as a response to the initial post by GavinFoo work.

This is really a shame...

Bought a 16 inch mac book pro, spent lot of money and a so basic function is not working properly.

I mean, Apple is on of the richest companies in the world but cannot test their products properly?????

I hope this is going to be fixed soon, it ruins completely the good old feeling of using a mac...

This happens every time my MACBook Pro goes to sleep with no attached storage or anything else on my MACBook PRO, just the motherboard and SSD which are built in.

I got into apple because Microsoft was so bad with new releases. Now Apple seems to have swapped places, perhaps it's time to move back to Microsoft which seems to be better than Apple at its releases.

Is there ever going to be a fix?

I have found that it crashes ONLY if you put it to sleep after having used (in any way, with any device) the USB ports or the SD port.

In order to avoid the crashes, I reboot my MBA evertime after having used USB and before put it to sleep. In this way I had no more crashes but, of course, this is not a workaround.

I've posted this before but I want to share the update. The only time I have the problem with the crash is when it goes to sleep is when I have my OWC drive doc connected. I find the same outcome when I attached them via thunderbolt the computer crashes when I put it to sleep. This has been replicated on my laptop also running on Catalina. The one thing that is interesting, is that with the drive docs attached via USB it does not crash but what it does is eject the drives in the doc.

At this time one of my drive docks is under warranty so they are going to send me a replacement to test it. It's a newer model, but if it doesn't they want to gather some logs for Apple.

Has Apple weighed in on this at all? I am interested to know why it seems to happen only with my drive docs and why others are having it happen all the time just by putting the computer to sleep. According to OWC they have not received other reports of this happening. When I return my doc to them they want to run some tests.

Obviously something is very strange with this issue.

I've also isolated mine to an OWC Thunderbat external RAID drive. I unmounted the drive and the sleeping waking problem went away, but the drive will not auto mount now. I've contacted OWC technical support to see if they have any update RAID software, but I'm a bit confused by Tony's post. Does my computer need those components to run RAID, or is it some Apple stuff that I don't really need that interferes with my RAID software for the OWC hardware? I other words, if I remove the files he describes, will my OWC RAID device start working again AND the waking up problem will go away?

Thanks a bunch!

This was happening to me and was driving me nuts.

I'm using macbook pro 15 2019. Didn't happen before upgrading to Catalina.

After upgrading, it was happening everytime the macbook was going to sleep.

After contacting the Apple Support, I did NVRAM SMC something or everything. After those attempts, I found out that this kernel panic and rebooting was happening only when my macbook was connected to power adapter AND 4k monitor with usbC-DP cable. It did happen in other circumstances before the NVRAM and SMC reset, but it was narrowed down to that specific situation.

I googled and tried every possible ways, but the only difference was the error message ranging from "darkwake...", "...watchdog...", ,"...window server....", "....powerstate change...." or whatever. after 3to 5minutes of no work, the screen freezed, 2minutes after that, the fan suddenly "whoosh" than automatic reboot...

After the frustration with new poweradapter, THIS worked for me:

"using belkin usbc to HDMI converter and HDMI 2.0 cable"

I was using 3840x2160 monitor, and needed a cable supporting 4k 60Hz transport. I bought Moshi usbC-DP cable, and that was okay before Catalina, but did not go well with Catalina.

So, hope this helps. I'm not trying to advertise belkin or anything. Maybe the apple usbC to HDMI converter may work as well, in cases like mine.

"

an update on my own post:

I am sorry, the new cable did not solve the problem, but gave me another error message:

"BAD MAGIC! (flag set in iBoot panic header), no macOS panic log available"

I agree.. this is BAD...

the difference was, my macbook did not crashed while getting into sleep and even 20 minutes of after that.

That was last night. This morning I found out that my macbook was shut down and had to be boot up with power button, giving me above BAD massage.

I tried new profile, safe mode as well as NVRAM and SMC reset.

All didn't work.

Talking to apple support makes me more frustrating....!!!!

Sorry for the "!" s...

A further update on my Catalina problems after sleep. Basically my native apps do not work after sleep until the Mac is rebooted..

I've had nearly 5 hrs worth of phone calls to Apple Support and submitted multiple screen shots and sys logs. There have been detailed investigations by the engineers behind the support staff.

By the way they strongly advise that anyone with problems should contact support and submit log files to them so they can eliminate the usual suspects of external influence or 3rd party software. They stated that they have very little evidence of similar problems to mine despite this and other blog files stating to the contrary. Without the full sys log info they state that they cannot identify the specific OSX problems and develop a solution...

After going through this exercise exhaustively with me they have now identified a problem in Catalina which is causing multiple errors to occur in the background eventually leading to core apps falling over. Don't know what the problem is but they are now working on a fix which will come in the next Catalina update.

Until then they advise that I should expect core Mac apps to fall over and cease to work after a period of inactivity whether the Mac actually sleeps or not. (which is the case). It is not related to the connection of external usb kit/ ext drives etc.

Until then I am advised to switch the Mac off after each use and also reboot before I do any word-processing etc to ensure native apps work ok and I do not lose work. However I have now also taken to using Libre office to get past the problems as this works and seems unaffected by the problem

I await a new Catalina update with bated breath