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Big Sur 11.3 multiple crashes and restarts a day

Hi,

Since upgrading to Big Sur 11.3 (& 11.3 1), my MacBook Pro 2020 13' has been crashing multiple times a day. Sometimes it promptly shuts down, and sometimes the screen turns black and the login screen appears again. In the beginning restarts happened when I woke the device from (long) sleep, but now it's also happening with only safari and Onenote open. I have been getting kernel panics with varying causes, but mostly WindowServer. I've tried many things: resetting SMC, resetting PRAM, multiple re-installing, clean re-install, booting into safe mode, hardware test, but nothing seems to help. I had this same phenomenon happen when I first got Big Sur, and it took me a few weeks and multiple clean installs to get it fixed (or it might be an update that fixed the issue).


Does anyone experience the same problem? I have included my Etrecheck report, which doesn't report any issues but only that there are app crashes...


Posted on May 6, 2021 3:18 PM

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Question marked as Best reply

Posted on May 6, 2021 3:42 PM

I see none of the usual suspects in the report. A good clean report.


Try the following:


#1

Boot into Safe Mode according to Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support and see if the problem persists. Reboot normally and check again.

NOTE: Safe Mode boot can take up to 10 minutes as it's doing the following; 
• Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed
• Loads only required kernel extensions (prevents 3rd party kernel/extensions from loading)
• Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically
• Disables user-installed fonts 
• Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files


If the problem persists:


#2

Boot into the Recovery volume (boot with the Command + R keys held down), select Disk Utility and repair the disk. If you get any error messages repeat until no errors reported. Reboot normally and test.

If the problem still persists:


#3

Boot into the Recovery volume (boot with the Command + R keys held down) and reinstall the system. This does not affect your user files but it's always wise to have a full and current backup before attempting any of these fixes.



Similar questions

15 replies
Question marked as Best reply

May 6, 2021 3:42 PM in response to ysl1

I see none of the usual suspects in the report. A good clean report.


Try the following:


#1

Boot into Safe Mode according to Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support and see if the problem persists. Reboot normally and check again.

NOTE: Safe Mode boot can take up to 10 minutes as it's doing the following; 
• Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed
• Loads only required kernel extensions (prevents 3rd party kernel/extensions from loading)
• Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically
• Disables user-installed fonts 
• Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files


If the problem persists:


#2

Boot into the Recovery volume (boot with the Command + R keys held down), select Disk Utility and repair the disk. If you get any error messages repeat until no errors reported. Reboot normally and test.

If the problem still persists:


#3

Boot into the Recovery volume (boot with the Command + R keys held down) and reinstall the system. This does not affect your user files but it's always wise to have a full and current backup before attempting any of these fixes.



May 8, 2021 7:42 AM in response to Old Toad

Thank you for your help.


I tried all your suggestions. Directly after reinstalling the system, a login screen appears (just like it's supposed to). I was busy on another device and didn't login, but let it sit at that screen. After a while, I saw that it randomly restarted. After a while, the same happened again. I haven't done anything yet after reinstalling. After logging in, I got a kernel panic report that it was related to 'macOS watchdog' Do you perhaps have an idea what's going on?


May 30, 2021 8:08 PM in response to ysl1

My 2017 MacBook Air just started quiting mail on its own this morning. Had issues for the last 3x months connecting my account, which was fixed by the update, but now this is happening. Only impacts Mail right now (which opens for about 10 seconds then quits again and displays the 'unexpected quit' report), so I hope there isn't still more to come... Have tried the re-start but no change. Will uninstall Chrome (only used for testing) and see what happens as I've seen other topics suggesting this could be the culprit.

Big Sur 11.3 multiple crashes and restarts a day

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