Can the Automatic Boot Up when the lid is open on the New M1 Chipped MacBooks be disabled?

VikingOSX wrote:

My new 16-inch MacBook Pro M1 Pro shows the NVRAM field as:

auto-boot true



Thanks for your M1 insight...

from Terminal you can..

stop auto booting when lid is raised on M1

sudo nvram auto-boot=false 

... part of proving this is by opening the lid once the system is shut down.

I realize this may not help, but that requirement is neither reasonable nor is it justified. A Mac that has been shut down radiates nothing. As such it presents no hazard to electronic navigation equipment or anything else.

Plenty of things radiate tiny amounts of energy, even my Apple Watch. No one ever asked me to power it down before taking off. And if they did, it'd be the last time they asked me anything 😄

Perhaps you can comply with their unreasonable requirement by opening the lid, and have a responsible party observe as you shut it down. Then, close the lid and put it away. Asking to reopen it after doing all that makes no sense.

If that doesn't meet the operator's requirements, then they cannot be reasoned with. It's not possible to transact business with an outfit closed to all logic and reason.

nvram write commands that worked in the past tend to become deprecated with macOS releases. I don't know of a way to circumvent that one.

Wazza27 wrote:

I need to be able to stop my new M1 MacBook from booting up when the lid id opened. I travel regularly by helicopter and all PEDs (Personal Electronic Devices) need to switched off completely and part of proving this is by opening the lid once the system is shut down.

Ive seen the NVRAM solution for previous Intel versions but can't find anything for the M1s

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

You can try and report back your findings here, no harm in trying for your M1...

disable your Mac's Auto Boot feature. Auto Boot powers on your Mac when you open the lid, or plugging in the charger.

From the Terminal.app copy and paste:

sudo nvram AutoBoot=%00

Say, "It boots up when you open it. If you want to see for yourself that it's off, you will have to watch me shut it off and close it."

Proceed to open, then choose Shutdown from the Apple menu.

"OK, its off now. You SAW it shut down."

A slight variation to this idea is to press the Caps Lock key first. When the Caps Lock LED goes out, you know the laptop has been powered down. This is a better indicator since sometimes a computer can get stuck while shutting down. I do this with all the laptops I'm working on for this very reason. Just don't touch any keys or the laptop will power back on.

@Wazza27 can provide Apple with product feedback here (maybe your issue would actually convince Apple to provide this feature as well as disabling pressing any key to power on).

https://www.apple.com/feedback/

Wazza27 wrote:

Hi John

The request is completely reasonable, the helicopter operators in the North Sea (Scotland) have an excellent safety record especially in the hazardous environment we all operate.

The issue with the lids are that the vibrations from the aircraft can open the lid enough to start the boot up.

Even if the NVRAM settings work, then you may want to tape the laptop shut to make sure the lid does not open since the laptops can be powered on just by a key press (do the M1's still do this?). Some painters tape will work and should not hurt the laptop or leave a mark.

The issue with the lids are that the vibrations from the aircraft can open the lid enough to start the boot up.

Placing the Mac in a sleeve will prevent that.

So the issue lies with Apple and a software solution.

I seriously doubt Apple is willing to regress in what they consider product improvements. Macs have been inexorably moving toward iOS devices in that regard. No one routinely shuts down iPhones either. Steve Jobs famously said he didn't want his products to have on/off switches, as even that minor detail stands in the way of seamless user interaction. Product evolution is going his way, even beyond Apple.

An aircraft operator may request they be placed in "airplane mode" and put away, but I maintain their request is unreasonable and will ultimately be rescinded as PEDs continue to proliferate.

My new 16-inch MacBook Pro M1 Pro shows the NVRAM field as:

auto-boot	true



That is a nice flourish on the dark screen==off concept, and could help an ignorant inspector understand:

"When this little light goes out, it's OFF."

This auto-boot issue may be a feature, just like my M1 Pro beeping every three seconds while charging with the lid closed, that Apple did not intend, and may be fixed (hopefully) with a macOS 12.1 firmware update.

Plan B. Use your 90-day free phone support and call Apple to see if they know how to resolve this. You may need to escalate this up the support management tree.