MacBook Pro crashes

I have a 17" Mac Book Pro that just recently started crashing every night. I use to be able to leave it run for weeks or months and now every night it crashes. I've even shut down all software so only the OS is running and it still crashes. I get an unexpected restart every day. I go through the windows to report the problem to Apple but I'm sure nothing will come of it. Everything was fine until a recent upgrade to the OS. I'm running Sonoma 14.2.1. It's a 2.6GHz 6 Core Intel i7 with 64 gig of ram. Does Apple actually do any quality control on software updates before they ship?

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.2

Posted on Jan 23, 2024 3:28 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jan 25, 2024 4:30 PM

I don't see anything in the report regarding the usual software culprits to cause problems, however, you do have a few things installed which I am unfamiliar, but I'm not a software expert so maybe another more knowledgeable will chime.


You do have about 10 Kernel Panics and about 26 "ProxiedDevice-Bridge" panic reports. Unfortunately the EtreCheck didn't pull any relevant sections from the Kernel Panic logs, but usually the "ProxiedDevice-Bridge" panics indicate a hardware issue with the Logic Board and T2 security chip. I think combined they probably confirm it since I don't see any of the usual software culprits which cause kernel panics.


You can try a DFU firmware Revive to see if that can fix the issues with the T2 security chip, but that process unfortunately requires access to another Mac running macOS 14.x (Apple recently raised that requirement).

How to revive or restore Mac firmware - Apple Support


Revive or restore an Intel-based Mac using Apple Configurator - Apple Support


The Logic Boards on the 2018-2020 Intel Macs tend to have a higher rate of failure than other models, with the 16" 2019 model having an extremely high rate of failure. Unfortunately it can be hard to get Apple to confirm a hardware issue with this type of hardware failure since many times it won't register as an issue even with the Apple service diagnostics. The best way to have Apple repair the laptop (you must pay) is to perform a clean install of macOS and show the issue exists without any third party software installed and without having restored from a backup. It is possible to create a new APFS volume & install macOS to it for testing...while not quite as good as an actual clean install, it is a way for you to test a fresh copy of macOS while still being able to boot to the existing OS with all your apps so there is minimal impact for you to test a clean install although you only have about 100GB of Free space which will make things a bit tight on storage since you need to make sure to always keep at least 20GB+ Free.


Normally I advise people it probably isn't worth repairing this model laptop since it has other known issues (butterfly keyboard) and the battery cost needs to be factored into the decision (hard to say when the battery will need replaced), but you have a really high specced system so it does make it a much harder decision.



3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jan 25, 2024 4:30 PM in response to ptc57guo

I don't see anything in the report regarding the usual software culprits to cause problems, however, you do have a few things installed which I am unfamiliar, but I'm not a software expert so maybe another more knowledgeable will chime.


You do have about 10 Kernel Panics and about 26 "ProxiedDevice-Bridge" panic reports. Unfortunately the EtreCheck didn't pull any relevant sections from the Kernel Panic logs, but usually the "ProxiedDevice-Bridge" panics indicate a hardware issue with the Logic Board and T2 security chip. I think combined they probably confirm it since I don't see any of the usual software culprits which cause kernel panics.


You can try a DFU firmware Revive to see if that can fix the issues with the T2 security chip, but that process unfortunately requires access to another Mac running macOS 14.x (Apple recently raised that requirement).

How to revive or restore Mac firmware - Apple Support


Revive or restore an Intel-based Mac using Apple Configurator - Apple Support


The Logic Boards on the 2018-2020 Intel Macs tend to have a higher rate of failure than other models, with the 16" 2019 model having an extremely high rate of failure. Unfortunately it can be hard to get Apple to confirm a hardware issue with this type of hardware failure since many times it won't register as an issue even with the Apple service diagnostics. The best way to have Apple repair the laptop (you must pay) is to perform a clean install of macOS and show the issue exists without any third party software installed and without having restored from a backup. It is possible to create a new APFS volume & install macOS to it for testing...while not quite as good as an actual clean install, it is a way for you to test a fresh copy of macOS while still being able to boot to the existing OS with all your apps so there is minimal impact for you to test a clean install although you only have about 100GB of Free space which will make things a bit tight on storage since you need to make sure to always keep at least 20GB+ Free.


Normally I advise people it probably isn't worth repairing this model laptop since it has other known issues (butterfly keyboard) and the battery cost needs to be factored into the decision (hard to say when the battery will need replaced), but you have a really high specced system so it does make it a much harder decision.



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MacBook Pro crashes

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