dfloyd888
Level 1 (1 points)

Q: Keyboard and mouse inop at filevault screen

The machine is an early 2015 13" MBP, 16GB RAM, i7, 512GB SDD, running OS X 10.10.5.

 

This machine has run flawlessly where this problem wasn't present until two days ago.  When I reboot the machine and it prompts for the FileVault password, the keyboard and mouse are inoperable, where both are locked except for random 250-500 millisecond intervals where both work briefly, then go back to being unusable.  Booting to the reset password screen works.

 

Even more odd is that clearing the NVRAM via option-command-P-R also alleviates the problem until the next startup.

 

This doesn't seem like a hardware issue, and it might be a recent OS X update, but it is a pretty odd bug.  I initially reinstalled OS X (as a file related to Core Storage was corrupted as per the Fix Permissions dialog in the Disk Utility), but this continues to persist.  Without FileVault on, everything is as normal.

 

Are there any known bugs or workarounds for this?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Yosemite (10.10.5)

Posted on Sep 19, 2015 2:39 PM

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dfloyd888

Q: Keyboard and mouse inop at filevault screen

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  • Helpful answers

  • by Jamie Clark,Helpful

    Jamie Clark Jamie Clark Oct 4, 2015 2:44 PM in response to dfloyd888
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Oct 4, 2015 2:44 PM in response to dfloyd888

    I have exactly the same issue and hardware. This problem persisted after upgrading to 10.11

     

    Extremely annoying to try to move the mouse cursor down to "restart" when it only works for tiny snippets of time at random intervals. Tried connecting an external keyboard or TB display and had the same issue.

     

    Often I would be left with the "if you're having trouble entering your password, press and hold the power button and reboot to access safe mode" (or something like that). After choosing the obvious recovery option "my keyboard does not work when entering password" the recovery tool unhelpfully suggests that my keyboard is not compatible with FileVault and instructs me to disable FileVault.  Oddly enough this solution actually works.

     

    So it seems this is a serious bug in FileVault - the initial boot "unlocker" code seems to have trouble on "MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Early 2015)".

  • by dfloyd888,

    dfloyd888 dfloyd888 Oct 4, 2015 2:49 PM in response to Jamie Clark
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 4, 2015 2:49 PM in response to Jamie Clark

    I thought upgrading to El Capitan would fix it, so I did a complete format and reinstall just to be completely sure there is no cruft left over.  Same issue, the FileVault boot screen takes 3-4 minutes to boot, mouse remains locked up except for a random interval where you have about 1/2 second of movement of the pointer.  Holding the power button, resetting NVRAM fixes it for this boot cycle, as it did previously.

     

    Other than the workaround by resetting the NVRAM on a reboot, the other way is to use the authenticated restart feature (fdesetup authrestart.)

     

    I hope this isn't some edge/corner case because I have a fairly uncommon BTO machine (16 GB RAM, 512 GB disk, i7 CPU.)

  • by retepppank69,

    retepppank69 retepppank69 Oct 29, 2015 12:56 AM in response to dfloyd888
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2015 12:56 AM in response to dfloyd888

    Same here on my 13" Retina MacBook Pro Early 2015, 8GB, i5 even after several clean installs to 10.11.1 (and at least it is a relief that I am not alone)

     

    Are there any news about this case or an appropriate workaround?

     

    First I thought this came up since I was on the public beta programme. But after two clean installs with the original build 15B42 this happened all the time. Funny enough, also when I erase the SSD completely and want to access the recovery option via Internet (the screen with the Globe). Also there the mouse and keyboard stucks. So I restarted my mac several times and one of this times the mouse didn't stuck. What I did not do was to reset NVRAM/PRAM. So this is the only workaround? Or is it best to leave FileVault off? Seems like a bad compromise...

     

    Thanks for this post here.

  • by Jamie Clark,

    Jamie Clark Jamie Clark Oct 29, 2015 1:07 AM in response to retepppank69
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Oct 29, 2015 1:07 AM in response to retepppank69

    Yes; the only workaround I am aware of at this stage is to ⌘⌥ P+R (reset the parameter ram). I pretty much have to do this on every reboot.

     

    I don't want to leave FileVault disabled as I am traveling for work every week and require most of my documents to remain encrypted at rest.

  • by retepppank69,

    retepppank69 retepppank69 Oct 29, 2015 1:14 AM in response to Jamie Clark
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 29, 2015 1:14 AM in response to Jamie Clark

    Ah, OK. Thanks. Full disk encryption should be a must not an option at least on portable computers. So I will turn it on and will reset the NVRAM.

    But you never were on any Betas before, right? Since I am still wondering, why I ran into this... again, now I am on a clean install of 10.11.1 with this problem.

  • by Jamie Clark,

    Jamie Clark Jamie Clark Nov 10, 2015 12:03 AM in response to dfloyd888
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Nov 10, 2015 12:03 AM in response to dfloyd888

    Update: on a hunch I deleted my Bluetooth pairing with Magic Trackpad. (I hardly ever use it and had almost forgotten it). The NVRAM clear workaround led me to this hunch. Bluetooth pairing is kept there for pre-boot use. 

     

    This seems to have solved the problem for me. Many clean reboots since clearing out the Bluetooth pairing. 

     

    suggest deleting and Bluetooth  HID pairings to see if that fixes it.

  • by dfloyd888,

    dfloyd888 dfloyd888 Nov 25, 2015 6:33 PM in response to Jamie Clark
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Nov 25, 2015 6:33 PM in response to Jamie Clark

    Oddly enough, after the last OS update, I've not encountered this issue, although it has only gotten rebooted twice (once due to patches), once due to a thermal shutdown.

     

    Am crossing fingers... maybe Apple put this beast to rest after all.

  • by TrickyEarlobe,

    TrickyEarlobe TrickyEarlobe Sep 11, 2016 10:50 AM in response to dfloyd888
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 11, 2016 10:50 AM in response to dfloyd888

    I have this issue on 10.11.6 with early 2016 Macbook 12"

  • by burnsrickj,

    burnsrickj burnsrickj Sep 13, 2016 3:52 PM in response to dfloyd888
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 13, 2016 3:52 PM in response to dfloyd888

    I have the same issue with 13" Retina Macbook Pro early 2015, i7, running 10.11.6