El Capitan - Bluetooth Not Available

philshaffer wrote:

Apple - you have customers who can't use their mice and keyboards. You need to fix this for them right now. It has been 5 months since the problem was reported. Another sign that Apple is not the company it once was.

hi phil,

sorry to hear that you're similarly being frustrated by this issue like the rest of us. you seem to think that this forum is a way to reach apple. it isn't. if you want to report this problem to apple, use https://bugreport.apple.com . i'd do it, but i'm too burned out on it :-/

I have a similar system to yours:

a Broadcom chip:

chipset: 20702A3

firmware version: V151 c5842

Apple Bluetooth Software Version: 4.4.3f4 16616

Chipset: 20703A1Apple Blue

However, my problem is that the Bluetooth immediately jumps off the network - connects to my Android phone for a moment, then the message box states that I have no internet connection.

I have been reading forum posts on this subject for hours now, finally finding relatively relevant ones. I deleted the bluetooth.plist, but have no idea what most of the other stuff - DSDT editing, etc. - are about. Upon rebooting, I noticed that the network lists my Active Services: Bluetooth PAN as Type: Ethernet. Does this make any difference?

It sounds as if my issue is different from the others. Any advice for me?

I had the same problem after updating to El Capitan v10.11.4. Trash the “com.apple.Bluetooth.plist” and similar bluetooth plist files from Library/Preferences. Here are the steps : http://osxdaily.com/2014/02/17/fix-bluetooth-not-available-error-mac/

I also had no problem at all until 10.11.4 update. The only thing I was using was an Apple® oversized track pad. Bluetooth disappeared as described by multitudes here. PAIN from my neck to my fundament. Just the sort of inattention to detail one expects from Redmond, not Cupertino. It's a new world. Thanks to all for semi-solutions that sometimes work.

The sudo commands you proposed do not work for me.

SMC reset works fine, but I am tired of shutting down everytime I reconnect ... I may have done it for over 6 months at least once a day ...

APPLE seriously? This seems to be an important problem for many users!!

I migrated my account from an older iMac running Yosemite to my brand new iMac running El Capitan. After a couple of reboots, I also lost my mouse support. Hopefully I had the wired keyboard and an old wired Microsoft mouse in my cupboard. So I could at least have the ability to check the System Report. I also got the BlueTooth feature missing.

I rebooted in diagnostic mode (Press D while powering on). No problem detected and the mouse was working OK.

So I rebooted in normal mode with my migrated account, went into the Library/Preferences folder and deleted all the Bluetooth related plist files:

- com.apple.Bluetooth.plist

- com.apple.Bluetooth.plist.lockfile

Some were obviously heritated from my Yosemite Mac and may not be compatible with El Capitan.

I rebooted and my Bluetooth support was back and the Magic Mouse 2 was working OK. New plist files have been created.

Hi Macounette, same over here. Brand new iMac 27 late 2015, i7, 512 SSD, 8gb, as currently sold by the Apple store. Received and unboxed last week. Unlike you I've done a full auto-migration from my older 21.5" late 2009 (which BTW was already on 10.11.4, had first generation wireless keyboard & mouse and never had such a problem). Initial test run ok and excitement about performance & specs of the new hardware. After updating to 10.11.4. Bluetooth becomes "not available" practically upon each new boot and - here I am - I joined the party. Removed preferences and had initial success. But not for long. The Mac behaves as if there were no Bluetooth hardware installed. Found an Intel paper about interference between USB 3 & Bluetooth (referenced by Apple), read the suggestion from Apple to (each time !?) disconnect all USB periferals and attempt a reboot and I've quickly got fed up by all that. I connected a USB keyboard & USB mouse and I'm waiting for the issue to be properly sorted out. I've been using Apple products since the Apple II. This is the most sophisticated and expensive computer I ever purchased from them and it is really frustrating to see that key components of the set (which went wireless long ago) are that fragile...

Thanks for reading.

Hi sekok, thanks for your feedback. It's good to know I'm not alone in this situation and it seems indeed that the latest El Capitan release has brought along this new issue.

I have received a response for my bug filing in the Apple Bug Report platform, was asked to submit some additional information, so it seems they are working on it, maybe we will get a fix for this issue sometime soon. 🙂

Well, this definitely is an issue, I opened a support ticket and though the support team said they didn't have identified a common Blueooth problem they were not able to solve it either. It may be some kind of incompatibility with some software.

I am exchanging Blueooth debug data with support team at apple and waiting for their answer (which so far has been SMC reset, PRAM reset, bluetooth.plist removal, verify/repair permissions ... but it didn' work because the problem has again happened ...So next option would be reinstall from scratch.

My guesses are:

1. Incompatibility with Parallels Desktop ... any of you have this installed too?

2. Incompatibility with Adobe Reader upgrade last autumn ... any of you have this too?

3. just a generic bluetooth issue with magic mouse and bluetooth keyboard

I have to say though that the Apple support team seems dedicated and willing to help but they don't have a clear answer ... full reinstall is not an option unless it is the only option and clearly solves this problem ... has anyone tried that? any other ideas?

Hi Gabriel, I have Acrobat reader DC installed (as however I had on my old iMac which I upgraded to 10.11.4 on march 28th. So I've been roughly one month on the latest El Capitan release on the old HW with no problems and with the very same apps installed. Pure luck? Maybe but difficult to believe as the issue than popped up immediately with the new HW, as soon as I installed 10.11.4. I tend to think that there must be a factor that takes into consideration the HW, it's components, it's firmware etc. Just my 5 cents about the issue.

In fact, after rebooting, the problem appeared again. So I deleted the plist, shutdown the iMac.

Then I have done a PRAM reset (Cmd+Alt+P+R immediately after power on till you hear the booting sound for a second time) and it worked OK then even after reboots. I cross my fingers.

In the meantime I had a short lucky experience after doing a safe boot (performed in order to complete an update from app store which was "hanging" and aborting). Automagically, once finished in safe mode, and rebooting in normal mode Bluetooth was available with no other action (no plist removal &tc). But unfortunately not for long. It did not survive the next reboot. Lately it is 100% "Not Available" upon each boot, so I'll give a try zapping the PRAM.

Same issues here. I bought a 27 inch iMac yesterday. Took it home, unboxed it and all was fine - the one thing Apple is known for is having products which can be set up and run seamlessly straight out of the box.

I then updated the OS through the App store, which I thought was a sensible thing to do.

I am then left with no bluetooth functionality at all. I was on the phone to apple support for an hour - we did everything including the SMC restart, delisting the .plist files from Library/Preferences, reinstalling the OS in recovery mode... none of it has worked. During all of this, I had to go out and buy a wired mouse (which Apple support told me to do), as you can only progress so far in recovery mode without one. The only thing I can think of doing is doing now is a complete factory reset, which I can do because it is less than a day old and had no data transferred to it to begin with (but I haven't worked out how to do this yet).

I appreciate that there will always be bugs, but this is such a fundamental issue which renders a £1600 high end computer basically unusable, unless you go out and source/buy additional wired accessories.

Thanks, but I tried a NVRAM reset during my call with Apple support on Sunday - reference no: 1105046038

However, this failed to work. I also did an "internet reinstall" during that call, but it did not work. Most recently, this morning, I performed a complete factory reset - i.e. starting in recovery mode, erasing the hard drive in disk utility, then reinstalling OSX.

Having done all of this, there is still no bluetooth and the magic mouse/keyboard do not work. My bluetooth has been completely killed off within 2 hours of unboxing, and nothing seems to be fixing it.

I have no option but to take it back to the Apple Store.

I spoke with Apple Care this morning, who suggested that because my iMac is such a new machine, the various restores/re installations only allow a recent version of El Capitan to be reinstalled. In other words, it cannot go far enough back in time to reinstall a version of the OSX where this is not a problem.

If this really is the case, then it sound like a completely fatal flaw in new iMacs rendering them inoperable (assuming there is no wired mouse/keyboard available or update of OSX which corrects the problem).