Touch Bar Not Available To Adjust Brightness At Startup

Hello All,

I've recently noticed this issue as well and when dealing with Apple Support over the phone, the High Tier Agent took 5 Mins to see if this was an "Expected Function"; He stated that this was as expected… After doing some testing after that disappointing session with Apple Support here is what I've found:

• Vanila install - TouchBar does appear at Login Page from StartUp and Restart
• FileVault Activated - TouchBar does NOT appear at Login Page from StartUp and Restart

  Note: I initiated the Encryption but did not let it complete before restarting / shutting down computer

I am currently testing any other factors, but it may be possible that the root of the issue is FileVault. I am currently waiting for a full encryption then removing it to see if this resolves the issue and I will report my findings here.

I wanted to check to see if anyone here that has this issue is also using FileVault as well to see if it coordinates with my efforts and testing…

Best,

Snake

Hey All,

Just completed my testing last night and when I disabled File Vault it looks like the touch bar appears at startup and restart again. At this time I have confirmed that the most likely root of my issues is with File Vault. I will test a few iterations and configurations to see if I can reproduce any other way but more importantly to get it to work while file vault is on.

Best,

Snake

hello there,

Its was fine research from your side and I did what you wrote in the section, you are right touchbar loading up immediately as result of FileVault disabling. Now I am re-enabling FileVault I will post back with result.

Please try to come up with your experience.

Thanks.

Hey Vynu,

Thanks for the follow up, I've came up with the same results multiple times as well from a Vanilla and old time machine back up. I'm going to try and turn back the OS to see if this is High Sierra only or if it affects Sierra as well. I'm thinking it maybe due to the new Apple file system… not 100% sure but some of my other tests I'm running in regards to APFS Encryption has run into some interesting Mounting Issues…

But let me know if your using High Sierra or Sierra in this case (this would cut my testing in half).

Best,

Snake

hey snake,

i tested option on HighSierra, but is was the same case with Sierra also as per my observation.

fast boot is the problem. file encryption needs password that is why OS not loading touchbar drivers on startup.

Thanks.

Find system controls and settings in the Control Strip

When you start up your MacBook Pro, the Control Strip on the right side of the Touch Bar shows a few familiar buttons like volume, mute, and display brightness, as well as Siri. The Escape (Esc) button appears on the left side of the Touch Bar.

System controls: Tap in the Control Strip and it expands, showing system controls like brightness, Exposé, Launchpad, and media playback:

Make your adjustments, then tap . The Control Strip returns to its smaller version on the right side of the Touch Bar, with Esc showing on the left side. You can always tap to expand the Control Strip and see all the system controls

Start up in safe mode

To start up in safe mode:

1. Start or restart your Mac, then immediately press and hold the Shift key. The white Apple logo appears on your display. If you don't see the Apple logo, learn what to do.
2. Release the shift key when you see the login window. If your startup disk is encrypted with FileVault, you might be asked to log in twice: once to unlock the startup disk, and again to log in to the Finder.

To leave safe mode, restart your Mac without pressing any keys during startup.

Try safe mode if your Mac doesn‘t finish starting up

Happy Holidays!

I'm having a more serious problem where in the morning, I found my MacBook Pro 13' showing a message about a critical update and that it would not restart without that update. I tried following the prompts to install the critical update to no avail after several retries. I decided to start the laptop in safe mode, with I was able to do, but the touch bar was completely black, nothing on screen. I read in another post that this critical update behavior is related to the touch bar, which had its own embedded OS (an iOS derivative), and that when there is a discrepancy between the date/time of the main OS and the touch bar OS, this critical update behavior may kick in. At this point, I am trying to perform a full backup of the machine, and will re-install it from scratch to see if that solves the problem, after which, if this does not resolve the problem, I will try to get a replacement. I feel that there is something definitely wrong with my laptop's touch bar.

Since day one, I've seen several problems such as the Touch ID functionality stop working after sometime and having to reboot the laptop to get it to work again, among other things. It's not boding well for the touch bar, at least in this laptop, right now. The problem is that I can't say definitely that this is a touch bar issue because I have the latest 10.12.3 beta installed, so, I'm going to see if this happens with a stable 10.12.2.

hello Snake,

I re-enabled FileVault and result is not good .. again touchbar is not loading until successful login. Should report to apple. Probably they will come up with firmware update.

Thanks.