(macOS High Sierra 10.13) Bluetooth devices disconnects by itself

Sarah

Your symptoms sound exactly the same as mine interestingly. Main difference is I've only had the iMac since December. I have an apple engineer examining my logs this week - I will report back what is found.

A post I made at weekend on macrumours forum - details what Ive done so far:

I've addressed all potential issues I can think of :

• made sure nothing close is interfering with bluetooth (its in same place my previous mac mini 2012 with rock solid bluetooth keyboard/mouse was - I did remove a usb 3 hub!)

• reset bluetooth via debug menu

• recharge devices to full capacity

• disabled wireless (using ethernet),

• safe boot

• reset PRAM etc

• Turned off handoff ()

• booted with D - gets clean bill of health

I haven't done a system reinstall - but I only got the iMac a few weeks ago so it has a clean system - software was installed from scratch - nothing was copied over from previous computer.

I've been through the Applecare call now - logs are with an engineer. I was hoping it was something High Sierra related. My mac mini was not upgraded beyond Sierra, so I have no experience with latest OS yet.

Don't have any hopes of apple fixing this. Apple is a phone company now. The only way they'll fix this is if it impacts their position in the mobile market. Just jump ship. The last update is to put a finger in the dam, it patches Webkits vulnerability to Spectre or so somebody at Apple thinks.

Thanks Stephen, yours probably came with High Sierra then, whereas I had Sierra from July to November without any bluetooth issues. It was only after the High Sierra update that it kept disconnecting. I'd be very interested to see how you get on with the engineer. I don't drive and I don't have an Apple store in my town so lugging my imac to a store will not be easy for me, but looks like that might be my only option.

Yes - mine came with High Sierra - tbh I'm really hoping its an OS issue thats causing this. Before you think of taking it in to an applestore - ask them to remotely gather your logs and get them checked by an engineer - thats what they did for me - a pretty smooth process. My contact should be contacting me at the weekend with the results/analysis.

I´ve struggled all the way with BT issues on my old 2012 MBP. Made me skip bluetooth on professional work all together.
Got a brand new MBP in november (with High Sierra) and everything ran perfectly.

No BT issues whatsoever - until the latest security update (10.13.2) done yesterday (17th of January 2018.

Same old issues with bluetooth connection.

Disconnects all the time, Mac doesn't recognize my headset. This is embarrassing for Apple. Seems like they don't want us top use bluetooth at all.

No issues with iPhone or any of my iPads. Only an issue on my "professional" gear.

Back to cabled outboard gear on my MBP :-(

Just spent 3k on a new Imac and I can’t get any of my BT devices to connect properly. Is Apple going to resolve this or should I pack everything up and send it back? For this kind of money, I expect EVERYTHING to work. Not kind of work. WORK!!!!!

Any further information Stephen, interested to see what your logs showed? I'm still having issues after reinstalling the OS and removing Garmin Express (I read somewhere that removing that seemed to solve someones problem - but not mine it seems). Next step back to Apple again but interested to know how you got on first.

Thanks

Sarah

Hi Sarah

Sorry I didn't update the thread sooner. So I had the call with Jake (Apple rep) at the weekend. Apparently the logs were a bust - I was told that there was too much logged information for the engineer to be able to work out what was happening! ***!! This was from a 5 week old mac that wasn't used for work over Christmas - lol. Unbelievable. The suggestion was to partition my hard hard drive and do a clean install on 1 partition, and just run the mac with base software for a while and then re-upload the logs. I suggested an external SSD and Jake said that would work as well. However I am really busy with work atm so will have to hold off for a while.

However, I've only had 1 single bluetooth disconnect in the last 9 days - and that was immediately after 10.13.3 install. I have removed some apps, but have no idea if this is the reason, and if it is, which one may have been the culprit. However, my suspicions lie with an app called iMazing - not the app but the background process called iMazing Mini. The reason I uninstalled was I noticed a bluetooth disconnect at same time as it attempted to backup.

Anyways, for now I have what seems like a solid bluetooth connection with both my mouse and keyboard. Hope that helps 🙂

I am having this issue too. Mine is a late 2013 iMac running High Sierra. It’s never had connectivity issues before but after the latest update the keyboard wasn’t working. When I went to reconnected it dropped the connection immediately. After dozens of times to get the keyboard to connect I found an old wired keyboard and chatted support. I went through all of the suggested steps – except I did not reinstall the operating system. Nothing has worked. I’m sure this is connected to the update because the problem happened immediately after and I’ve never had connectivity issues before.

To update you all - I contacted apple support again today to say reinstalling the OS has made no difference and my mouse and keyboard are still disconnecting from bluetooth on a daily basis. They said the next step was for me to take it into an apple store for repair. This is not ideal as it is my only computer and I work from home using it on a daily basis. They were unable to tell me if they would make repairs there and then or if I would have to leave it. I'm going to book my appointment for next weekend as this weekend is not convenient. I'll update you on what they say. If they make repairs and it still happens when I get it home I plan to contact John Lewis, where I bought it last July, and ask to return it under warranty. I'll then be going back to a windows pc. Apple does not seem to be acknowledging that the High Sierra update has caused a real issue with bluetooth connection and I'm not convinced the disruption of taking it in for 'repairs' is going to work, but I suppose I have to give them the chance to rectify it.

I'm pretty sure this is a software issue, related to High Sierra, and in my case, to the update that immediately preceded the bluetooth issue. Also, bringing a 27-inch iMac into a repair center is extremely difficult (I've done that in the past.) In my case it means parking, usually blocks away, and juggling an awkwardly-weighted, delicate machine as I walk through traffic, struggle through the doors of the Apple store, and wait in a long line behind a lot of people with broken iPhones. My experience with these "repairs" has been horrible. They keep the machine for weeks and sometimes do nothing at all.

To be honest I'm dreading taking it in. We don't have a local store. I don't drive, so it has to wait for a weekend for my husband to drive me. I don't want to leave it as I won't have a pc to use for home or work. But what can I do? Am I within my rights to go back to John . Lewis and ask for a refund without them trying to 'fix' it. I too think this is a software issue and whatever 'repairs' they make to my hardware won't make any difference.

I'm so fed up of all this but no idea if I can return to John Lewis based on tall these issues I've been having since November, or whether JL will insist I allow Apple a chance to repair?

Interesting development--I decided to change the batteries in my apple keyboard (this is a late 2013 iMac running High Sierra 10.13.3, and bluetooth stopped working as soon as I did the last update.) These were a fairly new set of batteries, and I always get *ample* warning when it's time to change batteries, was not getting any low battery signal, etc. But after swapping out the batteries, the bluetooth is working again. I wonder if they keyboard is somehow reset by removing the batteries completely and reinserting them or inserting new ones.

I certainly can imagine a voltage threshold under which the Bluetooth transmitter becomes unstable. (I have a non-Apple laptop that will not maintain a wireless connection unless it's actually plugged into the wall because of an underpowered transceiver.) However, my newer Magic Mouse and Wireless Keyboard have sealed batteries. If this turns out to be another batteries-get-old-tough-luck-signed-Apple message, I'll have to figure out how to migrate away from their desktop designs.

However, I think above are some examples of brand new equipment exhibiting this behavior.