"iMac Pro" kernel crash

Count me in as well. 10 core Radeon Pro Vega 64 owner here.

I returned my first iMac Pro during the grace period for having the same reboot issue right out of the gate. It rebooted several times in the first three days right out of the box. Second one has had the same issues but I was so deep in a big project I couldn't afford to be without it.

Machine reboots or shuts down on it's own. Sometimes while using it, sometimes it is shut down when I return to it. Even though I have enabled "Prevent Computer from sleeping automatically when display is off." I can pretty much cause it to reboot if I run a h.264 through Compressor and compress it into h.264. After that the machine reboots constantly until I let it cool down. I called Apple Support after a Compressor induced reboot. They had me boot into the Recovery OS and run Disk First Aid in Disk Utility. While waiting on the phone with DU idle, the machine rebooted, I was on hold with the Support Rep at the Login Screen and it rebooted again. After that reboot I logged in while I was on hold to see if I got a Kernel Panic report to share. While I had Text Edit open copying out the report, the machine rebooted again.

Kernel Panic reports: {"caused_by":"macos","macos_system_state":"running","bug_type":"210","os_versio n":"Bridge OS 2.3.1 (15P5064)","timestamp":"2018-07-06 17:20:27.93 +0000","incident_id":"E42E2C96-5621-4870-A5A6-BAD76C4BA723"}

I've also had intermittent static come through audio no matter what the playback is, Spotify, Web Browser, Quicktime, FCPX, and then playback jumps to something like 10x, only a reboot will remedy. I've connected with another user on Twitter who is having this same problem.

I'm thinking this is a GPU thermal error. I was really hoping that the Support call would get me through to speak with an engineer so I could relay some info and help them figure things out. Instead I was told to make a Genius appointment and take it in. Obviously since this happened with 2 separate machines, and others are having the same issue, this is a core design problem either in the base hardware or software. I'm worried that they will chase their tail replacing components and nothing will get done except me being without the machine for days at a time.

I've used Macs for 25 years, and this is a huge disappointment for a machine I payed $7k for to be reliable. I'm seriously considering building a PC workstation now, which I would have never considered before.

So, I got a call from Apple Support about this issue on Friday. We talked for an hour, time in which I explained when it happens and when it doesn't happen. He was watching with me what I was doing, what settings I had enabled or disabled and he witnessed the crash with me. In my case if I have the power saving settings turned on + the apple watch login + asking for the password after sleep or lock it crashes either in sleep or when I export 4K video in Final Cut Pro. Once I disable all those settings the machine runs fine. It never restarts while sleeping and I am able to export my 4K videos. This gives me hope, because it could be only a software issue.

Sounds like the same issue I'm having. I've already had the motherboard and SSD replaced. I talked with Apple over the phone with the Compressor and h.264 issue and we were able make the computer crash after 3 seconds of compressing. I uploaded a crash report to them and some other things. Still no word on if it's a software issue or a Graphics/T2 chip issue.

I’ve a call scheduled for Monday with an Apple support engineer on this. I’m glad that this thread has caught their attention. I’m hopeful that we can get a resolution on this. I have been hesitant to start swapping out motherboards and ssds until I saw some forward progress. Hopefully we can get the right info to Apple so that a resolution is found.

I highly suggest everyone call Apple support. I have been in touch and they are gathering data around the crash to understand what's happening. Given my computer ran for 6 months with no issues, and this only cropped up lately, Im inclined to believe this is software related. But I guess we'll see what the outcome is.

Did you ever call them back? I have a Genius Bar appointment this week, but I think it will be a waste of time to take it in right now until engineering figures out what is the core problem. Anyone made any progress with Support to report?

My case worker simply stopped communicating with me, and forced me to open (yet) another case. After providing an aggregate of crash data/sysdiagnose logs, screenshots, etc. my new case worker admitted that they have a growing number of these cases, and that engineering doesn't appear to have a solution/response. Last evening, I collected & uploaded these items again. I was told to expect a response on Wednesday/Thursday. ...increasingly frustrated.

I’m not into airing dirty laundry on social media, I think it’s a waste of time.

But I’m all for writing some angry letters.

Does anyone know where to send these at Apple?

Who’s the head of the iMac team?

Who’s the head of the support team?

Tim Cook?

Honest question, not rhetorical.

They may ignore mine alone but they won’t ignore a few hundred or thousand.

They will not get back to you. Their task is to collect data. When all the data is collected they will try to fix this. They will not make any official statement. This is what i got from the apple care representative that i talked to. If you aske me this will take many months to fix.

It does help to get a large response back to them. However it’s also abundantly clear that Apple has multiple serious software AND hardware issues that need to be addressed. If they acknowledged something right now it would kill sales and force a general repair recall. THAT’S certainly happening anytime soon, and if and when there IS a recall, they need to be completely finished with all problems so it only happens once. And by that time there’s probably a new model on the horizon, so stay visible!

There are reports on a MacRumors forum of folks having some similar issues as to the ones we've described here. One poster recommended the 10.13.6 update may help. Has anyone installed this update and noticed a difference? I'm jumping in....

So the 10.13.6 install had a progress bar, did what I can only describe as a full shut down, not just a restart. Everything powered down including external drives, sat for almost 30 secs, came back up, progress bar, short restart, progress bar with time remaining. I'm assuming there was a firmware update, but it was not the "fat" progress bar I've seen on older machines and I got no warning about removing power.

Boot ROM is now 15.16.6059.0.0,0, can someone on 10.13.5 check their Boot Rom to see if it did a firmware update?

Guys, relax. No upcoming update is going to fix this issue. They are just barely getting the data in. The collection of data is not even finished and you want a fix? Let me be clear: they havent started working on a fix yet because it would be a waste of time until they have the data. Like i said in a previous post, the fix is at least a few months away. Id say 6 months.

To me it isn't just about an immediate fix, it's about what I perceive to be AppleCare's cavalier attitude towards their customers.

i.e. replace the iMac (twice) then each time when the problem re-occurs they simply tell you open another ticket. It's all geared towards presenting high fix rate statistics. If these tickets stayed open and someone had to report at least once a week back to the customers that the problem persisted I'm pretty sure things would be different.

So far they (AppleCare) are just wasting everyone's time by having us re-install MacOS, replace our Macs, and twiddle our settings like it might be a fix rather than just halting the process until we all hear back from engineering.

Also not admitting to a problem in the first place but rather going through the motions.

I sense a lot of people here are simply frustrated from the deafening silence from Apple, I am.

Sorry for the rant, like I said, frustrated.

That's also my issue with this. The support basically replies "oh just waste your time doing random bs", such as replacing the mac, reinstall the OS, etc... and then goes silent if you got any real question or are trying to follow up.

I'm pretty sure quite a few apple users spend this kind of money on a mac in the hope that they don't have to spend time doing constant maintenance... in that respect, it hasn't been great so far.