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iMac 2013, MM-1 speakers crash.

C

Carlos840

macrumors member
Original poster
Nov 5, 2013
39
0
Hi,

New member here, just upgraded today from a 2009 24" iMac to a brand new 2013 iMac.

Specs are: 3.4 Intel Core i5, 1TB Fusion drive, GTX 780M, 8Gb RAM, came with 10.8.4 but i installed 10.9

This iMac is perfect, screen is as good as it can get, i am very happy with it.
( i really don't want to have to go through 3 of them before i get a keeper like i did 4 years ago with the 24")

Problem is that for some reason it doesn't like my B&W MM-1 speakers.

I have used the computer around 5 hours and have had 2 different issues:

- I hear a screetching through the MM-1s and all sound stops, only way to get them back on is to turn them off and on, reselect them in system preferences/ sound/ output. All is good for a while.
This happened twice.

- Sound stops, everything freezes, no mouse, no keyboard, nothing.
Only way to get things back on is to hold the power button on till it shuts down and reboot.
Weird thing is the computer is still running, if i wait for a bit i can see the name of the next song appear in the top right corner, i just can't do anything!
This happened 3 times.

Of course the speakers never gave me a problem until this new iMac.


Any ideas?

Does it sound like a software issue? Hardware? Send it back? Keep it?
 
Last edited:
Is there any other USB devices plugged in while you were troubleshooting this? I had a similar issue with a faulty USB cord used for an external disk messing up my wired mouse and USB audio.
 
Johnf1285 said:
Is there any other USB devices plugged in while you were troubleshooting this? I had a similar issue with a faulty USB cord used for an external disk messing up my wired mouse and USB audio.
Click to expand...

I do have a hub with a couple hard drives plugged in...

But it was all working this morning on my 2009 iMac!

Still i have just tried plugging the speakers straight in the iMac rather than going through the hub and it has not crashed in the 30 min since i did that.
I do get a bit of crackle here and there that never happened before.
 
Well, since plugging the speakers straight to the iMac i have had a third version of the problem.

-No screetch of any kind, sound just stops. Turning the speakers on and off did nothing, i had to manually go to system preferences/ sound/ output, select built in then back to MM-1 and it works again...

This is so annoying, don't know if i should just send it back or if it is some sort of Mavericks bug that will get fixed at some point.
 
More fun!

Out of nowhere things started getting extremely sluggish, i had firefox, iTunes and a couple low key apps running and activity monitor was showing huge RAM pressure and a huge amount of swap used (20gb! never saw that even on my core2duo), I felt like i was back on a dx2 66!

Force quit then came up telling me my system was saturated that firefox was paused and that i had to quit apps to free some RAM.

I shut it all down, reset the SMC, NVRAM and PRAM, and fixed permissions lets hope it does something magical because i am starting to lose hope!

A friend of mine is a sound engineer and he tells me a lot of his colleagues are having issues since installing Mavericks. Things like Protools or Logic not recognizing sound cards, or randomly not seeing the cards after a certain time.

This sounds a lot like what i am experiencing, it feels like it just randomly looses my speakers and crashes because of it...
 
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Update:

After spending most of the afternoon on the phone with apple support i have decided to send the iMac back.

We discovered that the problem was not with the MM-1, if i rebooted the mac it acted fine.
If i put it to sleep upon waking up it would crackle in the speakers and the mic would crackled to if used on Skype or garageband, even without the MM-1 connected.

Apple care dude told me to do a clean install without uploading my time machine files. Even after doing that the same issue continued.

I was then forwarded to the senior manager, who had me do a few tests, and in the end admitted he had no idea what the problem was.

The solution was to take it to the "genius" bar, which i was not ready to do, so back in the box it goes...

I have asked for a refund and will wait for 10.9.1 to some out, before i order again....
 
Carlos840 said:
Update:

After spending most of the afternoon on the phone with apple support i have decided to send the iMac back.

We discovered that the problem was not with the MM-1, if i rebooted the mac it acted fine.
If i put it to sleep upon waking up it would crackle in the speakers and the mic would crackled to if used on Skype or garageband, even without the MM-1 connected.

Apple care dude told me to do a clean install without uploading my time machine files. Even after doing that the same issue continued.

I was then forwarded to the senior manager, who had me do a few tests, and in the end admitted he had no idea what the problem was.

The solution was to take it to the "genius" bar, which i was not ready to do, so back in the box it goes...

I have asked for a refund and will wait for 10.9.1 to some out, before i order again....
Click to expand...

If you want the new imac, why not leave it on 10.8? 10.9 seems to have some pretty serious issues right now. I do understand how your new purchase could be spoiled, though. I had major issues with Lion when I purchased my 2011 imac.

I installed on one imac and two MBPs. One MBP is 2012. The other two computers are 2011. Only the 2012 MBP was a success. The other MBP would not stop crashing. Tried both an upgrade and a clean install after the initial issues but no success either way. Re-installed a time machine backup and all was well again.

I'm still troubleshooting the imac which crashed but I'm about to give up on Mavericks for now.
 
Mr. Buzzcut said:
If you want the new imac, why not leave it on 10.8? 10.9 seems to have some pretty serious issues right now. I do understand how your new purchase could be spoiled, though. I had major issues with Lion when I purchased my 2011 imac.

I installed on one imac and two MBPs. One MBP is 2012. The other two computers are 2011. Only the 2012 MBP was a success. The other MBP would not stop crashing. Tried both an upgrade and a clean install after the initial issues but no success either way. Re-installed a time machine backup and all was well again.

I'm still troubleshooting the imac which crashed but I'm about to give up on Mavericks for now.
Click to expand...

Well to be honest i didn't buy this iMac because i really needed it...
My 2009 24" is still going strong, and it has been running great under Mavericks, which is weird considering how crap it was on the 2013 iMac! ( i did go straight from 10.6.8 to 10.9 on the 24")
I bought it because right now i have the money and felt it was as good a time as any to do the switch to 27".

It doesn't make much difference to me to wait a month or two for the 10.9 update to come out and hopefully fix things up...
 
Well, i just received my replacement, and sent it back 2minutes after turning it on!

It has a dead pixel in the middle of the screen, and bot lower corners have weird smudges.
A bit like the effect you have when sandwiching a liquid between two glass plates, like the glue between the screen and the glass was not pressed enough or something.

I don't know what to do right, now, i went through 4 24" iMacs 4 years ago, i am not sure i am ready to do that gain to get a 27"

But then, i hate windows so much...
 
Carlos840 said:
Well, i just received my replacement, and sent it back 2minutes after turning it on!

It has a dead pixel in the middle of the screen, and bot lower corners have weird smudges.
A bit like the effect you have when sandwiching a liquid between two glass plates, like the glue between the screen and the glass was not pressed enough or something.

I don't know what to do right, now, i went through 4 24" iMacs 4 years ago, i am not sure i am ready to do that gain to get a 27"

But then, i hate windows so much...
Click to expand...

I never had a 'troubled' Mac (1 logic board replacement on my 15 rMBP only..) , so there's hope. It's fairly uncommon to go through so many before you find the right one. But I have purchased loads and loads of Macs, so there's hope! best of luck.
 
Sorry to hear about your bad replacement, but your problem definitely seems to be the widely reported and now well known issue with Haswell iMacs and Fusion Drives. See here, here and here for examples.

Using USB audio devices on these machines will lead to a situation where the audio becomes distorted and eventually the keyboard and mouse stop responding and the only alternative is to press and hold the power button to hard reset it. You will find an error message similar to the following in your logs:

12/15/13 8:07:16.000 PM kernel[0]: vtd[0] fault: device 0:20:0 reason 0x6 R:0x12bd000
12/15/13 8:07:16.000 PM kernel[0]: USBF: 17276.645 AppleUSBXHCI::UIMCheckForTimeouts - HSE bit set:5 (1)

Unfortunately, a replacement machine is not going to help. We're waiting for Apple to release a fix for the Fusion drivers. One poor solution which is reported to work is splitting the Fusion drive into separate drives.
 
Yeah, i have realised that and am wondering if i am not going to cancel the third replacement and wait for 10.9.1 to come out!
 
Carlos840 said:
Yeah, i have realised that and am wondering if i am not going to cancel the third replacement and wait for 10.9.1 to come out!
Click to expand...

In the Apple discussion forums, someone running a 10.9.1 beta reported that it has not resolved it. :(

We can only cross our fingers that one of the reasons for the delay in the final release of 10.9.1 is that Apple has added this to their list of last-minute fixes.

Yeah, unless you have other problems with your latest machine, I think you'd be better off waiting for the fix rather than get another replacement.

Do you happen to have an iPhone plugged in to the iMac via USB? I managed to reduce my lockups to zero by removing mine and charging it via AC. With my 5s plugged in to the Mac, the freezes were totally random and without warning. Without it plugged in, I have to use my USB headphones with an app to induce it.
 
Well, i have just cancelled my order!

The waiting game starts again, i will see how things evolve, and order again when things get fixed...
 
And of course, the day after i cancel 10.9.1 comes out...

I would love to know if it sorts out the USB audio interface crashes!?

Well, a bit of research was done, and apparently the issue has still not been resolved...

Go Apple!
 
Not only has the issue not been resolved yet, Carlos, as far as I can tell Apple has yet to publicly acknowledge that the problem even exists nor given any indication that they are working on it.

I'm beginning to think you made the best choice of all. :(
 
Same issue with my audio engine DAC. Speakers will work then pop, pop... crackle, crackle.. fizzzzz. Everyone with the fusion drive is prone to this problem or at least those that are reporting the symptom seem to have this hardware.
 
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