Did they not have beta testers on Intel Macs that could have been screwed over by this "update"?
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Apple Fixes Bug That Bricked Some Intel Macs After macOS Monterey Install
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Did they not have beta testers on Intel Macs that could have been screwed over by this "update"?
Yeah, this is a problem, no doubt. I'm guessing by "small number of people", they really mean a small number of people in this case though. I can only imagine this is the difference between testing on thousands of machines for the beta and millions in the release.
The fact it was a failure in a secondary processor might mean that there was a multi-process synchronization issue that wasn't correctly guarded against in the code. When you're dealing with millions of people, there's going to be some who push different buttons or try different things during the update. Betas are typically installed by the more detail oriented folks, with cleaner machines and enough technical knowledge to know what a beta is. Full release goes to everyone who can click.
Then when this starts to happen, it takes time to verify that the failures really are update related (millions of updates leaves a lot of room for coincidence) and then to find the cause and correct it. If the failure disables the machine, then you'll need someone to bring their personal machine to an Apple support center and get it into the hands of engineering to disassemble and analyze. That's going to be a slow process-- with days needed just to transport the machines.
We'll probably never learn what the root cause was, but I'm really, really curious.
This is high school sloppy coding on Apls part. Ridiculous
Considering the Macs with T2 are relatively new (2018 and newer) https://support.apple.com/HT208862, you'd think a "smart" conspiracy of this sort would brick the pre-T2 Macs capable of running Monterey, which include the 2013 Mac Pro, 2014 mini, and 2015 iMac, MBA, and MBP. It's the people with 5-7-year-old machines who should be getting the "hint" to upgrade.
I doubt any conspiracy, just the outgrowth of added complexity. The more you try to do, the more likely you'll have unintended-but-rare consequences (and when you sell as many machines as Apple does, even thousands of affected users can constitute "rare"). The T2 replaced a lot of time-worn technologies and added some serious security lock-downs. No, this is likely just a garden variety bug that was compounded by a security-related feature like SIP, which responded by locking things down. And it's a good bet that for those still affected, they'll need the firmware refreshed via connection to a second Mac.
Times have changed. Now, everything is a conspiracy. Back in the days of Y2K folks were willing to understand that the Y2K bug was nothing more than human nature and economics at work. Data storage was far more expensive back then, so a 6-character date (MMDDYY) saved real money over an 8-character date. They all knew the Millennium would arrive, but at the time, it was 40, 30, or 20 years into the future. "We'll fix it before it becomes a problem" or "I'm retiring before then, the new guys will fix it."
From my perspective, as systems/societies become more complex, conspiracies become less necessary. There's plenty to go wrong without anyone helping it to happen.
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This isn't totally correct, my new 14 inch died after updating and would not turn on 2 days after receiving the computer, I went to the apple store and they gave me a new computer for free so I'm not mad, but this issue wasn't just for intel chips.
You can't know that you were affected by the same bug; you only know that the symptoms were similar. The fact that they replaced it rather than refresh the firmware suggests that something bigger was at play in your case.
It's great seeing a thoughtful and well reasoned comment here without the typical feel-good Apple slagging hyperbole. Sadly, that's a rarity here.
It certainly is with the new M1's - the USB problems should never have made it through either.
I can't even erase a drive - still have to go back to the intel machine to do that.
Yes.
No.
Thing is, there was no secrecy and compartmentalization here. Monterey was in public beta for months, and either nobody encountered the issue, or so few did that it didn't reach Apple's QA.
My guess: most Intel Macs weren't affected. After all, not only were there many people on this very forum using betas on Monterey on their Intel Macs; even running Monterey on unsupported Intel Macs has been a popular topic for months.
In other words, overall, stability of Monterey seems to be rather good.
That's not to downplay the severity of this bug, but I think you're misjudging how many were affected.
They did, including on these forums.
Rather interesting that as I checked the App Store for Apple Configurator 2, I was surprised to see that they just released a new version that's only 1 day old, from 2.14 to 2.15, and there are only two notes for it:
v.2.15 1d ago
• Allow skipping the App Store pane in Setup Assistant
• Bug fixes
I bet they encapsulated the BridgeOS update in the new version.
Edit: if you have Apple Configurator 2 installed, you can run "MCU Resource Updater" and that will also update all of its assets to reflect the latest available firmwares.
v.2.15 1d ago
• Allow skipping the App Store pane in Setup Assistant
• Bug fixes
I bet they encapsulated the BridgeOS update in the new version.
Edit: if you have Apple Configurator 2 installed, you can run "MCU Resource Updater" and that will also update all of its assets to reflect the latest available firmwares.
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Exactly. There are a lot of things one should have to think about before performing a software update, but “will this render my machine totally inert and beyond my ability to revive it” is not one of them.
I could sort of get it if they were a scrappy startup with few resources, but they’ve got basically infinite resources.
It has really come down to who can adapt to change, deal with complexity, and avoid distractions the best. And the gap between those that can and those that can't will get wider as time goes on.
Apple would never intentionally brick someone’s computer. There’s no reason to attribute to malice that which can be more easily accounted for by simple incompetence.
But between this bug and others I’ve come across lately (like 4K at high refresh rates being broken on external monitors over USB-C for Intel Macs but not M1 Macs since the second Big Sur beta), it’s certainly becoming clear where there focus is, and where it’s slipping.
I get that Apple Silicon is where their focus is now, as it should be, but a company as large as Apple should be able to multitask better than this.
Saddling my existing (still under AppleCare) machine with bugs they can’t be bothered to fix is not a great way to convince me to upgrade to a new one.
Apple is abandoning Intel at a quicker and worrying rate. They should slow down. They've probably transferred their best engineers to work on Apple Silicon already. The next version of macOS (13) is probably going to be the last stable macOS for Intel-based Macs.
Again, waiting for 15.2 at least before updating....
Also, to allow macOS to "catch up" to iOS somewhat.
Thanks to all beta-testers, BTW.
Also, to allow macOS to "catch up" to iOS somewhat.
Thanks to all beta-testers, BTW.
This isn't an Apple M1 focus thing. The M1 has had massive issues since the day it was released last year and there are still issues plaguing them, especially with external displays. This is a quality control issue and it hasn't gotten any better since Apple said they'd focus on quality control. They only have a handful of hardware they need to focus on since it seems with every new macOS release they are cutting out tons of device support. For a company as massive as Apple and with the handful of devices they have to focus on, this is absolutely unacceptable. I get that bugs happen, but the bugs are job interrupting piles of crap that often don't get fixed for months or some still haven't been fixed yet. Their pride and joy and 80% of their revenue stream is the iPhone. The Mac seems to be on the back burner. Hopefully with the release of their new Crown Jewels, the M1 Pro and M1 Max, they might start prioritizing Macs again, but this has been a frustrating issue for some time now.
Whether you were kidding or not, now I’ve got that damn song stuck in my head, so thanks for that …sabotage..
...JK... ( or am I )
From what I read it was more the T1 chip than the T2....I wonder then they will address that, assuming this update didn't already do that.
"The problem also seems to impact T1-equipped Macs at a higher rate than T2-equipped models."
"The problem also seems to impact T1-equipped Macs at a higher rate than T2-equipped models."
Yeah, as I said in another comment, they broke high refresh rate 4K monitor support over USB-C early in the Big Sur beta cycle and it remains broken in Monterey.
Funnily enough, the bug (if that’s what it is) only affects Intel Macs — which worked fine in the same scenario on Catalina.
That kind of regression should never happen, but to have it not only happen but persist over two OS releases is totally unacceptable.
A lot of people mess with Secure Boot and disable T2 on their Macs. I wonder how many of those bricked machines have their T2 played around with. Apple obviously didn't make reinstalling macOS easier so they're at fault here as well. I wonder what the reason is for those machines getting bricked. I guess we'll never know.