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Bluetooth Dies Whenever I plug a USB Device in, on Mojave

BergerFan

BergerFan

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Mar 6, 2008
2,170
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Mos Eisley
This started happening as soon as I ‘upgraded’ to macOS Mojave, on my 2017 27” 5K iMac.
It never happened in any previous iteration.
Does this happen to anyone else?
 
BergerFan said:
This started happening as soon as I ‘upgraded’ to macOS Mojave, on my 2017 27” 5K iMac.
It never happened in any previous iteration.
Does this happen to anyone else?
Click to expand...
It’s radio interference. Try repositioning the USB devices.
 
chrfr said:
It’s radio interference. Try repositioning the USB devices.
Click to expand...
It can’t be that as it happens every time, regardless of device, be it an external HDD, my iPhone, my Magic keyboard or anything else - and it literally never happened on High Sierra or anything else before that.
I updated to Mojave, and it began immediately.
 
BergerFan said:
This started happening as soon as I ‘upgraded’ to macOS Mojave, on my 2017 27” 5K iMac.
It never happened in any previous iteration.
Does this happen to anyone else?
Click to expand...

I'm not having the same issue, but my WiFi has been flakey ever since upgrading to HS. Up until a month or so ago bluetooth would just turn off, then turn back on in 15-30 seconds. Many times I had the bluetooth preference pane open I would see this. My mouse and keyboard with then reconnect. I started keeping my magic keyboard plugged in all the time so I could do something. Occasionally my mouse would not connect and I would have to reboot.

After my last update to 10.13.6 things have gotten worse. The mouse will not reconnect (and it is not the mouse, I've tried 3 different magic mice and my old Kensington bluetooth mouse). I've kept a cheap usb mouse plugged in so I can go and toggle bluetooth on and off until the magic mouse connects. What is strange is sometimes it connects in the PP -- I can even see the battery level -- then disconnects before the mouse working or getting the connected graphic.

I've given up -- I have a wireless RF mouse ordered and we'll see how that goes. I did buy a bluetooth usb dongle but I could never get that to work.

This is a late 2017 5K iMac so still on Apple Care. Their solution is for me to schlepp it down to the local mall, park somewhere, schlepp the computer up to the Apple store were they will tell me it is not broken but after insisting they will agree to keep it and sometime later I will repeat that all in reverse.

The problems with this and my MacBook Pro have really put me off Apple. I used to love them because They Just Worked. Now every time I do an update it is cross my fingers and pray to the FSM. When I upgraded my MacBookPro to Mojave it was basically useless (to me) for a month as it wouldn't let me access the app store or install any updates (so I couldn't upgrade Xcode). Took about 4 escalations before finally somebody was able to come up with a solution.

Sorry for the vent...
 
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Apple somehow managed to f... up the Bluetooth drivers in Mojave, but it does not affect every Mac out there. I can personally attest though that the 2017 27" iMac is affected by this. Ever since upgrading mine from 10.13.6 to 10.14 my Logitech MX Master 2S Bluetooth mouse (jittery, lost connectivity, unreliable) and my Bluetooth headset (Jabra PRO 9470) (regularly disconnected randomly and refused to stay connected for more than 5s afterwards) became utterly unusable. I've tried reinstalling Mojave and resetting and reconnecting the devices to no avail. Whatever Apple did, Mojave's Bluetooth driver for the iMac is completely messed up. I ended up going back to 10.13 recently and have not had any problems since.
 
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nambuccaheadsau said:
mj not Apple's responsibility. Get over to Logitech and tell them to get their fingers out and come up with a driver for your mouse.
Click to expand...
Except that I have a similar issue on my 21" 2017 iMac using the wireless keyboard and Magic Mouse that came with it. Bluetooth will suddenly crap out, rendering both devices unresponsive, and then come back around 30 seconds later. Happens more or less daily. There's definitely something wonky about Bluetooth in Mojave...
 
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I just got a Imac Pro which came with preloaded with Mojave. My 3Dconnection wireless Space Mouse loses connection when I restart the Imac Pro. I have to unplug and replug the wireless usb dongle to get it working. My logitech mouse works fine except the latest drivers do not allow for modifing the mouse button features. It’s just a mouse. Both wireless devices work fine on my old 2010 cMac Pro. Since my 3Dconnection space mouse is new I have been on the phone with tech support and they sent me a new dongle to test and it is the same as the one I had. No connection on startup.. But after reading this it may be OS 10.14. However. On a CAD users group I saw a notice that it’s a recent Mac issue “They're tracking it as "mac-48", and hoping to have it fixed by the next driver update.”. Whatever it is the USB and wireless is not working the way it did on the old Mac.
 
nambuccaheadsau said:
mj not Apple's responsibility.
Click to expand...
How is it not Apple's responsibility if

a) a Logitech mouse is affected
b) a Jabra headset is affected
c) it only happens on my 2017 iMac, not my MacBook
d) it only happens when running 10.14 but not 10.13

In return, the an Apple Magic Mouse 2 has been acting up when connected to my MacBook when running 10.14 but not 10.13. Coincidence? I think not.

This is 110% on Apple. Nobody else. They f'ed this up big time.
 
I'm not sure if you don't WANT to read what everybody is saying or if you simply don't care.

A Logitech mouse is affected.
A JABRA headset is affected (see what I did there? JABRA, not Logitech).
An APPLE mouse is affected (see what I did there? APPLE, not Logitech).
People are reporting Bluetooth issues with all kinds of devices, from Apple to Zyxel.

Interestingly enough the Logitech mouse works perfectly fine when using Logitech's Unifying Receiver via USB. Yet more proof that it is not Logitech's fault but Apple's: the Bluetooth stack and driver is written by Apple, the Logitech driver only takes over as soon as the operating system reports an HID but knows absolutely nothing of the type of connection (wired/wireless, bluetooth, infrared, etc.)

And it all works brilliantly with High Sierra. Please, tell me again how Logitech is to blame for a Jabra headset or an Apple mouse not working correctly in 10.14 but perfectly fine in 10.13.
 
Wow... just... wow. You cannot possible be that ignorant. It's like talking to a brick wall.

I'm going to ask this one last time, because you keep blatantly ignoring that fact: Care to explain how exactly it's Logitech's fault that Apple's own Magic Mouse 2 is having Bluetooth connectivity issues with 10.14 as well?
 
Last edited:
BergerFan said:
This started happening as soon as I ‘upgraded’ to macOS Mojave, on my 2017 27” 5K iMac.
It never happened in any previous iteration.
Does this happen to anyone else?
Click to expand...
Page 4 of this thread on Mac Mini sub forum is interesting and might be related as all 2018 Minis come with Mojave by default.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/mac-mini-2018-bluetooth-issues.2157086/page-4

In one of the post, Apple is recommending the user to delete a few files. Luckily, I am not having any issues with my 2018 Mini
 
My suggestion:

Use the Logitech "unifying receiver" and DON'T USE bluetooth for the Logitech mouse. Having said that, I've been using Logitech mice for years like this without problems.

I realize this doesn't solve the "bluetooth connection problem" that is the issue here, but the idea here is to get a configuration "that works"...

My opinion only follows:
For some reason, bluetooth and recent Macs don't "mix" particularly well.
I generally don't use BT at all.

For all the frustration, perhaps the best solution might be to buy a 3' USB "extension cable" (has male plug on one end and female port on the other), and a 3rd-party bluetooth "dongle". Then connect the dongle to the extension cable and "drape it" forward from behind the iMac (or Mini), and letting it "hang free" more towards the front of your desk.

Now it will be away from all the USB interference at the back of the Mac, and may work without problems.

Has anyone tried this?
If so, did it improve BT "connectability"?
 
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