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MBP 16" There isn't a keyboard connected

bigcat

bigcat

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 12, 2008
493
168
I'm having this issue with a new MBP 16". When I open the lid, neither the keyboard nor the trackpad respond, after almost a minute, a window pops up saying that "There isn't a keyboard connected", and its looking for bluetooth or wireless keyboard. Other times the message says trackpad instead of keyboard. The window closes after a couple of minutes or so and everything works. It doesn't happen all the time, but it's frequent, also very annoying to have to wait that long every time I open the machine.

Wondering if anyone else has experienced this; also whether it could be a hardware issue. I've never returned/exchanged any machines with Apple. Is that painless with Apple? It's a BTO ordered online. I hate to call Apple support because I am sure they are going to have me re-install the OS and what not, which I'd just hate to do on a new machine; I'd rather exchange it if that's something they do.
 
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bigcat said:
I'm having this issue with a new MBP 16". When I open the lid, neither the keyboard nor the trackpad respond, after almost a minute, a window pops up saying that "There isn't a keyboard connected", and its looking for bluetooth or wireless keyboard. Other times the message says trackpad instead of keyboard. The window closes after a couple of minutes or so and everything works. It doesn't happen all the time, but it's frequent, also very annoying to have to wait that long every time I open the machine.

Wondering if anyone else has experienced this; also whether it could be a hardware issue. I've never returned/exchanged any machines with Apple. Is that painless with Apple? It's a BTO ordered online. I hate to call Apple support because I am sure they are going to have me re-install the OS and what not, which I'd just hate to do on a new machine; I'd rather exchange it if that's something they do.
Click to expand...

Yup, I started seeing this shortly after upgrading to Catalina (10.15.0) and continuing in to 10.15.1
Reported it in this thread

Are you running VMware VMs?

In my case, it seems to happen pretty predictably when I have a VMware Fusion VM running when I close the lid, putting the laptop to sleep. When I open the lid [sometimes] the keyboard and trackpad are dead. I can tell when it's happened because the keyboard backlight doesn't even illuminate.
 
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patwithamac said:
Yup, I started seeing this shortly after upgrading to Catalina (10.15.0) and continuing in to 10.15.1
Reported it in this thread

Are you running VMware VMs?

In my case, it seems to happen pretty predictably when I have a VMware Fusion VM running when I close the lid, putting the laptop to sleep. When I open the lid [sometimes] the keyboard and trackpad are dead. I can tell when it's happened because the keyboard backlight doesn't even illuminate.
Click to expand...

I have VMWare fusion installed but I haven't even launched it the first time yet. So sounds like a Catalina bug or software issue and not hardware, at least in your case, since you didn't have the issue prior to Catalina.
 
I had this issue and indeed VmWare fusion was running. Good to know that was the cause.

VmWare+WinXP actually runs crappier with each iteration of macOS. With Mojave on an iMac Pro a new bug appeared where pressing return in the virtual machine would in certain menus trigger an infinite series of carriage returns that didn't stop until I pressed escape (very annoying while editing a document). In Catalina this bug remains, but in addition much of the time I have to double instead of single-click for single click tasks. The mountain bugs (that I don't know how to stop) are increasingly interfering with my workflow.
 
Same problem. Purchased the MBP16" last week. Currently on Catalina 10.15.5.
This is extremely frustrating. Does anyone have a solution?
 
UPDATE: After updating to 10.15.6, the issue hasn't come up for me. It's been about 10 days.
 
I have been having this same issue with a 2019 MacBook Air. I keep it updated, but the issue seems to occassionally occur.

Does anyone else still have this issue or have experience talking to Apple about it?
 
I have the same issue on the 2020 13inch MBP. Only occurs if my laptop wakes from sleep with proxy settings applied, but connects to a network without them. In work, my laptop has to use a proxy and if it connects to my home network after waking from sleep with the proxy settings still in place, the keyboard and trackpad (and all USB devices) fail to work for about a minute. TouchID and the touch bar still work fine. Still occurs on 10.15.6.
 
I am still having this issue on my 16 inch MBP (10.15.6) . Actually happened on consecutive days. Have turned BT off will see if that helps but don’t really want to turn it off since I use my AirPods with it
 
Same problem for me since some weeks with my MacBook Pro 15.

Then I got a MacBook Pro 16 3 days ago and transferred everything on it with Time Machine, I didn't get the issue for 2 days, and just now I got it again when I opened the lid.

I don't have VMWare installed but I do have Parallels Desktop with Windows 10.
 
I also have experienced this same issue twice back in June or July on my 2020 MacBook Pro 13 inch. Both times it happened when I closed my Mac and walked to a specific spot in the building I work in to sit and use it there.

I suspect it has something to do with wifi as the wifi signal is weak or non-existent in that part of the building. This is all before I updated to 10.15.6 and then later installed Parallels Desktop and Windows 10. I should go back to that spot and see if it happens again.
 
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