Touch Bar unavailable at login screen MBP 15 2016

[elfxmilhouse]

I have a 2016 15" MBP and I noticed on a fresh power up the touch bar is blank until I log in. Most of the time the MBP starts up with the screen brightness very low. In a bright room or in sunlight it's almost impossible to see the log in screen. I have to guess that I selected the right user and type in the password.

There's no way to increase the brightness before logging in. I tried tapping the touch bar where the brightness buttons are supposed to be and no luck.

anyone else experience this issue? I found one thread on apple forums but it fizzled out with no resolution.

 

[Uhu]

Do you use FileVault?
If yes that’s an issue I already reported to apple. They have some issues with FileVault. I collected some (your finding too) at this reddit post: https://reddit.com/r/mac/comments/959d01/filevault_bug_collection/

 

[afir93]

So this isn't intentional?

I'm using FileVault and I also noticed this; thought it was a bit curious not to have the TB show anything at the login screen but I figured it was intentional and maybe a technical limitation (seeing how a lot of the startup procedures are done after the login screen when FileVault is enabled instead of before, so I just figured "booting" or loading the Touch Bar was one of them).

 

[jerryk]

I have a 2016 15" MBP and I noticed on a fresh power up the touch bar is blank until I log in. Most of the time the MBP starts up with the screen brightness very low. In a bright room or in sunlight it's almost impossible to see the log in screen. I have to guess that I selected the right user and type in the password.

There's no way to increase the brightness before logging in. I tried tapping the touch bar where the brightness buttons are supposed to be and no luck.

anyone else experience this issue? I found one thread on apple forums but it fizzled out with no resolution.

My 2018 does the same thing from cold power on. I think it may not complete the start processing until you select the user and type in your password. When I type in the password I see a progress bar appear and it takes 10 seconds or so for the bar to fill and the system to be fully operational with touchbar working as expected.

I assumed it was just how the new (I am coming from a 2015 MBP) systems worked.

 

[Uhu]

So this isn't intentional?

I'm using FileVault and I also noticed this; thought it was a bit curious not to have the TB show anything at the login screen but I figured it was intentional and maybe a technical limitation (seeing how a lot of the startup procedures are done after the login screen when FileVault is enabled instead of before, so I just figured "booting" or loading the Touch Bar was one of them).

I think it can be addressed in a future update. The T2 chip should be able to handle that better

 

[elfxmilhouse]

Do you use FileVault?
If yes that’s an issue I already reported to apple. They have some issues with FileVault. I collected some (your finding too) at this reddit post: https://reddit.com/r/mac/comments/959d01/filevault_bug_collection/

yep i use filevault. I hope it can be fixed. I think i'll file a report at apple also.

So this isn't intentional?

I'm using FileVault and I also noticed this; thought it was a bit curious not to have the TB show anything at the login screen but I figured it was intentional and maybe a technical limitation (seeing how a lot of the startup procedures are done after the login screen when FileVault is enabled instead of before, so I just figured "booting" or loading the Touch Bar was one of them).

This really can't be intentional. How is it acceptable to disable these functions? I really hope Apple has a solution to this. At the very least there should be a keyboard shortcut to emulate the missing functions.

 

[afir93]

This really can't be intentional. How is it acceptable to disable these functions? I really hope Apple has a solution to this. At the very least there should be a keyboard shortcut to emulate the missing functions.

The main problem I see is that this way, brightness controls aren't available on the login screen. If it wasn't for that then I probably wouldn't see an issue with it since there's no other Touch Bar function you really need on the login screen, but I could easily see a situation arise where the screen is too dark for the lighting conditions to see anything. Most people can probably find their way through the login window "blindly" if they really have to, and as a last resort there's the possibility of doing an NVRAM reset to reset brightness, but certainly none of that makes for a great user experience.