Random logouts - macOS Sierra 10.12.6

[OliverH]

Maybe this issue I'm experiencing is really a macOS issue, however, I seem to only ever experience it while using Pro Tools.

There's not much to explain, really, other than that several times a week, for no apparent reason, Pro Tools will suddenly lag very noticeably and behave as if it's going to freeze, but instead of freezing, it just quits and then my computer goes to a login screen asking for my username and password.

Needless to say, unless PT has done an auto-save, I lose work when this happens. I haven't had it happen during record.. YET... but I am terrified that it will happen during recording of clients!!

Anyone else experiencing this or know what it could be related to?

Not sure if it's relegated to being only a Sierra problem, or if people have experienced it with older OS's... I've done some research online and it seems like this is a Sierra issue with people reporting this behavior outside of Pro Tools in more stock apps like Safari/Chrome while watching stuff like YouTube videos on the web....??

In any case, curious if there's a fix or if I'm just totally missing something. Never experienced this before PT on Sierra.

[john1192]

Originally Posted by OliverH

Maybe this issue I'm experiencing is really a macOS issue, however, I seem to only ever experience it while using Pro Tools.

There's not much to explain, really, other than that several times a week, for no apparent reason, Pro Tools will suddenly lag very noticeably and behave as if it's going to freeze, but instead of freezing, it just quits and then my computer goes to a login screen asking for my username and password.

Needless to say, unless PT has done an auto-save, I lose work when this happens. I haven't had it happen during record.. YET... but I am terrified that it will happen during recording of clients!!

Anyone else experiencing this or know what it could be related to?

Not sure if it's relegated to being only a Sierra problem, or if people have experienced it with older OS's... I've done some research online and it seems like this is a Sierra issue with people reporting this behavior outside of Pro Tools in more stock apps like Safari/Chrome while watching stuff like YouTube videos on the web....??

In any case, curious if there's a fix or if I'm just totally missing something. Never experienced this before PT on Sierra.

hi oliver, did you do the 10.12.6 update automatically ?? of so, turn that off .. so you can have control of your computer .. and if so, what version of OS did you have before ??

if not, did you just buy this Computer or ?? just a bit more info would help ...

thank you john

[OliverH]

Originally Posted by john1192

hi oliver, did you do the 10.12.6 update automatically ?? of so, turn that off .. so you can have control of your computer .. and if so, what version of OS did you have before ??

if not, did you just buy this Computer or ?? just a bit more info would help ...

Hey John, no I did not do the 10.12.6 update automatically, I manually updated. It seemed here most people weren't having any issues with that combo of OS and PT. Also, I was having this issue with Sierra since before updating to the latest 10.12.6.

I have a recent Mac Pro "trash can" that I've had since very early 2014. I was running Mavericks (10.9.5) on it for quite some time but realized, for support with newer versions of software, I needed to update to Sierra (support for Native Instruments Komplete products, Avid Audio Server support for CoreAudio playback, among others...)

[Clément I]

Hi, I have the same problem with my mac pro late 2013 (trashcan) 4 cores 32GB of ram on mac os sierra 10.12.6

When i'm using protools on a mix session or even if i don't touch anything on my S6 or keyboard (during play of my session and just listening to it...)

It's happen randomly and i don't know why...

After several clean instal of the os using different style of reinstall (from a usb stick, directly from the internet, etc...) the problem is still here.

No problem with my other Macpro trashcan on 10.9.5 or other Macpro 5.1 on sierra...

Could this possibly due to the fact that the macpro is using 2 video card ?(cf https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7678232)

I also notice a "windowserver" process in the activity monitor sometimes, and if i try to shutdown this process, my mac log out as the same way... could this be a crash of this process that cause the mac to logout ?

Of course i check that all the parameters in the system preferences that could log out the mac on it's own are off.

Did you find a solution ?

[OliverH]

Hey Clement, no unfortunately I never found a solution to this issue. It still happens to me and the frequency with which it happens seems to come and go. There's not a whole lot of rhyme or reason to it. Sometimes it will happen multiple times in a day... and then I won't have the issue again for another week. It's very strange. I even tried something that I thought would work after many nights of researching the issue online... which was to get rid of my second monitor hooked up to the computer via HDMI and instead run both monitors via mini-DVI-to-VGA adapters (instead of one via adapter and the other via HDMI). I had heard this could be causing an issue, but the random logouts returned.

And yes, I too have seen the 'windowserver' process show up in Activity Monitor and, if I'm not mistaken, think I've also seen 'windowserver' listed in Console logs in macOS as well. I can't remember the last time I checked though...

To be honest, my late 2013 trashcan Mac has been very finicky since the day I bought it. I had to take it to the genius bar many times and it's essentially a Frankenstein machine now with swapped out graphics cards and logic board, among other things I can't fully remember now. The thing has had all sorts of issues and it used to freeze unexpectedly constantly in the first years I had it. All the experts who looked at it, including my suspicions about what I was seeing in the Console crash logs, seemed to point to something with the graphics cards on this thing being a mess. It still crashes/freezes unexpectedly, but add to that the issue of random logouts which, for all intents and purposes, count as a crash to me.... I lose valuable work and need to restart my machine because even when I log back in, the whole thing is sluggish and unresponsive until I do a full reboot. Definitely a vibe kill in front of clients!

Anyway... sorry I don't have more info to help, but wanted to let you know that I've just had to learn to live with less-than-fun Mac for several years now.

[hell pie]

OliverH, any updates?

I've been experiencing the same issue for most of this year now on a late 2013 trashcan, OS 10.12.6. This is our dedicated video playback machine, with a Blackmagic card for video output.

Some days there are multiple logouts, some days or even weeks none. I haven't seen the issue in a few months and then today I had four logouts in the span of an hour and a half.

[Darryl Ramm]

The computer is just logging you out, and a login prompt appears very quickly after? The computer is not rebooting?

If just a logout... Just to exclude one obvious source of a possible bug... go to Preferences>Security & Privacy>Advanced and make sure auto logout is not enabled.

Are there any error message appearing anywhere?

It is very likely there are clues hidden in the application or systems log. A little hard to know where to even start but look for stuff that. Igor be interesting in Console.app. I’ll update this when at a Mac.

If there is no relatively obvious thing here just try a full clean new macOS install onto a spare drive or partition. And add Pro Tools and ILM from clean new installs and minimal other stuff and check if that works without this problem before adding more software if needed (all new software and driver installs, not using the system migration.

[OliverH]

Hey hell pie - nope. Never found a solution to this. Still happens, like with you, very sporadically and with no rhyme or reason. Sometimes multiple times in a day... sometimes not for weeks. Usually happens in the middle of working though... that's for sure...

Goes straight to login screen and require password to log back in. However, I have to restart bc reopening pro tools or other applications usually yields extremely poor performance until I reboot.

And Darryl Ramm, just for the record, I too have quadruple checked that I don't have auto logout enabled on my system in Preferences>Security & Privacy>Advanced. THere's definitely something strange at play bc of the extremely sluggish performance after this random "logout" occurs. Feels like doing a logout, if that's what was really happening, shouldn't cripple performance of PT and others.

[Darryl Ramm]

Can you have Activity Monitor running while you work and if the system starts to get sluggish try to see what is going on. One suspect, is memory exhaustion/having a memory leak. So maybe have the Activity Monitor memory tool showing on your desktop. Since a memory leak or bug is going to be a suspect then you can try tackle that with usual type approaches. Don't have unnecessary software running. Move all plugins out of the Pro Tools plugin folder and just let it put back the standard ones magically when it starts and see if this happens with those. Disable disk cache (set it to normal or whatever that is called... not a size). If you are using stuff like rewire... don't.

Whatever is going on is very likely spraying evidence across multiple logs. So in Console.app just poke around and look for stuff, if I knew exactly what to look for I would know what the issue is...

Look in the following...

system.log... {find what is logged around the logout time(s). Especially make sure it's not showing a reboot. You can deliberately logout and deliberately rebooting the computer and see what they normally look like in system.log}

~/Library/Logs/Avid/CrashLog... {you can't read the Pro Tools dlog files but is there one from the time when the computer logged you out}

/Library/log/Avid/ ... {crap there from App Manager is normal}

var/log/DiagnosticMessages

[OliverH]

Thanks Darryl, I’ll try to remember to have Activity Monitor running. This is a tricky situation though because usually when the random logout happens, all open applications are closed down and the whole thing happens pretty rapidly and unexpectedly. Will Activity Monitor still give me recent information after it’s been shutdown by the logout?