Following up on yesterday’s story as to a number of 2013 Mac Pros in Hollywood editing studios crashing due to what appeared to be an issue with Avid, the software maker has confirmed that the issue itself stemmed from a Chrome update.
A number of users in the film industry reported that their Mac Pros were failing to reboot. Rumors about a virus attack circulated. However, Google itself then admitted that a recent Chrome update “may have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines.” Avid said this is what caused the issues, not its own software. Google has subsequently stopped the rollout of the update.
Avid has cited that there were no reports of data loss by its customers at this point in time. It also stated that the company has worked alongside both customers and Apple to resolve the issue.
Per Avid CEO Jeff Rossica:
“Avid is pleased that the reboot issue facing some customers is solved and while Avid products are not the root cause, we’re keeping an intense focus on bringing all of our customers back online and back to work. Over the past 36 hours, the deep dive of due diligence working closely with Apple, PACE and other partners exhausted all options and we’ve landed in the right place as quickly as possible. We owe our special thanks to Avid’s customer and user community for their typically strong show of support at this time, especially to those who welcomed our engineers into their studios.”
If you encountered the Avid/Google bug on your end, please let us know about your experience in the comments.
A number of film and TV editors throughout Los Angeles on Monday evening reported that their 2013 Mac Pro workstations running macOS operating system versions between macOS 10.9 Mavericks to macOS 10.14 Mojave were unable to boot, resulting in speculation as to a possible computer virus attack. Social media reports suggested that the issue was widespread among users of Mac Pro computers running older versions of Apple’s operating system as well as Avid’s Media Composer software.
Avid said in a statement Tuesday morning that it was aware of the issue, and that its engineers had mad a top priority of resolving it. Avid CEO Jeff Rosica and CTO Tim Claman released the following video, stating that the company is “working around the clock, whatever it takes” to solve the issue and that its engineers were on site a a number of locations to solve the problem.
Apple has yet to respond to a request for comment as of late Monday.
Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment late Monday.
“A lot of L.A. post shops and people out on shows having their Macs slowly crash,” tweeted video post-production consultant Matt Penn.
From what I gather there’s a massive failure of Macs with iLok/Avid that’s happening all over right now. A lot of L.A. post shops and people out on shows having their Macs slowly crash and wont boot again. Engineers are looking in to it. Don’t shut your machine off. #postchat
— Matt Penn (@mattpenndotcom) September 24, 2019
Some analysis by affected users seemed to suggest that the outage may not have been caused by a virus, but by a recent software update that may have corrupted some data, with some suggesting a OS X reinstall that keeps the existing data to restart the machine.
On Tuesday afternoon, Avid’s Claman suggested that users running Avid should for the time being not reboot their computers, not install any software updates and back up all sensitive data.
A fair amount of attention has been paid to the Google Chrome Keystone updater, which is found in the following directory: ~/Library/Google/GoogleSoftwareUpdate/GoogleSoftwareUpdate.bundle/Contents/Resources/
The following steps have also been suggested as a means of possibly resolving the issue via the Terminal application:
If you’re a Chromebook user needing a tethered 4G connection, this is going to come in handy.
A new build of Chromium, and evidence in its upcoming source code, hinted at being able to use a 4G data connection via a USB-connected iPhone, thereby saving power versus tethering over Wi-Fi.
While it’s uncertain as to when the change might find its way into Google’s Chrome OS, this could be a relatively easy change to the operating system’s Linux kernel.
Chrome OS already supports USB connections to Android phones. Currently, Chrome OS devices would have to connect to an iPhone by turning the latter into a personal hotspot.
While it’s easy enough to create a Wi-Fi hotspot on an iPhone, a wired connection uses less power, and depending on the connected device, could even recharge the iPhone as part of the process.
Google regularly extend apps, features, and services to Apple platforms, despite nominally competing. These are sometimes modified, and/or temporarily reserved for Android and Chrome.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
It’s been quite a few years since Microsoft has had a native browser running on macOS, but the company announced the release of its Microsoft Edge Preview for Mac users. The company wants the Mac app to match the experience of the Windows 10 version.
Users can snag the Microsoft Edge Preview via its Insider website, complete with some features unique to macOS though, like integration with the MacBook Touch Bar. Microsoft has stated that it is rebuilding the Edge browser using Google’s Chromium technology.
The Microsoft Edge Preview requires macOS 10.12 (Sierra) or later to install and run.
If you’ve tried the Microsoft Edge Preview on your Mac and have any feedback to offer, let us know about your experience in the comments.
