Avid editors who use Media Composer on Mac Pro, have been undergoing a couple of tough days. Their 2013 Mac Pro was crashed when editing on Avid. After some investigation, it appears that this severe bug was caused because of an impaired Chrome update. Read below for more info. 

Mac Pros were crashed when editing on Avid

Avid Media Composer is one of the most common NLE (Non-Linear Editor) among Hollywood’s post-production professionals. Many feature films, including blockbusters, are still being edited on Avid. In the last two days, the Hollywood editing community was enraged. Editors reported on strange phenomena regarding their 2013 Mac Pro crashes when editing on Avid.

Furthermore, it was not possible to reboot the Mac Pro after it crashed. Mac Pro Avid users warned other editors to avoid shutting down their Mac Pro to eliminate the non-reboot possibility. As we can understand, the bug was severe and froze many large scale projects in their post-production phase.

Users were blaming Avid

One of the consequences regarding this severe bug was blaming Avid and Apple. However, Avid has started an immediate initial investigation to get to the roots of this significant issue. As stated by Avid: “Avid is aware of the reboot issue affecting Apple Mac Pro devices running some Avid products. This issue is a top priority for our engineering and support teams, who have been working diligently to determine and resolve the root cause”.

Results of investigation

One day after the investigation has started, Avid released another statement, declaring that the source of the malfunction was via Chrome impaired update: According to Avid: “Avid is confirming that the root cause for a reboot issue encountered by some of our customers has been identified and is unrelated to Avid and its creative tools. Google confirmed that a Chrome update might have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines. Google has paused its release and provided instructions for affected users”. 

As stated by Avid: “Avid is also pleased to share that it has received no reports of data loss by affected customers. From the beginning, when this issue was made known to Avid, our teams actively worked with customers, Apple, and partners to identify solutions and communicate them to customers. At this time, most affected Avid customers have recovered from this issue by reinstalling their macOS. Avid received no reports of incidents from customers running on non-Mac operating systems. To reiterate, this was not an Avid issue, as was reported in some early media coverage”. 

Avid is confirming that the root cause for a reboot issue encountered by some of our customers has been identified and is unrelated to Avid and its creative tools. Google confirmed that a Chrome update might have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines

Avid

Chrome update impacted some macOS systems

As explained above, the source for this strange occurrence has emerged from an unexpected direction. It appears that a Chrome update has shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines. As stated by Google: “We recently discovered that a Chrome update might have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines with System Integrity Protection (SIP) disabled, including machines that do not support SIP.”

It’s important to note that many editors disable System Integrity Protection (SIP) in order to work with external audio and video devices. Nevertheless, Google says that they have paused the release while they finalize a new update that addresses the problem. Furthermore, according to Google, if you have not taken steps to disable System Integrity Protection and your computer is on OS X 10.9 or later, this issue cannot affect you.

We recently discovered that a Chrome update might have shipped with a bug that damages the file system on macOS machines with System Integrity Protection (SIP) disabled

Google

Conclusions and instructions of recovery

A system crash occurs when a software application or an operating system stops functioning due to a critical bug. In the case above, Avid has been caught in the crossfire. Nonetheless, it is crucial to understand that the source of the critical bug can be raised in an unexpected direction. Anyway, in case you have been affected, Google has published specific instructions for recovery lost data. Follow these steps: