Screen Freeze -- Image locks up at random?

Support Mac Technical Support
1

I’ve been running into issues where my screen/monitor will freeze unpredictably. Sometimes I can play for 15+ minutes without issues, sometimes <5 minutes. The displayed image will freeze but the game is still running (can hear background and blindly interact). Does not seem to have a specific trigger.

Kind of like a 0 FPS situation (I normally get ~100FPS with my current graphics settings). However, even after force quitting WoW the screen freezes until I fully shutdown (sometimes the login screen pops up as things are turning off for a few frames).

Anyone ever experienced this type of issue?

I’m running an Intel Mac, w/ 5700XT graphics. I’ve tried running on both of my external monitors individually and hit the same issues. Issues may have started with 9.2 – haven’t played much recently but I had no issues at all during the start of 9.1.

2

Glad to know this isn’t just happening with my Studio. Image locks up, game keeps running. I am actually able to fix it by disconnecting my USBC-Displayport cable and then plugging back in. The UI scale is wonky but the display does come back. I’ve tried different TB4 ports, different cables, different ports on my monitor. Nothing has fixed it.

3

I’m having the exact same problem with a new Max Studio. The game video output will lock up but it’s still running in the background. Power cycling the monitor fixes the issue. It’s a very frustrating issue!

Hopefully someone at blizzard can help out.

4

More information (that may be helpful):

Model Name: Mac Studio
Model Identifier: Mac13,2
Chip: Apple M1 Ultra
Total Number of Cores: 20 (16 performance and 4 efficiency)
Memory: 64 GB
System Firmware Version: 7459.101.3
OS Loader Version: 7459.101.3
Serial Number (system):
Hardware UUID:
Provisioning UDID:
Activation Lock Status: Disabled

So far has only happened in WoW, despite pushing the cores doing professional work. Unplugging/plugging the usb-c to DisplayPort cable seems to work.

Chipset Model: Apple M1 Ultra
Type: GPU
Bus: Built-In
Total Number of Cores: 48
Vendor: Apple (0x106b)
Metal Family: Supported, Metal GPUFamily Apple 7
Displays:
LC49G95T:
Resolution: 5120 x 1440
UI Looks like: 5120 x 1440 @ 120.00Hz
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Rotation: Supported

5

As a follow up, I Just got had a full-on system crash while playing WoW. See below for details. I snipped out the register information but I can provide that if it would be helpful.

panic(cpu 0 caller 0xfffffe0023fea8a4): DCPEXT4 PANIC - IOMFB int_handler_gated: failure: axi_rd_err [0x40300634]

  • iomfb_driver(7)
    IOMFB int_handler_gated: failure: axi_rd_err [0x40300634]

RTKit: RTKit-1827.100.26.debug - Client: local-t600xdcp.release
!UUID: 2998c293-b0e0-34e7-ae07-a5d79f620960
Time: 0x00000a62717a58b5

Faulting task 7 Call Stack: 0x000000000001d970 0x000000000001d480 0x000000000001d33c 0x000000000002040c 0x0000000000191c58 0x000000000013c50c 0x000000000019117c 0x00000000000dc99c 0x000000000001de04 0x0000000000011230 000000000000000000

Chinook ASC Async error info:
l2c_err_sts 0x5000fbfc00000000, l2c_err_adr 000000000000000000, l2c_err_inf 000000000000000000
lsu_err_sts 000000000000000000, fed_err_sts 000000000000000000, mmu_err_sts 000000000000000000

Mailbox (0): (0)
Inbox AKF_KIC_INBOX_CTRL = 0x00025501, AKF_KIC_MAILBOX_SET = 0x11111101
Outbox AKF_AP_OUTBOX_CTRL = 0x00023301, AKF_AP_MAILBOX_SET = 0x00000000

Sleep Count: 23
Wake Count: 23
Duty Cycle: 9
Sleep Count: 23
Wake Count: 23
Duty Cycle: 9

RTBuddy(AP): Debug info:
_iopStatus = 0x8
_powerStateChangeLocked = false
Mailbox Status:
IDLE_STATUS: 0x0000002d
INBOX0_CTRL: 0x00025501
OUTBOX0_CTRL: 0x00024401

Debugger message: panic
Memory ID: 0x6
OS release type: User
OS version: 21E258
Kernel version: Darwin Kernel Version 21.4.0: Fri Mar 18 00:46:32 PDT 2022; root:xnu-8020.101.4~15/RELEASE_ARM64_T6000
Fileset Kernelcache UUID: 0631AF68D2B8D6FEA30E36D7895D4DB4
Kernel UUID: C342869F-FFB9-3CCE-A5A3-EA711C1E87F6
iBoot version: iBoot-7459.101.3
secure boot?: YES
Paniclog version: 13
KernelCache slide: 0x0000000019e14000
KernelCache base: 0xfffffe0020e18000
Kernel slide: 0x000000001a5c4000
Kernel text base: 0xfffffe00215c8000
Kernel text exec slide: 0x000000001a6ac000
Kernel text exec base: 0xfffffe00216b0000
mach_absolute_time: 0xa6271869d6b
Epoch Time: sec usec
Boot : 0x626f3b43 0x00074b11
Sleep : 0x00000000 0x00000000
Wake : 0x00000000 0x00000000
Calendar: 0x62767d9f 0x0008c16b

Zone info:
Foreign : 0xfffffe0028ba0000 - 0xfffffe0028bb0000
Native : 0xfffffe10003a8000 - 0xfffffe30003a8000
Readonly: 0xfffffe14cd074000 - 0xfffffe1666a0c000
Metadata: 0xfffffe76d5964000 - 0xfffffe76e18c4000
Bitmaps : 0xfffffe76e18c4000 - 0xfffffe76f92d0000

CORE 0 PVH locks held: None
CORE 1 PVH locks held: None
CORE 2 PVH locks held: None
CORE 3 PVH locks held: None
CORE 4 PVH locks held: None
CORE 5 PVH locks held: None
CORE 6 PVH locks held: None
CORE 7 PVH locks held: None
CORE 8 PVH locks held: None
CORE 9 PVH locks held: None
CORE 10 PVH locks held: None
CORE 11 PVH locks held: None
CORE 12 PVH locks held: None
CORE 13 PVH locks held: None
CORE 14 PVH locks held: None
CORE 15 PVH locks held: None
CORE 16 PVH locks held: None
CORE 17 PVH locks held: None
CORE 18 PVH locks held: None
CORE 19 PVH locks held: None
CORE 0 is the one that panicked. Check the full backtrace for details.
CORE 1: PC=0x00000001c44fc740, LR=0x00000001c44ff2d8, FP=0x00000001702e2690
CORE 2: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe61618c3f00
CORE 3: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe6161153f00
CORE 4: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe615fab3f00
CORE 5: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe61611a3f00
CORE 6: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe6161743f00
CORE 7: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe615161bf00
CORE 8: PC=0xfffffe002173f418, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe6161363f00
CORE 9: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe615fcc3f00
CORE 10: PC=0x00000001dbf06340, LR=0x00000001dbf06248, FP=0x000000016bbf6f10
CORE 11: PC=0xfffffe0021ce7ce8, LR=0xfffffe0021ce7b98, FP=0xfffffe615153bd90
CORE 12: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe615f693f00
CORE 13: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe615f8e3f00
CORE 14: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe616051bf00
CORE 15: PC=0xfffffe0021842e10, LR=0xfffffe0021842e0c, FP=0xfffffe6037b5be90
CORE 16: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe6032b3bf00
CORE 17: PC=0xfffffe002173f418, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe614f233f00
CORE 18: PC=0xfffffe002173f41c, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe614f43bf00
CORE 19: PC=0xfffffe002173f418, LR=0xfffffe002173f418, FP=0xfffffe6032d3bf00
Compressor Info: 0% of compressed pages limit (OK) and 0% of segments limit (OK) with 0 swapfiles and OK swap space
Panicked task 0xfffffe1666b2c678: 0 pages, 862 threads: pid 0: kernel_task
Panicked thread: 0xfffffe1b33fb6a08, backtrace: 0xfffffe6032bc3760, tid: 1558
lr: 0xfffffe0021709560 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc37d0
lr: 0xfffffe0021709228 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3840
lr: 0xfffffe002184decc fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3860
lr: 0xfffffe002184005c fp: 0xfffffe6032bc38d0
lr: 0xfffffe002183da98 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3990
lr: 0xfffffe00216b77f8 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc39a0
lr: 0xfffffe0021708eac fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3d40
lr: 0xfffffe0021708eac fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3db0
lr: 0xfffffe0021f32b34 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3dd0
lr: 0xfffffe0023fea8a4 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3e70
lr: 0xfffffe0023ad1220 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3ea0
lr: 0xfffffe0021e415cc fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3ee0
lr: 0xfffffe0021e42228 fp: 0xfffffe6032bc3f20
lr: 0xfffffe00216c0e78 fp: 0x0000000000000000
Kernel Extensions in backtrace:
com.apple.driver.IOSlaveProcessor(1.0)[8707B1D9-4BF8-3F7B-8D92-7AD6087C5C8B]@0xfffffe0023ad0150->0xfffffe0023ad1aa3
com.apple.driver.RTBuddy(1.0)[01D2582C-18F4-3CBD-8AD3-883FC1E6ECD9]@0xfffffe0023fcad00->0xfffffe00240038a7
dependency: com.apple.driver.AppleA7IOP(1.0.2)[B22DD5A6-6D37-3839-8E91-89999541C2AD]@0xfffffe0022009720->0xfffffe0022018443
dependency: com.apple.driver.AppleARMPlatform(1.0.2)[9FD6A666-15C3-37F0-A577-FC27967A1628]@0xfffffe00220b6750->0xfffffe0022100d97
dependency: com.apple.driver.IOSlaveProcessor(1)[8707B1D9-4BF8-3F7B-8D92-7AD6087C5C8B]@0xfffffe0023ad0150->0xfffffe0023ad1aa3
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOReportFamily(47)[BD0867F7-DE61-3E4D-ABBE-25CBAD925319]@0xfffffe0023a19d30->0xfffffe0023a1cd53
dependency: com.apple.kec.corecrypto(12.0)[10DF8078-222D-3E6D-9690-E225E8445BF6]@0xfffffe00242a6b80->0xfffffe00242f3307

** Stackshot Succeeded ** Bytes Traced 496256 (Uncompressed 1279120) **

6

I am receiving the exact same behavior. New Mac Studio with M1 Max. The screen will lock up, but the game is still running, and I can use my second monitor. Main monitor is connected via HDMI - second is connected via DP>USB-C cable. I am also able to power cycle my monitor and usually resolve the issue, but occasionally have to reboot.

Retail is basically unplayable at this point. I seem to remember retail doing something similar a year or so ago when I had an iMac with a RX 580.

7

TL;DR: This monitor lockup is happening at seemingly random times; sometimes the lockup happens 10 minutes in, sometimes 3 hours. To rule out heat being an issue I moved the monitor to a front TB4 port on my Studio (have an Ultra so front ports are TB4 as well), same results.

We bricked a key last night because of this (I probably shouldn’t have been tanking with my monitor randomly locking up)…super annoying. I haven’t been able to reproduce this error outside of WoW, which just makes it worse.

RE: Last year — THAT issue, from what I remember, locked up my iMac Pro completely and required a hard reboot and only happened to me on the internal panel. Could be related to this problem, hard to tell with nothing useful being written to the system log.

8

M1 Max with 36 GPU cores. Same issue described above with main wow screen freeze. Also was using prior to this a MacPro 6core Xeon dual AMD Firefro D700 GPUs, and in recent weeks the screen would freeze and turn solid red.

9

I’ve opened a ticket with Blizzard…should have done that already but better late than never, I suppose.

Ticket ID: US84099763

10

Blizzard response. Blizz is pawning this off on Apple (even though it only happens in WoW). Punch line is that link is outdated to the point of being hilarious (applies to pre-2013 Apple devices).

"Hello there Michael! This is Tech Specialist Ektiledil and I’ll be the one helping you out today. Thank you for contacting Blizzard Support. I understand your screen is randomly freezing while playing World of Warcraft.

Thank you for including a link to your forum pots. This helped a lot in understanding your issue better. If World of Warcraft game client doesn’t freeze and power cycling the display or disconnecting and plugging back in the cable helps resolve the problem then it is likely a hardware or a driver issue. I’m afraid this is not something our Customer Support can assists with directly. If you haven’t already I suggest trying the following:

• Run the Apple Hardware Test:

• Try connecting your display using HDMI cable instead of USB-C > DP

If issue persists please report it to our Dev team using in-game Bug Report option which is available in Support menu. Also might be worth reporting this issue to Apple.

To report a bug in-game:

  1. Press Esc or click the ? button to open the menu.
  2. Click Support.
  3. Click Submit feedback or bug report.
  4. Enter the details of the bug into the Submit a bug description box, making sure to follow the guidelines outlined on the submission form.
  5. Click Submit.

If there are ever any other questions or concerns that you have for us, please don’t hesitate to let us know! We’re always more than happy to do what we can to help. Have a most excellent day. (*^∇^)ノ

Regards,
Blizzard Entertainment
www.blizzard.com/support"

11

Follow up: Both Apple Diagnostics and a ‘Scan and Repair’ came back with no errors, as did a First Aid scan of the disk. I’ve looped benchmarks (and I push the machine encoding video as part of my job) with no issues. It’s only WoW where I see the issues.

Follow up 2: Found this in my WoW error logs. Going to try a full scrub and re-install of the game, see what happens.

5/12 13:11:14.228 LogOpen
5/12 13:11:14.228 World of Warcraft Retail ARM64 9.2.0.43345
5/12 13:11:14.228 macOS 12.3.1 (21E258) arm64
5/12 13:11:14.228 Mac13,2
5/12 13:11:14.228 Apple M1 Ultra | Sockets:1 Cores:20 Threads:20
5/12 13:11:14.228 64.0 GB System Memory
5/12 13:11:14.228 On AC Power - Battery Not Present
5/12 13:11:14.228 Adapter 0: “Apple M1 Ultra” family:Unknown type:Integrated vendor:0x106b device:0x0000 driver(0x0) location:0
5/12 13:11:14.228 Monitor 0 “(null)” Size(5120x1440) Pos(0, 0)
5/12 13:11:14.284 Choosing low power gpu: “Apple M1 Ultra”
5/12 13:11:15.905 Error Loading Shader: 3186452
5/12 13:11:15.906 NotifyOnDeviceCreate
5/12 13:11:15.907 Metal Device Create Successful
5/12 13:11:15.907 Using shader family mtl_1_1
5/12 13:11:15.907 No
5/12 13:11:15.907 Detected Graphics Defaults: 7 (CPU = 7, GPU = 7, MEM = 7) WindowSize: 5120x1440
5/12 13:11:16.012 Render Settings Changed. New Render Size: 5120x1440
5/12 13:11:16.414 Render Settings Changed
5/12 13:11:52.947 Render Settings Changed
5/12 13:16:17.366 Render Settings Changed. New Render Size: 1920x1080
5/12 13:16:24.003 Render Settings Changed. New Render Size: 5120x1440
5/12 14:02:32.604 Metal Device Destroy
5/12 14:02:32.604 NotifyOnDeviceDestroy
5/12 14:02:32.785 GxShutdown

12

Interesting. That freeze issue (sometimes solid red as well) also occurs on my 2017 intel iMac 5k (Radeon Pro 580), albeit very rarely. I always thought it was an AMD related issue but I’m quite surprised it happens on M1 Macs as well.

It usually only happens when I phase in a different area (ZM sand area, Banewood forest in Revendreth, or flying through the portals in Theatre of Pain dungeon). Especially quick movements (notably the ones where you fall down or fly towards the ground), it feels like some video buffer is overloading or can’t cope.

When the freeze happens background tasks run just fine (playing music, receiving mail etc) but it’s like the window manager completely locks up. You can’t tab out. I just wait a few minutes until the lockup and spinning beachballs end, and relaunching WoW usually fixes the issue w/o having to reboot.

To those using M1 Macs: does this also happen on the new Studio Display or only on 3rd party monitors connected via a Thunderbolt/USB-C->Displayport adapter?

Does the freeze occur in specific areas only or is it totally random?

13

I don’t have a Studio Display, unfortunately, so I can’t answer that question.

I do have an M1 Ultra Mac Studio connected to an Odyssey G9 via TB4-to-DisplayPort that is having the issue. My lockups have been random: Sometimes it’ll happen five minutes into playing, sometimes I can go three hours without an issue. Happens in outdoor content, raids, dungeons, all over the place.

14

A work-a-round when using 3rd party 4k display and M1 Max where I had used a thunderbolt (USB-C) to displayport cable is the use HDMI to the primary wow display. I had noticed that turning off the 4k display when the images froze resulted in wow moving to the 2nd display which was HDMI connected and lower res (1920x1280 I think) but continued to play the game fine, this prompted me to try the 4k display via HDMI - an 8k 60Hz cable also spec’d at 144Hz for 4k. I have noticed the frame rate to noticeably less than before but so far no screen freeze issues.

As to where it happens - the Antos world boss seems to be a favourite for both the Mac Pro red screen lockup and the Studio screen freeze. But the Mac Studio screen freeze also started occurring in dungeons and Sepulcher raid. I now have a usb-c to HDMI adpater so I can connect my second display up again. Will advise if further issues until a permanent fix is found for the thunderbolt connection to the wow primary display.

15

Unfortunately the work-a-round no longer seems to work, after I did the firmware update today. Possibly just co-incidence, but a frustrating raid session with freezes every few minutes, despite goiung back to a single monitor etc.

2 Likes
16

After today update to Monterey 12.4 the issue is happening on every few min.
I try with second display and it is really odd, the game freeze and non responsive but on my primary display i can see that app is running in Activity monitor, and everything looks fine, however when i open Console app and start the live streaming i can see multiple warning messages from WOW and also in the moment of the freeze the App become non active for this monitor.
The more odd thing is that this monitor is no longer working if i try to move window there it is moving but its hidden under the WOW and not visible, it appears like Graphical interface is complete broken and it occupy the monitor and cannot control it. If i disconnect the HDMI the wow is showed on my primary monitor and it is working - no errors in the WOW/Error folder, no crashes.
it appears apple change something today with the new release and WOW app cannot handle something in the WindowServer.
in the past with previous versions i also had issues but very rarely once per few days.
This is the errors in the moment of the Freeze
Acquiring assertion targeting [app<application.com.blizzard.worldofwarcraft.1104113.8027845.D46E3F9B-07B1-4870-8632-2CAE195CF24F(501)>:3053] from originator [daemon<com.apple.WindowServer(88)>:163] with description <RBSAssertionDescriptor| “FUSBFrontmostProcess” ID:205-163-5515 target:3053 attributes:[
<RBSDomainAttribute| domain:“com.apple.fuseboard” name:“Frontmost” sourceEnvironment:"(null)">,
<RBSAcquisitionCompletionAttribute| policy:AfterApplication>
]>
World of Warcraft [3053]: slow hid response: not sampling due to conditions 0x480208002

17

Here is some videos i created, for this really odd behavior

https://youtu.be/gnhliC1FRNE Game is crashed - i killed it completely from the system but it is visible on the display and it will stay there until i don’t disconnect the display , clear proof that something is wrong with app and MACos cannot understand it is shown at all
https://youtu.be/WDZkJbTuwSI - Game is crashed - i remove the HDMI for secondary display and game switch to primary display and you can see game is running, so it the whole time the game was running however it was not shown on the display as running - some kind of bug of utilizating the WindowsServer.

This is the errors from the Console APP on streaming mode, in the moment of WOW freeze - SPINDUMP cannot create error log for some reason :
SPINDUMP: World of Warcraft [21268]: slow hid response: not sampling due to conditions 0x480208002

18

Ouch, that looks like a serious error related to MacOS, Metal, or the WindowServer… Thanks for sharing the videos.

Now this is pure hypothetical but what happens if you disconnect the 2nd screen entirely and reboot and you only use one screen? Does it still freeze? It almost seems as if the WindowServer can’t cope with multiple displays somehow and gets clogged quickly when you are gaming.

I’ve ordered a very similar setup. A Mac Studio Max 32-core with both a Studio Display (main screen) and an LG UltraGear 27GP850-B (for WoW). Wonder if I’m getting the same issues… Still have to wait 2 months for delivery here in EU, urgh, but will report my findings as soon as it arrives.

(btw I guess the previous ‘red screen’ freeze is a separate issue, more related to Intel/Radeon Macs).

19

Same happen with one display , I try with 1 Studio display or 1 Dell Display , same thing happen - display totally freeze game become like picture , nothing generated in error logs or spin log . You need to disconnect the monitor cable and plug it again and all is working , and game is never crashed it’s working just not displayed on, and that happen after yesterday Monterey update.
This is happen only with wow, I try some heavy video editing software where my cpu and gpu goes to 65C and no issues at all , with wow temp never goes above 58C and CPU is on 20%.
By the way I am also in EU playing in Twisting Nether but keeping my US account as there is no EU forum for Mac :frowning: :expressionless: .

20

A solution is found in Apple community forum and it is really simple - Turn the Vsync ON!
It appears after call with Apple support that some applications who doesn’t correctly utilise Metal protocol have such issues, and it reality what happen is that Monitor get out of sync with GPU.