Macbook Air M1 OSX 11.7.2 keeps freezing and restarting with error message

ganzoltd

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It has been fine until 3 days ago when I left California and flew to Louisiana and restarted on my own private wi-fi system. Now at least once a day, often when awakening and I click on a Mail in the inbox the pointer freezes and then it shuts down and restarts saying that there was an error with the computer. The log is displayed but I can't make heads or tails how to understand what it says. I report it to Apple but I also can't save the log anywhere that I can find.
Could this problem have anything to do with my ISP or Wi-Fi modem? I know that the apple mail program has been problematic for several years for me and I close it, reopen it, no improvements. The other problem program is Contacts. Whenever I try to add a new contact while I'm typing the info it closes the window and goes to another card in my contacts. And if I search for the new name I was entering it isn't there. Could all of this be related?
 
Not sure of your problem, but you say you have OS 11.7.2 with an M1 Macbook Air.
Whatever it came with, update to OS 13.2 (Ventura) which is current right now.
 
The odd thing is that I've been using it as is on Big Sur at home in California on my own Wi-Fi with no problem of the restart / error. Only when I restarted in Louisiana on my other private Wi_fi did it start to give me that problem so I don't know that it's related to the OS. Any other thoughts? I didn't want to change the OS due to applications not working with the newer version.
Now I am back in California and so far it hasn't yet crashed (fingers crossed) which makes it that much odder.
 
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I was hoping it was a weird location problem but it isn't. It crashed again this morning upon opening the screen and clicking on an email. I even did a start from RESTORE yesterday and ran Disk Utility First aid for the whole thing. No luck. Any other ideas? I might just bring it in to repair shop if nothing else that I can do works.
 
While it's not really a startup issue, per se, because it happens after it's already running, sometimes all day, I did try your suggestions. The terminal version didn't work. I kept getting the message: nvram: Error clearing firmware variable fmm-mobileme-token-FMM: (iokit/common) not permitted. I also tried the 4 keys restart but nothing displayed to confirm that it had cleared the PRAM/VRAM. Maybe this is because it's an M1 chip Macbook? I will return here if it continues to plague me. Thanks for the help.
 
Have you tried safe boot?

To perform a Safe Boot on an M1 Mac, follow these steps:

  1. Shut down your Mac.
  2. Hold down the Shift key.
  3. Press the power button to turn on your Mac.
  4. Release the Shift key when you see the Apple logo.
A Safe Boot can help resolve issues with your Mac, such as frozen apps, slow performance, and other problems. During a Safe Boot, your Mac performs certain checks and clears certain caches, which can resolve these issues.
 
I did but with no change. I believe that I have tried everything that I can do. So now I am doing the upgrade to Ventura and hope that solves it. Otherwise I'm taking it in. I looked for new applications that I might have added around the time it started to crash but there were none, only regular updates.
 
It wouldn't do a time machine backup, kept stating that files weren't available and it would continue when the computer was unlocked? it crashed during the update too, so it didn't install at first try, but now it worked. Holding my breath to see if it crashes again today after the new OS installation.
 
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now 24 hours later after upgrading to the most recent OSX Ventura 13.2 there have been NO further crashes (fingers still crossed). I am assuming that something deep in the machine got corrupted and even using disk first aid and any other tool like Onyx nothing was able to even discover a problem, let alone fix it. I am hoping now that the upgrade holds solid and I no longer have freezes and crashes.
Thanks for your concern and help JaapvanderVeen.
 
now 24 hours later after upgrading to the most recent OSX Ventura 13.2 there have been NO further crashes (fingers still crossed). I am assuming that something deep in the machine got corrupted and even using disk first aid and any other tool like Onyx nothing was able to even discover a problem, let alone fix it. I am hoping now that the upgrade holds solid and I no longer have freezes and crashes.
Thanks for your concern and help JaapvanderVeen.
I say bookmark the cool site that was recommended to me and is great for looking up if Silicon ready universal or pure silicon an read called RoaringApps.com! Use it many times when looking at specific big software purchases because many many older Intel developers seemed to have moved on sense the silicon era! so those programs share none of my money now!
Try real hard to stay away of Intel only Mac software!
 
OK, got it now. In the meantime I did the upgrade to Ventura, got through some update issues with that, but now all is fine. I don't download any Intel apps, only ones configured for M1 chip and later.
thanks for your advice.
 
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