Apple Silicon (M2) Crash on Minimizing

Hi,

I’ve tried searching but I’ve found nothing on this topic.

I’m currently using 2022.3.7f1 (I’ve tried plenty of other versions) and when I minimize Unity it locks up MacOS, the window starts the minimizing animation and gets stuck halfway and then the entire OS locks up. I have to wait 30 seconds or so for MacOS to return to the login screen having closed every application.

This is incredibly frustrating. I’ve reinstalled MacOS and the problem is still persistent.

Any support would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Rob.

This isn’t your MacOS. It’s Unity.
There’s a LOT of problems with the Silicon Unity Editors.

Rolling over some drop downs can crash it. Opening the Preferences panel can crash it.

Being in Play mode for more than a minute can crash it.

There’s glitches that are truly incredible during gameplay.

One trick I’ve found that’s somewhat helpful: Download the current alpha (2023.2.xx) and install it fully.

Get rid of The Hub. Completely.

Create a 3D project with a few things in it that you only ever open in the alpha Unity editor.

Save it and close all Unity instances open.

Now alt + Click your 22.LTS working Unity, and open the project you’re wanting to work on.

Before you begin working, alt+ click on the 23.alpha version of Unity and open the little 3D project you’ve created in it.

Switch back to 22.LTS Unity and begin working. Believe it or not, this makes Unity more stable. I presume this is because of some kind of paging and/or caching flushing of the GPU that the two instances of the Editor have that are different, such that there’s more flushing going on.

This is the only way I’ve found of getting a stable 120fps frame rate on an m2 MacBook Pro when in Play Mode, and gets rid of a lot of the weird glitches.

Sometimes having Blender open performs this same facility, but that’s not as reliable as using the Unity alpha editions of the editors. Another app that sometimes provides this benefit it Affinity Designer.

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Same issue with unity 2022.3.5 on M2 pro. The whole mac just freezes.

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Same issue with unity 2022, 2023 all 3 lasts versions

Also experiencing this on every minimize.
Unity 2021.3.21f, Mac OS Ventura 13.6

I have 2 monitors, so I guess it saves me - when I move my cursor to another monitor, sometimes Unity is unstuck, and minimized okay.

Same issue with Unity 2022.3.12f1 on MacBook M2 Pro

same issue Unity 2022.3.14f1 in Macbook M3 pro

Same issue m3 max 2022.3.15f1. There is no issue raised for this on the tracker.

Also freezes with the latest 2023.2.3 - I’ve filed a bug report - though I think it needs to be approved before it appears on the issue tracker.

Stupid fix but I changed my dock settings to stop minimizing applications into their icons and I haven’t had a crash since.

same issue, m3 max, 2021.3.1f1
also fixed by turning off minimize applications into their icons. definitely a pain

edit: try changing from scale effect to the genie effect. seems to have worked for me. ill update again if it stops working

Genius find. Switching to “genie effect” indeed prevents unity from crashing the whole mac. It’s the lesser of two evils.

Sorry everyone, unity tagged it as a “wontfix” (despite actually having a repro).

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I reached out again to unity. Now it’s no longer tagged with “WONT FIX”, though I haven’t heard back from them.

Hi everyone. This minimizing window management issue is something my team normally handles. I’ve reactivated the bug so we can try again to reproduce the scenario that people are facing with the mac freezing.

The bug in reality is something that the engineering teams have not been able to reproduce on any configuration locally. Which is why I’m here.

Given that the repro for the bug is actually pretty benign (opening unity then minimizing the main window), I’d expect this issue to be an absolute drop-everything-and-fix-now type bug. In reality only a few people are hitting this minimize issue, with these people hitting it consistently.

It will help a lot to know for those hitting it if there is anything unique about your system configuration. I’ve tried the following based on what I’ve seen in the bug report and this thread:

  • Change my window minimize effect to scale. People indicated that this reproduces less with genie.
  • Enable “minimize window into application icon”. People indicated that the issue reproduces less when this is off.

But with both of these changes, I can’t get a local repro.

If anyone would be willing to share any other parts of their configuration that may be non-standard, it will help a lot. We need to get a local repro in order to nail down the bug. “Non-standard” things might include…

  • Non-default settings in the OS for window management
  • External monitor usage if on a laptop / multi-monitor configuration
  • Is Stage Manager on or off?
  • Any other “helper” apps that include window management features like Magnets, Bartender or Barbee

Other things that would be helpful:

  • What version of macOS are you using?
  • Are you using the Intel editor? If so, are you on an Apple silicon-based mac?
  • Any particular template you are using?
  • Are you using any special input devices like a tablet or high frequency mouse?

If you are willing to share any of this information, you can reply or PM me if you would rather not share publicly. We want to make our best possible effort to find out what is going wrong.

Thanks,
Kevin

these issues with M powered Macs, and how long it’s taken to even recognise (let alone get around to trying to fix) them as very real, very big problems, and the prior woeful performance of Unity on previous generations of Mac GPUs and the horrific manner in which VisionPro is being “supported” have left most of us with little choice but to find alternatives to Unity.

Deciding to leave Unity was helped greatly by the licensing terms changes significantly more impacting iOS focused devs (Mac users) in more negative ways than others.

These are both cumulative and compounding issues. If you want Mac users to come back, or take Unity seriously again, perhaps figure out how to fix the problems internally.

In reality a whole bunch of people are hitting this, but since Unity on Silicon is a dumpster fire “I’ll just not minimize Unity” is a better solution than trying to get you to fix anything.

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Hello Folks,

I am a product manager on the editor. I am sorry to hear about the frustration you are facing on MacOS. The fastest and best thing we could do is to collect information on how to reproduce the issue, be inform of any special configurations or hardware combination, then look into debugging this issue at hand mentioned in the forum. So far, we did not receive enough information to be able to get to the bottom of this.

If you could answer @KevinWelton and give us as much information as possible, the faster we can be in prioritizing a solution.

That is unfortunate. Getting help from our community as we prioritize what we need to work on would definitely speed things up. Building software is a collaborative experience with our customers and we are committed to that approach.

I hope you see the fixes and progress within the engine that you had in mind materialize soon.

Agreed!

Open Source an option under the new CEO?