Has anyone any experience how long it usually takes for the developer versions to become public mac os updates?

As everything beta is under NDA with Apple, you won't find anything unless you're enrolled in the beta program.

And even if you're enrolled, you might not find it, as these notes tend to be a moving target. They get updated and changed all the time.

Matthias, I am a relatively new user of RME products having recently purchased several Digiface-Dante interfaces. Since we transitioned the studio to Dante a couple of years ago, we have been plagued by glitches, clock problems, and instability using the Audinate pcie Dante cards.  A combination of poor drivers and the disturbing direction the OSX operating system is heading.

What an exceptional piece of kit your Digiface products are, and we no longer use the buggy Audinate pcie cards. I am too busy to spend much time on discussion forum's, but, I registered an account just to post a response to the issues identified on this thread.

I have a 12-core Mac-Pro 5,1 for legacy Pro-Tools TDM sessions that still runs Snow Leopard.  The computer is an old beast running a truck load of Digi/Avid hardware/kexts/software, and here is a screen grab of Activity Monitor:

35 processes and 257 threads, 60 threads of which is the Ilok driver, no apps running, just the desktop.

My newer MacBook Pro with 16gb ram running a fresh install of High-Sierra is 218 Processes and 913 threads, ilok not installed, no apps running, just the desktop. My techs have been griping about this trend for years, now I know why.  From 2011/Snow Leopard to present this is a 600% increase in default running processes on OSX.

Effective Jan-1-2019, my corporate IT dept banned the use of employee Apple (IOS  and OSX) and Android devices on the company network due to security concerns and GDPR compliance (we have European locations). Our corporate version of Windows 10 has all of the spyware and telemetry stripped out.

I was shown a firewall log of outbound IP traffic from High-Sierra....could not believe the insane level of analytics and user telemetry data being sent back to Apple and other US technology companies with little ability to control it.  Orwellian US technology companies like Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple are solely the reason the EU enacted GDPR laws.

I don't think many users appreciate the monumental technical challenges of developing efficient hardware drivers that work reliably at low latency on bloatware filled computers running the latest Apple and Microsoft operating systems.

Imho, RME's FPGA architecture is likely the only viable way to get reliable audio performance form newer computers/OS.

Rant Off

I just tested live playing some layered sounds on Mainstage with macOS 10.14.4, all was going well for 5 mins or so until I got a massive glitch.... oh well.

I have a BabyFace Pro, top spec 2018 MBP with i9, Vega 20 etc and run with length-64 buffer @ 96kHz.

Short.

I monitor CPU load and audio loop durations for each plugin/AU I use very carefully via Mainstage's CPU meter and, yes I admit, do configure my system for minimum latency with enough headroom for the plugins I am using (for best playing experience).

But the glitch I'm talking about here registered I think 3000% or more duration compared to buffer on Mainstage's CPU meter graph and was identical to those I've been seeing since I upgraded to a T2-equipped MBP. In my previous testing the T2-chip-correlated glitching was independent of sample freq and buffer settings.

So my conclusion was the issue is still present but I can test again with different buffer settings and sample freq when I get a chance (I will report back here).

Just for reference, I had a perfect non-glitching system with predictable plugin CPU readings using the later releases of High Sierra before I upgraded laptop to a T2 laptop (around the same time Mainstage 3.4 also degraded my system although I think the Mainstage issues are now resolved/reduced with subsequent updates).

Also, to any Mainstage users out there, I really encourage you to use the CPU meter to get invaluable info on audio system performance including individual plugins and your external interface. You can pick out bad plugins (look for plugin-specific spikes) and OS issues (look for spikes which affect all plugins) very easily. I don't know any other way to get this kind of diagnostic info, it's far easier than trying to correlate overloads with Console logs. (You can also use the CPU meter to benchmark your audio system performance e.g. per plugin to see changes with time and different setups, much more scientific!)

Another thing I encourage is use of Intel Power Gadget to check what's happening with CPU freq and power. I notice Mainstage seems to have some special OS connection to keep CPU freq above 4GHz all the time when Mainstage is open on my i9 MBP which is great for low-latency audio.

Just thought I'd note error (repeated multiple times) I see in Console app corresponding to glitch (in case someone from Core Audio team reads this):

HALS_IOA1Engine.cpp:365:EndWriting:  HALS_IOA1Engine::EndWriting: got an error from the kernel trap, Error: 0xE00002EE

Please Apple, consider creating proper Core Audio performance regression tests and running them on all OS updates! So much frustration of users that has been caused is so avoidable. (And of course more, better diagnostic tools for users/developers would be most welcome.)

Thanks Matthias, I am a registered Apple developer so think I will file a bug report when I get the chance. From what I can see around the web many people's issues were solved with 10.14.4 so posted here as curious to see if other T2 MBP + RME users still having issues. (10.14.4 improved, but not solved, things for me too I believe.)

To everyone reading this and having second thoughts on a new macbook pro (2018 6 core):

I was quite hesitant to take the jump and upgrade simply because of all the above posts in this thread, however I took the leap and have been working on it now for over a week on a number of different programs, under different buffer sizes with different adapters, apple's included - I have had 0 crashes on my RME UCX so far, and relatively stable performance on all daws (Pro Tools, Logic and Ableton).

From what I can see, there is a lot of unnecessary fear-mongering in this thread - don't be completely discouraged, the 6 core machines are a great step up for audio processing.

From my experience, if you are considering the upgrade and you are running a mac pre 2016 - it is 100% worth it, even if you are running a 2017 model I think you'd notice quite an improvement. I felt it's important to add a positive voice here to counteract the general sentiment.

Cheers,
L

Good to hear your machine is working well.  I'd like to add another positive voice, since the 10.14.4 OS X update fixed most of our audio glitches too.  I still get occasional drop outs on YouTube or DVD player when switching tabs/apps but I'm not sure it's the same problem, and the important thing is Reaper is stable.

The quad core 13" MBP is a good balance of portability and power and the reviews for the 15" models and Mac mini are encouraging too.

However, I don't think it's fair to brand the discussion 'scaremongering' -- this thread is an order of magnitude more informative and measured than the equivalent one on Gearslutz, which gets constantly derailed, and sticks to the topic which is/was unusable USB 2.0 audio on T2 Macs for 9 months.

RME Babyface Pro + New Macbook Pro i9

After several months of owning the new Macbook Pro i9, I've had small little dropouts with the RME Babyface Pro plugged in via a USB-C adapter. I tried several adapters, different cables, isolating just the Babyface Pro.
The dropouts would sometimes happen randomly, without even touching anything, and more often would happen if i plugged and unplugged USB-C peripherals, especially the Macbook power supply.

I think I finally solved the issue!

I found a power supply for the Babyface Pro and since giving the interface it's own power, I have had no dropouts whatsoever. It seems it doesn't like to draw power and audio from the new USB-C (Thunderbolt 3) ports on the new MacBook Pros.

Hope this information helps anyone out there having the same annoying issue!
So far so good.

We don't think so. Might be a fix for their internal hardware only...

What's the latest news on T2 Macs and (RME) audio interfaces?

I have been running a UFX II on a 2015 MacBook Pro for a year, BFP for years prior to that - never had an issue.
Now using an iMac Pro and using the UFX II causes the USB system to crash (nothing USB works, requires full restart, no loose cables). UFX II still works fine on MacBook Pro. BFP works fine on both machines.

Got myself into a pickle here with this iMac..

Zero issues on our 2018 MacBook Pro since Apple fixed the USB issue in March 2019. I use both RME interfaces (MADIface Pro, UFX etc) and the ADI-Pro (class compliant) with genuine Apple adapters.

Actually I should say YouTube audio occasionally glitches when switching tabs/windows but I suspect this is a Safari problem. 

The iMac Pro is older than the T2 Macs and I don’t remember it being mentioned on this thread in the past — have you tried one of the Caldigit USB-C hubs?