Sudden Motion Sensor Issues

To start this off, recently, when I slightly move or touch my MacBook Pro Late 2011 15 inch, it shuts down. It has only been like this for about a week. I disabled the SMS through the terminal using "sudo pmset -a sms 0". This seemed to fix the issue, but I no longer have a sudden motion sensor. Now, when I push down on a certain area on the bottom left of the computer, it shuts down. Is this something I should worry about? What should I do about the SMS? Should I take my mac to the Apple Store? Thanks for the help!

andrew845
Now, when I push down on a certain area on the bottom left of the computer, it shuts down.
top down, the bottom left of the computer is the battery, not the HD. Indications are a fault of the battery to logic connector in such a case.
The SMS sensor is no worry, on or off.

Similar Messages

10.6.8 update and sudden motion sensor

I have MBP 8,1, 2011 base model i5. Since i updated to 10.6.8 it seems like sudden motion sensor got a lot more sensitive. Never seen it work before, now if i lift the mbp from desk even i can hear the hdd clicking home. I have disabled the sensor and it stops even i move the computer around very fast. So it is not just the drive doing, sensor is triggering that.
I was wondering if anyone knows if sensivity of this sensor changed on last mac os update? or if anyone else noticed it too?
Thx
Ozzy

Hi Ozzy,
I have not noticed any difference on my MBP.
You can try an SMC Reset, which can resolve SMS issues: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964

Where is Sudden Motion Sensor data stored?

Background:
I replaced my superdrive with an optibay + ssd (OS is stored here) and I left the stock HD (home folder) in it's place.
Problem:
I guess I triggered the SMS the other day and now I can't access my HD (basically just hangs / takes forever to load anything) unless I disable SMS. Where would I clear the data / tell it that my HD is safe to use again. Restarted pram and reinstalled OS, but it didn't help.

Thanks for the responses. Yes, as JoeyR stated, I replaced my superdrive with an SSD and the hard drive is in it's original place so I wanted to re-enable the sudden motion sensor. Thank you for clarifying how the SMS works. I wasn't sure if there was a state that was saved somewhere.
Well the original issue was that my OS would boot (SSD), but I couldn't get into my login (HD). I have a temporary user on the SSD so I was able to use that to troubleshoot. I swapped my HD with another one and it worked (STOCK HD). Then I tried putting the HD into an external closure and that worked as well. I had a feeling it was the connector, but I did not have spare parts to test this theory. I would swap the HDs back and forth and sometimes it would work and sometimes it wouldn't. It was a hit or miss situation. It worked when I disabled the SMS, but when I enabled / disabled it again it didn't work. Ran diagnostics on the HDs, both drives seem fine and in perfect condition. Tried to format the hard drivers and do various combinations of swapping drives and in the end the problem still persisted so it had to be a connector issue. I brought it into repair and they replaced the SATA cable for me and all is good now.
Thanks for the help.

Can't enable "Sudden Motion Sensor" in 13" MBP

My brand new MacBook Pro's "Sudden Motion Sensor" won't seem to enable. I've done the Terminal commands listed on Apple's support page and I get a "1" instead of a "0" next to the results, implying that the system thinks it's turned on, yet under "System Profiler" it says "Disabled." Obviously, either Terminal or System Profiler is wrong, but I can't figure out which one.
I'm not sure if this would influence it but, I do have a WD500GB Scorpio Blue drive inside and was/am suffering from the "Beach ball of death" issues associated with the 3rd party HDD's, so I downgraded from the 1.7 EFI Firmware to the 1.6 EFI. Anyone experienced this issue or have any recommendations?

Hi, got the same problem on a 15" MBP running 10.6.1. Apple support referred me to these discussions for a solution.

2011 MBP - HD in Optibay - Sudden Motion Sensor?

2011 15" MacBook Pro with BTO Apple SSD.
Optibay with WD 750GB Scorpio Black.
What is the correct setting regarding the Sudden Motion Sensor?
There is conflicting information that this drive does or does not have a SMS - according to WD's website it does have "ShockGuard"
There are several that have had trouble with motion sensor in a hard drive, in the optibay and in the Mac software. Some have not... and it seems to depend on drive.
What is the correct setting - should one turn OFF Sudden Motion Sensor in the operating system? or leave it on?
and either way, does SMS or "Shockguard" work properly when in an optibay?

Jim,
I have a similar setup to yours. SSD in main MBP drive bay, and WD 750GB Scorpio Black in the optibay.
Ok, so we know that:
SMS doesn't work in the optibay.
Having the boot drive in the optibay causes hibernation issues, which could be "solved" by disabling hibernation and its creation of the /var/vm/sleepimage file.
WD has something called ShockGuard on their Scorpio Black drives:
"WD's ShockGuard technology protects the drive mechanics and platter surfaces from shocks during shipping and handling and in daily operation. WD’s SecurePark parks the recording heads off the disk surface during spin up, spin down, and when the drive is off. This ensures the recording head never touches the disk surface, resulting in improved long-term reliability due to less head wear and improved non-operational shock tolerance." [http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/SpecSheet/ENG/2879-701275.pdf]
I'm wondering if, after a few months with your setup, you still consider the WD ShockGuard to be a sufficient reason for leaving the WD Scorpio Black in the optibay.
My initial instinct is that ShockGuard may not be as effective as SMS. I wonder, in part because whenever the Scorpio Black is accessed (via spotlight usage or what have you), it stays spinning for quite a while before eventually spinning down. Do you experience this? Do you have any more advice from your experience?
Thanks.

Logic 9 sudden motion sensor error.

Hi Guys,
my rig often gives me the "system overload, sudden motion sensor" error during playback, its driving me nuts, the thing that really gets me is that its a mac pro, booting off an SDD, audio is running off a fast drive and the whole lot is in a shockmounted flightcase, i have no idea how the sudden motion sensor could be doing anything at all.
does it have something to do with the 2.5" SSD the rig boots off?

Hi - I am experiencing this error as well. I believe the issue is due to Logic Pro not quite ready for Lion. I just bought a new iMac 2.5 GHz 4GB RAM. Got it to run Logic, and found 9.1.1 doesn't even run on Lion. After upgrading to 9.1.5 the first thing I tried to do was open the demo projects from The Killers and Lilly Allen, to see what this software is all about. Logic hangs somewhere while loading all of the tracks/software instruments, and needs to be Force Quit. The Santigold project loads but it gives me this error about a minute into playing it:
Disk is too slow or system overload
(-10010)
The sudden motion sensor may have parked the hard drive head, or the disk performance is not sufficient to read or write all audio tracks, or the system was not able to process all data in time.
I do not yet have an external drive and am not sure if running project files off a fast external (as opposed to the system drive running Logic) would resolve the issue. But I notice the error is broad and basically multi-purpose, not necessarily stating that your hard drive has parked for sure, rather that disc/system performance couldn't keep up. I haven't duplicated the error when playing my own projects, with less tracks/software instruments. I think that there may be a threshold where you can just push logic too far for Lion interoperability on this 9.1.5 release. Hoping for a new release soon! Good Luck!

Driving and watching a DVD - sudden motion sensor

Just out of curiousity, I was on a road trip and brought the MBP with and watched a DVD. The ride was somewhat bumpy. My question is do you think the hard drive is being used slightly during the playback of the DVD? AND does this pose any issue or possible damage from the "Sudden Motion Sensor" working indefinitely?
What do you guys think

I would doubt it. The sudden motion sensor is only going to engage if there is a major change in G-forces on that machine -- i.e. it flies out of a seat. The normal vibrations associated with driving shouldn't activate the sensor and your machine ought to handle them... Of course, there is the issue of whether or not you ought to be watching movies whilst driving, but that's another matter altogether...

Disabling sudden motion sensor - harmful?

I've been having an issue where my unplugged macbook would randomly shut down when moved (even slightly), but the battery was in good health. Tried the usual resets, SMC, PRAM, etc and had no problems with temperature/overheating.
The only thing that 'fixed' the issue was disabling the sudden motion sensor. Is it possible that the sudden motion sensor was hyper sensitive or something? Is it dangerous to keep it off? And is it worth getting fixed ( I'm a student out of warranty)?
Thank you.

nope... only stops working if moved from the bottom right hand corner when unplugged.

Sudden Motion Sensor DISABLED?!!?

I am not sure what has caused this, but recently my sudden motion sensor in my 1 month old Macbook Pro has stopped functioning. I first noticed it being disabled under the system profiler. I looked how to re-enable it through console, but that did not work.
Anyone else having problems? I fear it may be related to high temperatures (80 deg Celsius playing Halo...
I will be calling apple tuesday about this, but worry that it may be a hardware repair issue.
Responses appreciated

No on the dropping. Definately would have mentioned that if I had...
Totally came out of the blue. Called the phone line and they referre me to my local service retailer...
They're looking at it and doing some tests I assume... I'll hear back when I hear back...
VERY dissapointed in this.

Replacement HD and Sudden Motion Sensor

Is there a compatibility issue when choosing a replacement hard drive if the Powerbook as the Sudden Motion Sensor?

No, the sensor is not integrated into the hard drive.
Joe

Sudden Motion Sensor panics

I have been having intermittent kernel panics and finally took the MacBook into the Apple Store.
The Genius took a look at the panic.log and informed me that my Western Digital drive and/or my Sudden Motion Sensor were the cause.
Here is the panic log for one of my crashes:
Wed Oct 4 16:58:42 2006
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x00878D87): ERROR: no valid tag was found!
Backtrace, Format - Frame : Return Address (4 potential args on stack)
0x25083cb8 : 0x128d1f (0x3c9540 0x25083cdc 0x131df4 0x0)
0x25083cf8 : 0x878d87 (0x881d40 0x1 0x25083d38 0x399b050)
0x25083d18 : 0x879813 (0x399b000 0x39af000 0x25083d78 0x1a157e)
0x25083d78 : 0x879eca (0x399b000 0x8e35dbb6 0x25083dc8 0x13d4c8)
0x25083dd8 : 0x87de20 (0x399b000 0x39af000 0x1 0x87de5e)
0x25083e48 : 0x910924 (0x399b100 0x3c86180 0x0 0x0)
0x25083e88 : 0x89df22 (0x3a70e00 0x3c89be0 0x25083ed8 0x0)
0x25083f08 : 0x398a1f (0x3c04900 0x3c68500 0x1 0x3828b70)
0x25083f58 : 0x397bf1 (0x3c68500 0x135ec3 0x0 0x3828b70)
0x25083f88 : 0x397927 (0x38307c0 0x25083fd4 0x134d5e 0x135ec3)
0x25083fc8 : 0x19a74c (0x38307c0 0x0 0x19d0b5 0x38247a0) Backtrace terminated-invalid frame pointer 0x0
Kernel loadable modules in backtrace (with dependencies):
com.apple.driver.SMCMotionSensor(2.0.1d1)@0x90f000
dependency: com.apple.driver.AppleSMC(1.0.2d3)@0x89a000
com.apple.driver.AppleSMC(1.0.2d3)@0x89a000
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOACPIFamily(1.2.0)@0x61c000
com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIBlockStorage(1.0.3)@0x877000
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOStorageFamily(1.5.1)@0x5ea000
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIFamily(1.0.2)@0x7c8000
Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 8.8.1: Mon Sep 25 19:42:00 PDT 2006; root:xnu-792.13.8.obj~1/RELEASE_I386
Other World Computing has sold a ton of these drives and has never run into this. The Apple Store kindly swapped in another drive and, after getting the MacBook good and hot (something that seems to trigger the panics), we whacked it around and were unable to replicate it.
They determined that it is the drive.
Does this make sense? Has anyone heard of such a problem? The drive shows no other symptoms.

Got this from Macintouch.com that says that, yes, indeed the Western Digital drives have built in shock protection that is interfering with the Sudden Motion Sensor:
Upgrading
Cyrus Bhedwar
"We swapped in a spare Seagate they had at the Apple Store and tried that. No KPs, but this isn't a definitive test as it doesn't always KP on rapid movement. Called OWC, and they had no reports of such an issue so sent me an RMA. Today I installed the new drive. The MacBook KPs when a decent motion is applied."
I recently read somewhere (sorry, no reference) that the WD has its own motion protection that interferes with the MB SMS. I have the Seagate Momentus 120 GB (1 week) and have not had any probs.
Jim Cowing
Regarding James Ehrler's post on Kernel Panics and Western Digital 120 drives in a macbook - I can confirm. We have a 2.0GHz macbook with a WD120 that KP's on sudden (fairly harsh) motion. Didn't even notice this until I read the post and tried it.
MacInTouch Reader
You're not the only one who's encountered this:
MacBook/Pro Owners Beware
A light bulb then went off? we started to associate the panics with movement. Then it hit us like 3 tons of bowling balls, the Scorpio has built-in shock protection. The ShockGuard technology that WD employs is interfering with the Macs own head parking technology. We placed another call into Other World and returned the second Scorpio in exchange for the slightly more expensive Seagate Momentus (which does not have built-in shock protection). After installing the Momentus and cloning over the now tired image, we haven?t had a single kernal panic.
All that said, if you have a MacBook or MacBook Pro, DO NOT upgrade to the WD Scorpio line of hard drives. They are definitely fine drives, just not fine for MacBook/Pro owners.
Here is the link to the Macspecialist post on this issue:
http://www.macspecialist.org/content/articles/macbookpro_ownersbeware/

Sudden motion sensor - hardware malfunction - beach ball lag related

Hello,
I have a macbook pro 13" bought in July 2009 with the 160Gb Hitachi 5400 rpm hardrive and 2Gb Ram. I also have the beach ball lag problem and have been reading many posts about it on this and other forums. However, I noticed today that in my System Profiler - Hardware overview, my sudden motion sensor (sms) is indicated as State: Disabled. I look at the state of the sms through the terminal window (sudo pmset -g) and is says sms 1!!! Something is wrong there! Then I executed "sudo dmesg | grep -i error | grep -i sms" to check whether there are any errors about SMS. and I get the following line:
SMS::checkForInvalidInts ERROR: we appear to have a hardware malfunction
SMS::setupInts ERROR bad hardware detected, disabling the interrupts
Then I looked in the Console at the System.log and realized that everytime the beachball lag was occurring, I was getting the same message in the system log:
Aug 23 17:07:28 localhost kernel[0]: SMS::checkForInvalidInts ERROR: we appear to have a hardware malfunction
Aug 23 17:07:28 localhost kernel[0]: SMS::setupInts ERROR bad hardware detected, disabling the interrupts
Although there are many posts on the beach ball lag and on the firmware updates, I don't seem to be able to find any information about this error what it means and how it might be fixed.
I also tried to test the SMS. When I enable SMS through the terminal command, I hear a click if I move my computer up and down through the air. When I disable SMS through the terminal command, I don't hear the click. So I'm very confused!
Has anybody got a similar issue with their sms and have they been able to resolve it?
Thank you very much.
Noemi

Hey, have you called Apple? I have the exactly same problem as you. Hope apple will give us a update for fixing this problem.

Sudden Motion Sensor and WD Scorpio drives

I'm researching the 13-inch MacBook pro. I stumbled on this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=683913 which says that the Sudden Motion Sensor in Apple portables have issues with kernel panics when you use Western Digital's Scorpio line of hard drives. I was wondering:
- Is there a way you can disable SMS in System Preferences?
- If I get WD's Scorpio drive without their implementation of SMS ("free-fall sensor"), will Apple's SMS take over without KPs? Or do I have to use a stock drive?
Thanks!

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1934
Also, the application Cocktail can disable SMS by disabling it and without venturing into the Terminal.
Bryan

Sudden motion sensor dissapears

Hi,
I have an issue with the sudden motion sensor on my computer.With the latest mac os x 10.4.10 the sensor always appears in the system profiler on warn starts (ie, when I reboot) but never on cold starts when I turn on the computer). I've tried with the original mac os disk that came with the PB with version 10.4.0 and the sensor always appears. I've tried with a retail mac os 10.4.6 mac os x installation disk and the sensor only appears with warm starts. I've updates 10.4.0 to 10.4.10 and I have the same problem, this upgrade done from system update and with the combo updater.
the only consequence is that widgets like Level don't work. Starting the computer takes like 1 second more and in the system.log log I get the error:
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: IOI2CController::clientReadI2C cmd key:1017, B:1, A:b0 S:25, L:1, M:3 status:0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: -IOI2CController::clientReadI2C status = 0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::readBytes ERROR: failed to read from I2C
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::shockIntHandler ERROR: failed to read the byte
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: IOI2CController::clientWriteI2C cmd key:1019, B:1, A:b0 S:25, L:1, M:2 status:0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: -IOI2CController::clientWriteI2C status = 0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::writeBytes ERROR: failed to write to I2C
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::clearInterrupt ERROR: failed to write the bytes, retval = 0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::shockIntHandler ERROR: failed to clear the interrupt, retval = 0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: IOI2CController::clientReadI2C cmd key:101b, B:1, A:b0 S:0, L:1, M:3 status:0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: -IOI2CController::clientReadI2C status = 0xe00002ed
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::readBytes ERROR: failed to read from I2C
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::checkResult ERROR: failed to read the bytes
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::writeCommand ERROR: failed to check the result code
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::startApp ERROR: failed to send kStartAppComm
Oct 8 00:29:31 localhost kernel[0]: AMS::start ERROR: startApp failed
Apple has this kb article http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300781 but doesn't help much and this forum has reports from other people but with older versions of tiger and that got fix with version 10.4.3.
I've aldo used the AMSTracker program to report data from the sensor without problems (would that indicate the sensor works ok?)
Can anybody help me solve this error?
TIA
Message was edited by: PerseP
Message was edited by: PerseP

Update:
mac os x 10.4.0 to 10.4.7 to 10.4.8 to 10.4.9 to 10.4.10 works always.
mac os x 10.4.0 to 10.4.10 via combo update works only with hot starts.
In the post http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=228309 they've found that in versions 10.4.0, 10.4.1 and 10.4.2 of mac os x the the motion sensors appears properly in the system profile but with update 10.4.3 Apple seems to break this until they've released version 10.4.7 which fixes it again.

Sudden Motion Sensor crash in MBP with SSD

Hi. I replaced my 2011 17" MBP's internal HD with one, then another SSD from OWC, going from 240 to 480.
As indicated in OWC's instructions, the Sudden Motion Sensor no longer applies and should be disabled with this command from the terminal:
$ sudo pmset -a sms 0
And using this command, we can see that the SMS is off:
$ sudo pmset -g
Active Profiles:
Battery Power                    -1
AC Power                    -1*
Currently in use:
womp                    1
halfdim          1
sms                    0
What happens all too often though is that my Mac issues an SMS crash while asleep if I am driving home and hit a bump in my car. Just Monday, I was driving with my Mac open and on, the car hit a bump and I got to watch the Gray Screen of Death as the Mac issued a kernel panic from the Sudden Motion Sensor.
But it's off.
FYI, I turned it off to try and stop this behaviour

Download an run memtest to check your RAM.
http://osxdaily.com/2011/05/03/memtest-mac-ram-test/
www.memtestosx.org/downloads/memtest422/Users_Guide.rtf
Don Montalvo was preventing the crashes by turning off SMS. However, replacing bad RAM was the ultimate solution.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3013824?start=0&tstart=0
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3013824?start=45&tstart=0

Sudden Motion Sensor Issues

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