Ventura Hack for FireWire Core Audio Support on Supported MacBook Pro and others...

Have been playing around with getting this to work this afternoon. I'm on a Mac Mini M2 PRO + Ventura 13.2. I wasn't able to make the installer work, unfortunately. So I used 'Suspicious Package' to extract the AppleFWAudio.kext file from the installer. I've dabbled for years in the Tonymacx86.com world, so I am somewhat used to doing this sort of thing.

1. I first went into Recovery mode & set the Startup Security Utility > Security Policy... Allow user management of kernel extensions... as recommended.
2. Next, did a manual install to /Library/Extensions.
3. Finished up by using one of my old CustomMac tools, Kext Wizard to execute a "Repair Permissions" (disk permissions on the disk), followed by "Rebuild Cache" to rebuild system kext caches.
4. Rebooted.

Behold the System Report shows my Onyx-1220i audio mixer with integrated FW audio interface:

...but nothing shows up in the Sound System Settings option. I have another audio interface now that is my primary interface, but I could sure use the extra input channels with doing a bigger session & need more than 8 channels of input (other interface has 8 mic pre's).

If anyone is following along who has gotten this to work on the M2, I'd love to hear from you! Thanks in advance!

I have managed to get this working on an M2 2023 MacBookPro. I'm using an Apogee Ensemble Firewire and it is now detected and works, mostly. I had to use kmutil myself to get the kernel extension to load. The script in the package didn't work so I just grabbed the files from it using Suspicious Package, disabled SIP, modified my Startup Security Utility settings and then ran kmutil in the terminal.

However, I have been having problems with my system crashing at random intervals when using the ensemble. I'm going to keep tinkering and see if I can figure out a work around. Any assistance folks can provide would be greatly appreciated. I noticed a similar situation for folks here: eyetvforum.com/index.php?/topic/305278-incompatibility-with-macos-13-ventura-beta/ My console reports: Library not loaded: /System/Library/Frameworks/FWAUserLib.framework/Versions/A/FWAUserLib

Thanks Apple 🤬😡🤯 You now disabled this ability in Ventura 13.4 🤬😡🤯 I have no words.... Now I'm getting error message that this Kext cannot be loaded. Once I'm clicking on "Allow" button, I'm getting to the loop where I need restart computer.

WHAT"S WRONG WITH YOU APPLE??

It seems to be a bug in Ventura 13.4. Even Apple's kext is not loading even if I click Allow.

I removed the following kext from "/Library/Apple/System/Library/Extensions" and this message is gone.

AppleKextExcludeList.kext AppleMobileDevice.kext RemoteVirtualInterface.kext

Looks like they are from/and for Xcode (not sure). But this is system kext's and they worked before fine. It is obvious that this is a HUGE bug ((

Can confirm that matt's fix still works on the most current version of Ventura as of 5/30 on a M2 MacBook Air. Lifesaver! Thanks a lot!

@DBProductions I am at a similar stage with my UAD Satellite Thunderbolt. I can find it in the computers Hardware Menu but the software isn't seeing it.

Do either you or @matt9 any ideas on what to do?

Thanks.

Hey! Need help from you guys. I´m got a Mac Mini M2 Pro, with ventura installed, i have a Mackie Onyx 1640i, Firewire audio interface. With the help of this post, i was able to make Ventura recognise the audio interface in the System Report, on the firewire devices, but it doesn´t appear on Audio Midi Setup, System Sound or in Ableton Live. I followed all steps from this post, minus the "kmutil" command, it always give me an error. Anyone can help me please? I need this audio interface to work...thanks in advance

Thank you, @matt9! Adding the extension worked on my MacBook Pro 13-inch, M2, 2022 running Ventura 13.4.1 (c) with an original Presonus Firepod and GarageBand.

The install claimed it failed, and the System crashed a few times at first, but eventually restarting with the interface plugged made it stable.

Has anyone tried this on Catalina? I have some audio devices that I'd really like to "recover".

Any hacks for Catalina? I'm in the same boat with my audio gear :(

Catalina is not really a problem, is it? I mean, I can use my old Alesis io26 on Catalina just fine. It's just the Alesis HDM app that won't work because it's 32-bit so the io26 channel routing can only be changed when booting from an earlier OS partition, in my case El Capitan.

I couldn't make the io26 run on Ventura though.

Hey all, Matt's fix has worked to get my Onyx 1640i working with my new M2 Air (Ventura); however, anytime I power on the mixer the laptop screen goes purple and it crashes and restarts within a minute. Usually after the restart it will proceed without error. It also would crash if I booted up the laptop with the mixer already connected and powered. Anybody experience this and have a fix?

Hi, @matt9 the AppleFWAudioVentura.pkg, for some reason (perhaps due to permissions), doesn't fully work on macOS Sonoma 14.2.

However, it successfully copied /Library/Extensions/AppleFWAudio.kext into the system.

To fully install the AppleFWAudio.kext extension you must:

1. Fix file permissions: sudo chown -R 0:0 /Library/Extensions/AppleFWAudio.kext/
2. Manually load AppleFWAudio.kext: sudo kmutil load -p /Library/Extensions/AppleFWAudio.kext
3. Reboot

Finally, Sonoma 14.2 fully supports my Edirol FA-66 on my DAW.

Thank you again for your support.

Re-enabling SIP after install breaks this? Do I have that right?

Not a very smart move from Apple to remove Firewire support. Even removing support for 32 bit audio was foolish. And now even TB2 as I´ve read somewhere... Since one must assume all these decisions are made thinking in what way to sell more Mac computers, the result is when - like me anyway - one has invested in hardware (Ive got 3 TC Konnekt48 units connected to a Mac Pro 5.1. I was planning on being a new M3 Mac, either Studio Mac or MacBook Pro. But with no support (even for thunderbolt 2) I hesitate and am actually thinking of going back to PC. I can get my Audio Units working on a PC. Partly because of TC but anyway.

The funny thing is I get the units working and even without the "hack" in this thread Open Core patcher gets it working in Sonoma, but ONLY the inputs. Audio out I have to use internal digital out connecting an optical cable from the Mac to one of the Konnekt48:s. This actually works just fine. Until I want more than stereo out off coarse, or if I want to use my outboard gear as inserts.

I was hoping this hack would give me the outputs back, but not yet anyway. They did. work in Catalina and that´s the reason I haven't given up yet. I have seen some other people having this audio out problems with other FW interfaces so I´m not alone there.

But to buy a M3 I seem to need a TB3 interface and that would mean at least two Apollo 8p´s. That's the price of two Macs more, and I´m note even sure yet they are TB3. Are they? And when will Apple abandon TB3? If I wait for M4 maybe that´s gone too.......??

I heard the PC people are looking to match the M chips so...