MC 2021.9 was running just fine on my Mojave iMac. PhraseFind worked also. I updated to Catalina and the first thing I noticed was MC would hang on exit every time. Then I noticed PhraseFind didn't work either. The little arrows stay red whatever I do. I then did a clean install of Big Sur and migrated everything over, uninstalled and reinstalled MC. As things are, I still have no PhraseFind or background services at all, and MC 2021.12 hangs everytime I try to quit the app. I have a big project coming up in the new year and I'd appreciate any help, please. Thanks!

Hello,

These might help: 

https://community.avid.com/forums/p/202699/905347.aspx

https://avid.secure.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/troubleshooting/Background-Services-Not-Available-on-Mac

If none of the suggestions there work for you, you might want to open a support case:

https://avid.secure.force.com/pkb/articles/how_to/Support-Plan-Case-Creation

Also, are you running MC First?

Thanks. I am running a licensed Media Composer on Big Sur with a dongle that Avid Link accurately shows was just renewed. So, I deleted old files left over after uninstalling MC (not touching the kexts or drivers, etc.) as suggested. Then I reinstalled MC. Now the background services will start (the arrows turn green) but PhraseFind still says it's not activated (Avid Link says yes it is!) and MC will set up a background transcode job but not actually transcode. I can't turn off Dynamic Media Folders and if i click on the DMF button with the green circle, an error message shows up: "DMF Service is not supported in OS X Catalina." So, I'm still at a loss.

Edit: Made some slight progress:

I think this is a permissions issue which began with Catalina because I was able to get background transcoding working by adding full disk access for TranscodeServiceWorker.app and EditorTranscode.app in System Preferences/Security & Privacy/Privacy. However, PhraseFind and Quit are still not working.

Just to get this back to the top, I was able to get background transcoding working by adding full disk access for TranscodeServiceWorker.app and EditorTranscode.app in System Preferences/Security & Privacy/Privacy. BUT, PhraseFind and Quit are still not working.