MacOS – How to debug kernel panic on macOS Catalina, as Catalina is on Read-only File system

Kernel panics are generally not supposed to happen.

It can be impossible to determine the cause of a single kernel panic. They can be related to kernel bugs, version incompatibility, driver bugs and/or hardware problems.

As you have often recurring kernel panics, you should save the text of many of these kernel panics. Then you can compare them to each other to find a common thread, if any. For example, in this case the current process is coreduetd - is that always the case when it crashes? (then that could be the cause, although that would be due to Apple bugs).

The general error described in this kernel panic is a page fault - i.e. the kernel trying to access memory that isn't mapped for access by the kernel. This is due to kernel bugs or hardware error.

If it is always page faults, but various processes and device drivers - then that is an indication of either flawed OS installation or hardware error.

In your case I would recommend running the system for an extended period of time without any external devices of any kind plugged in (besides those necessary for the system to function obviously). If the kernel panic still occurs, that's a great data point.

In that case start the Mac in Recovery mode (hold down Cmd-R when booting). If kernel panics still happen in Recovery mode, it is much less likely that the problem is related to your software installation. Instead it is likely caused by hardware errors.

Hardware errors that cause page faults are usually defective RAM modules or lack of proper cooling. Check that fans are working properly, exhausts are not covered and temperature is nominal. If your computer has replaceable memory, try running with only one memory module plugged in. If crashes still occur, swap with another module.

Hopefully this should allow you to determine the true cause of the panics.

I've tried safe-booting which actually fixed the problem which let me to believe there was something about my standard suite of applications that was causing the kernel panics. Low and behold, I've identified the root cause to be Google Drive File Sync (com.google.drivefs.filesystems.dfsfuse 38.0.16). I found this post on the support forums of Google which suggested to turn Spotlight indexing off for Google Drive. This didn't quite fix the problem for me, only reduced the frequency of crashes somewhat. I ended up completely removing Google Drive File Sync.