Panther freezing

A

AmigaStu

Registered
I've got an annoying problem that i need help with.
Every so often (certainly not at specific intervals or times) the Finder (10.3.2) will freeze and become totally unresponsive with a spinning beach ball, running apps will still run but i can't start any new ones, and the running ones freeze with a spinnning beach ball as soon as i try to access the Apple menu from within them.

Putting the iMac to sleep and then waking it up again solves the problem and everything starts to run again.

Accessing the internet seems to be related somehow, as most of the freezes occur when using Safari or reading newsgroups. I've tried deleting my Network prefs incase something got corrupted in there, but it doesn't seem to have helped. I've also tried taking out my extra RAM and all my peripherals.

Any suggestions would be very gratefully received. :(
 
Try repairing your permissions with Disk Utility, which is in Applications > Utilities.
 
Yes, Repair Permissions. And try to force quit rather than putting it to sleep. You have enough ram to have all the apps open that you mentioned? Empty cache on Safari, see if that also helps. Make sure the extra ram is being read by the computer as well.
 
Defective RAM might be the reason for these occurrences. Once I installed an extra stick 256MB RAM into my ibook, and got the same issues (including "the sleep of death") until I replaced said stick.
 
Reading the initial post, I come to believe that it's rather a networking problem. DNS lookup or something like that. Does it _ever_ happen if you completely disconnect from the 'net and just work on the Mac?
 
I've tried repairing permissions, no change.
Yesterday i ran for a few hours without my extra RAM in, no difference at all. The only suggestion i havn't tried is running without my network cable in to see if that makes any difference.
 
Having tired an archive and install reinstallation of my 10.3.2 system, which didn't help, i'm now wondering whether to try a complete format and clean install.

Would this be more likely to help me than the archive and install that i've already done?
 
AmigaStu said:
Having tired an archive and install reinstallation of my 10.3.2 system, which didn't help, i'm now wondering whether to try a complete format and clean install.

Would this be more likely to help me than the archive and install that i've already done?
Click to expand...

I know it sounds drastic, but it is worth doing this.

With the small point updates [10.3.x], I just install over my existing setup, but with large point updates [10.x] I _always_ back everything up, reformat the hard disk and reinstall from clean.

I've learnt [from bitter experience] that this is the best way to go...
 
Well, the format and reinstall didn't help either. This time i'm going to reinstall and slowly bring the computer upto date, these problems only started when the 10.3.2/quicktime 6.5/iTunes 4.2 updates were installed.
 
AmigaStu said:
Well, the format and reinstall didn't help either. This time i'm going to reinstall and slowly bring the computer upto date, these problems only started when the 10.3.2/quicktime 6.5/iTunes 4.2 updates were installed.
Click to expand...

This could just be an iMac thing. I've been reading about a quite a number of iMac owners getting the same problems.

I've got a dual usb iBook and a Quicksilver G4 and I did a clean install and then sat for the best part of 30 minutes while Software Update .. well, updated.

No problems, slick as snot, like a new computer...
 
Ok, i may have fixed it.
Formatted and performed a fresh install, and only updated to 10.3.1, and it's been running all last night and all day today with no problems, so it looks like the 10.3.2 update was the culprit. Hope they fix it before 10.3.4 is out.
 
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