10.3.8 causes PowerBook freeze

[wowoah]

I installed the 10.3.8 update about a week ago and since then I've experienced almost 10 different instances of freezing, four in the past 24 hours. It seems to somehow be associated with being on the Internet, but randomly my computer will just completely freeze up. The mouse will still respond, but when I try to move it it'll stutter. Other than that, the entire interface is locked up and won't respond to any keyboard commands, including Force Quit. The only way I can regain use of my computer is to hold down the power button and restart.

Does anyone else have this problem or know a remedy to it? I've considered completely cleaning out and reinstalling everything on my computer, including the OS (the good 'ol clean install trick that used to always work on my Dell), or is there another way to go about fixing this problem?

Thanks for anyone's help.

 

[emw]

I've been running 10.3.8 without a problem, so I can't offer a lot of insight. I would suggest running a Repair Permissions.

 

[jph.daulte]

safeboot?

Is your display corrupt?

Have you tried to reboot in safeboot mode? (capital hotkey).

 

[tortfeasor]

You guys solved this? I have frozen twice in the last week or so. Everything was frozen, and both times it happened when I was trying to access the doc. No mouse movement, no keyboard keys worked... Even caps lock.

I would appreciate any help please.

 

[Sox]

I'm experiencing this as well. It's happened three times since I installed 10.3.8. I'm going to run some repair permissions now; hopefully that will help. Bizarre - seems this isn't an isolated incident.

 

[Applespider]

I've had 2 in the last 24 hours - when I'd had none in the year before that.

Like you, I can't tie it down to anything specific.

 

[tortfeasor]

It got worse today... It froze again and then when I tried to turn it back on it wouldn't start. Also, even though the speaker was tunred off, It made the start noise (booooong!) a few times. I had the impression that the system was on even though the screen was completely dark because I started hitting the keys and was hearing some boing noises although at strange volumes (sometimes soft, sometimes high). I finally closed the system up and waited a hour or so and tried again and it booted up just fine.

 

[wowoah]

Wow, I thought this thread had died. I did a few things that seemed to work for about 2 weeks, but now it's acting up again. What I did was:

- Cleaned out the cache (using CacheOut)
- Repaired permissions
- Repaired disk
- Reinstalled 10.3.8 completely using the combo install
- Ran fsck -yf from the Terminal

That made it fine for about 2 weeks, but now it's acting up again, freezing whenever I close the screen to sleep it. It's been acting up ever since I installed the new Security Update that Apple released two days ago. Something about these system updates just isn't sitting well with my Mac.

Please post if you guys get any results. I may just drop by a Genius Bar this weekend, but I don't know if I should, seeing as there's no real pattern to the problem and I can't replicate it consistently.

 

[GaiasChild]

I get intermittent freezing too. Any ideas?

I have had my PowerBook G4 since October. I have had periodic freezing from the beginning. I have just put it down to overheating since giving it a few minutes to cool down before rebooting usually helps. However, freezing has become more frequent recently and after reading this thread I'm wondering if its because of 10.3.8, which I installed several weeks ago.

I get two kinds of freezes: one in which the whole thing just stops...no processing, no mouse movement, nothing; it just freezes in the middle of whatever its doing. The three-finger-salute (Option+Apple+Start) will reboot. The second kind of freeze is less frequent. I'll be working along just fine when all of a sudden I get a screen full of Unix code over the top of my working screen with no mouse movement or other activity. Again, the three-finger-salute will reboot.

Anyone have any ideas about either of these two situations? Might overheading be any part of the problem? And if so, how do you deal with the heat problem?

Thanks!

Lesley

 

[mkrishnan]

I get two kinds of freezes: one in which the whole thing just stops...no processing, no mouse movement, nothing; it just freezes in the middle of whatever its doing. The three-finger-salute (Option+Apple+Start) will reboot. The second kind of freeze is less frequent. I'll be working along just fine when all of a sudden I get a screen full of Unix code over the top of my working screen with no mouse movement or other activity. Again, the three-finger-salute will reboot.

Lesley, the second instance is definitely a kernel panic. The first probably is too. Check your panic log -- often, it will identify if any program issued a call right before the panic, that is likely to be associated with the panic. If a pattern shows up, it might show that you have some software that is corrupted or is somehow incompatible with 10.3.8.

To see the log, either check it out using the terminal or run Console, which is in your Utilities folder. Click on the logs button in the window, and then click on Library/Logs (WITHOUT the ~) and choose panic.log. You will see entries separated by a series of ***. Each entry corresponds to one kernel panic, with the date and time given at the very beginning. What you want to look for is the name of a program or hardware element in the text that follows.

I had two kp's right after I got 10.3.8, but I have not had any in the past several weeks. Those two KP's did not seem to be related to anything obvious. I've had about six ever, and the other ones were related to either the firewire bus for some reason, or to Norton AV (which no longer has a home on my iBook! )

 

[wowoah]

I finally solved my freezing by doing a complete Archive and Install. So far one week and no freezing.

I used to also have problems like yours with garbage running up the screen. Apparently my logic board had malfunctioned and I brought it in to be fixed. If you have an Apple Store near you and if (only if) you can reliably reproduce the freezing, I would suggest having an Apple Store "Genius" check it out. They can usually figure out what is wrong, and if necessary, can send it in to be repaired. I was totally skeptical when my guy told me that my freezing problem was software related, but whaddyaknow, he was right!

 

[YS2003]

10.3.8

I second the combo update to 10.3.8 as the piece-by-piece update sometimes does not work well (I had a similar problems with 10.3.7 update). I did clean install of OS X and ran the combo update and it worked like a charm since then.

My new 12" PB came with 10.3.7. I am going to stay with this version as I don't want to take any chance for the OS instability I heard so many times on this forum. My other two PB (15" Ti and 15" Al are running 10.3.8 without a hitch after doing the combo update).

If you have firewire or USB equipment attached to your Mac, it may be a good idea to disconnect those extras before running the OS update. Of course, repair permission before and after the update, as the Mac Bible says.

 

[brap]

This sounds exactly like my problem, too. Mouse movement, stuttering (iTunes still plays, kinda). Comes to a complete stop, has done it thrice in the past couple of hours (!!) - I'm trying to write a bastard bibliography, for an assignment due tomorrow. These things certainly pick their time.

I'll reinstall OS X when I'm done, and take a backup after 10.3.7.... sigh, this is not helping my already low productivity.

 

[spiderlegs]

I wonder if the combo update will work for woefully lagging start up time...

 

[mac-toria]

I am having similar problems since 10.3.8 My 867 PB 12" goes to sleep and when it wakes, the mouse and keyboard will not work at all. I must reboot the machine to fix. I have reinstalled Panther and ran the combo updater, but it still does it, usually once a day (Which is a real pain in the ass, as my startup time is about 10 minutes) I have used Yasu to repair and update and clear, but nothing is making a difference.d

I was on another forum site and saw the exact same situation happening to others with this machine. Does anyone know if Apple has acknowledged this, or if there is a fix I can do?

 

[wowoah]

I am having similar problems since 10.3.8 My 867 PB 12" goes to sleep and when it wakes, the mouse and keyboard will not work at all. I must reboot the machine to fix. I have reinstalled Panther and ran the combo updater, but it still does it, usually once a day (Which is a real pain in the ass, as my startup time is about 10 minutes) I have used Yasu to repair and update and clear, but nothing is making a difference.d

I was on another forum site and saw the exact same situation happening to others with this machine. Does anyone know if Apple has acknowledged this, or if there is a fix I can do?

I've seen a few issues involving a "pinched trackpad cable" which causes intermittent freezing, but that seems to only apply to TiBooks, and since yours is a 12", that probably doesn't apply to you. Have you tried doing the normal stuff (i.e. Repair Disk, Repair Permissions, Reset the PMU, clean out the cache)? When you reinstalled Panther, did you just right a straight install or did you actually do a full Archive and Install?

Sorry if my questions imply some newbieness, but I figure it doesn't hurt to ask.

 

[mac-toria]

I did a complete archive and install about a week after noticing the problem (also about a week after installing 10.3.8). I used the combo updater to get back to 10.3.8, and used the Yasu utility to clear caches, repair permissions and all that jazz. No luck. I'm not quite sure when this freeze is happening, as I was at the coffee shop with it earlier and now I'm home and when it woke it worked fine. It seams to happen when it goes to sleep on it's own, like over night.

I'm going to try to back up to 10.3.7 and see if the problem goes away. If it does, I'll just steer clear of 10.3.8, and recommend others with the Al 12" PB's to do the same.

 

[wowoah]

I'm going to try to back up to 10.3.7 and see if the problem goes away. If it does, I'll just steer clear of 10.3.8, and recommend others with the Al 12" PB's to do the same.

That sounds like a good idea. After my big fiasco, I updated all the way to 10.3.7 and stopped. Been crash free for 3 weeks now and still going strong!

 

[filament]

Getting Apple to address problem

Hi,

I've searched the Apple website many times, in vain, recently (for problems with iTunes 4.7.1 application receipt problems, and OS X 10.3.8 freezing), for an email address to alert Apple to problems that don't create a bug report dialog, in hopes that they'll make amends. Other than forums, how do we make ourselves heard?

 

[mkrishnan]

I've searched the Apple website many times, in vain, recently (for problems with iTunes 4.7.1 application receipt problems, and OS X 10.3.8 freezing), for an email address to alert Apple to problems that don't create a bug report dialog, in hopes that they'll make amends. Other than forums, how do we make ourselves heard?

I would use the links on this page: http://www.apple.com/feedback/

It doesn't sound immediately like it's for *that* kind of feedback, but when you click on a product (iTunes and the PB are both listed), there are options concerning compatibility issues and bugs.

 

[filament]

Thanks.

Much obliged.

 

[j26]

I've recently updated to 10.3.8 (10.3.4 was on the PB when I bought it) and I've noticed that opening programs is a litle slower.

I see what people are sayingg about repairing permissions, but I've just checked the Mac Help on the PB and it's blank . It was there before I did the software updates.

The Mac Help opens, but there's nothing there. All other applications are fine, and the help is there, just not the main help. And I don't know how to repair the permissions.

Can anyone act as my help file for a few minutes please and tell me how to repair permissions????

 

[mkrishnan]

For repairing permissions, this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/89736/

For help viewer not showing OS X help, try this:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/helpviewer.html

 

[aldeluis]

Random crash in TiBook 500, fresh install, updated to 10.3.8

I've experiencing random crashes for 2 weeks without kernel panics or log traces. Cursor and all activity freezes suddenly. My machine is a TiBook 500 with dead firewire and it's software updated to 10.3.8. I've just made a fresh install and for the short time the machine was outdated all went smooth, there was no problem (but it was very short time, some minutes). After update to 10.3.8, in a couple of minutes, it freezes.

Before found this thread I was thinking in a hardware failure.

I will try to update to 10.3.7. I need my machine desesperately, al suggestions are wellcome, thank you very much for giving me some hopes for a software failure instead a hardware one.

 

[wowoah]

I've experiencing random crashes for 2 weeks without kernel panics or log traces. Cursor and all activity freezes suddenly. My machine is a TiBook 500 with dead firewire and it's software updated to 10.3.8. I've just made a fresh install and for the short time the machine was outdated all went smooth, there was no problem (but it was very short time, some minutes). After update to 10.3.8, in a couple of minutes, it freezes.

Before found this thread I was thinking in a hardware failure.

I will try to update to 10.3.7. I need my machine desesperately, al suggestions are wellcome, thank you very much for giving me some hopes for a software failure instead a hardware one.

Can you reliably recreate the freezing? If you read earlier posts, I mentioned that there have been some incidents of a "pinched trackpad ribbon cable" issue which has caused intermittent freezing in TiBooks. My TiBook wasn't affected by that, but yours may be, especially because it's a bit older. Try tapping on any combination of keys near the trackpad (ie the space bar, command key, option key, control, etc.) and see if that triggers a crash. If it does, you may have a pinched ribbon cable, and I can direct you to a site that shows you a pretty detailed fix for that.