How do I stop the crashes?

[beez7777]

My iMac (17" 800 mhz) has been crashing a lot recently. yesterday i got two kernel panics, one was the gray one with the text in different languages telling em to restart, the other was the weird one with the text along the left side of the screen. It's crashed probaby about 10 or so times ive had it (about once a month). Don't get me wrong, i haven't looked back once since switching last august, and i don't think i'll ever switch back. It's just that i hear everyone talking about how their mac hasn't crashed in 6 months, and i wanna say that too. what can i do to fix this, i'm not doing really intensive stuff, i don't see why the system should be failing. i repaired permissions last night, and its been fine since. i've only done fsck -y once (even though i don't really know what it does), and that was a few months ago. should i try fsck -y again, and if so, how often should i do this. is there any other regular maintainence that i should be doing to keep it running smoothly. I use macjanitor every now and then, not sure if that helps at all.thanks in advance.

 

[mikeyredk]

same thing here but i got a powerbook and i got rid of mine


(j/K)

when i got tired of it i called apple care and they took care of it because it was a hardware error (motherboard)

 

[beez7777]

if it is a hardware error, how would i be able to tell? would i have to bring it to an apple store for them to check it out? . i just want the one i have to work properly, although i wouldnt mind a nice new 1 ghz with ddr.

 

[arn]

if you are getting frequent kernel panics.... the most likely problem is a hardware issue.

The culprits are usually not-to-spec RAM or some random USB device.

Have you added RAM to you machine? Do the crashes happen often enough that if you were to pull the 3rd party ram from your machine, you could tell in a day or two if it made a difference?

arn

 

[beatle888]

unplug your usb devices and see if that helps you narrow the problem down.

if not, take out all third party ram and see if that works.

 

[GeeYouEye]

Mobo problem, almost certainly... especially since you're not supposed to get the ugly kernel panic in 10.2

 

[beez7777]

i have installed more ram (kingston), but i'm pretty sure i got kernel panics beore the installation, and as for usb devices i have my printer, a powermate into the keyboard, and a bluetooth adapter. If it is a hardware issue, and it happens to be the mobo, generally what is apple's policy regarding this. will i get a new computer, or will they fix the one i have. Also, how would you reccommend solving this. If i call applecare, i will be charged like $45 for the call. I'm still within my one year warrenty, should i bring it to an apple store (i have one 10 minutes away).

 

[Schiffi]

Well, since you are only 10 min away...

As for me I'm like 3.5 hours away from one. So hopefully I won't have this prob.

 

[MacBandit]

Sorry rather then retyping all this for the 16th time I'm just going to copy and pastes it. I hope it helps.




How long has it been since you reinstalled? Have you performed numerous system updates since the last time. If so definitely reinstall. It's really not a big deal. Start up off of the install discs by holding the 'C' key down once there choose the restore installation option. Within that option there will be another option to copy over your system preferences. This will copy your users folders over and all there preferences etc.. Unless you have manually modified a netoworking file you will not have to redo anything. It will not affect any of your apps or any of your data all that will change is you will have a fresh system installed. Once you are done with the install run system update and run all the updates. After that finishes you will have to restart. You will then want to run system update again to finish all the updates.

Also to run the monthy, weekly, and daily system maintenance tasks I recommend MacJanitor.

Something else to do regularly also is to repair disk permissions. Here's information on disk permissions and the proper way of doing it.

https://forums.macrumors.com/showthr...&threadid=17722

The final thing to do occasionaly is to run the file system check at startup. To do this at startup hold 'apple-s' this will put you into Single User Mode. At the prompt type 'FSCK -Y'. Be sure to put that space in there before the '-Y'. This will run the file system check. The '-Y' option tells it to answer yes to all questions. Once it's done running run it again if it says it repaired anything. If it says that there was nothing to repair then type 'reboot