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lots and Lots & LOTS of BEACHBALL - Help:(

Jovian9

Jovian9

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Feb 19, 2003
1,970
111
Planet Zebes
Today I started having lots of problems with my iMac G5. I am having beachball galore. It seems to have progressed as the day has gone on. Out of 6 hours on the computer today.....probably 2 1/2 hours have been watching the beachball. It has gotten to the point where I have to type this on my PowerBook b/c everytime I try to type on the iMac G5 it brings the beachball up for several minutes.
-I have repaired permissions, updated prebindings, ran daily/weekly/monthly scripts (used System Optimizer X) and restarted my iMac G5.
-CPU usage is b/t 20 & 50% most of the time......except when I start or try to stop an app (then that app uses 90% of the CPU by itself).
-1/2 of the apps I try to start end up 'Not Responding'. The Dock is constantly 'Not Responding'.
-Force Quit is taking nearly a minute to show up after I hit 'Open Apple - Alt - Esc'. Then it takes another 30 seconds to close the app I am force quitting.
-When I tried to post this on my iMac G5 the beachball would come up after every letter I typed (for several minutes).....and all that was running was Safari (along with my dial up connection). But it would allow me to run Safari with just a little beachball during the loading of various tabs.

I had a failed attempt at the 10.3.6 install and had to archive and install OSX but was able to get 10.3.6 installed after that and have not had any problems since (that was 9 days ago). I have an app called 'You Control Tunes' that loads up with the iMac (next to the time in the upper right of the screen). This app usually causes the iMac to take a little longer to load and I usually stop the engine after it loads.....but it has been installed for a few weeks now with no problems.

Any suggestions? I'd rather not have to install Panther again....considering I went through this barely over a week ago when the 10.3.6 update crashed my G5 (see some of my other posts for that info).
 
jxyama said:
how much RAM you got?
Click to expand...

I have 768MB in it right now (all Apple RAM). This has pretty much been in there since I got the iMac in late September......with no beachball problems like this until today.
 
yeah, that should be plenty...

i'd call apple. you should still be covered - there's something wrong with your machine for sure. most probably your HD - it must be having trouble accessing it for some reason.
 
Trouble with the HD?

Like a fragged file system/catalog.

Try running Disk First Aid (from CD, Disk Utilities)...

Or running fsck when you boot into single user mode (command-s) and follow the directions on the screen, run it until you get a clean pass (or it keeps showing the same problem -- ie, not fixing anything). Type reboot to get out of single user mode.
 
Sun Baked said:
Trouble with the HD?

Like a fragged file system/catalog.

Try running Disk First Aid (from CD, Disk Utilities)...

Or running fsck when you boot into single user mode (command-s) and follow the directions on the screen, run it until you get a clean pass (or it keeps showing the same problem -- ie, not fixing anything). Type reboot to get out of single user mode.
Click to expand...

How exactly do you run fsck? I've seen it recommended a lot in these forums but have never had to do it. Thanks!
 
Another poster on MacRumors (can't remember who right now) had a similar problem after installing 10.3.6, and fixed it by removing a RAM module. I wonder if 10.3.6 is exposing previously hidden RAM defects (I think the other poster was wondering whether 103.6 had fried his/her RAM).

If you are getting a beach ball after every keystroke, it's probably something other than the HD. You might want to try running your hardware diagnostic disk.
 
Jovian9 said:
How exactly do you run fsck? I've seen it recommended a lot in these forums but have never had to do it. Thanks!
Click to expand...
I'll add color to my post previous post...

Or running fsck when you boot into single user mode (command-s) and follow the directions on the screen, run it until you get a clean pass (or it keeps showing the same problem -- ie, not fixing anything). Type reboot to get out of single user mode.

1. Boot with the CD and run disk first aid...

or

2. Boot and hold command-s and follow the directions on the screen...

Running fsck is easy to do, since you don't need to find a CD. But should be done with regularity.
 
Sun Baked said:
Running fsck is easy to do, since you don't need to find a CD. But should be done with regularity.
Click to expand...

Thanks! I'll try this in the morning (the iMac is shut down and in the bedroom and my wife is already asleep).
 
MacinDoc said:
Another poster on MacRumors (can't remember who right now) had a similar problem after installing 10.3.6, and fixed it by removing a RAM module. I wonder if 10.3.6 is exposing previously hidden RAM defects (I think the other poster was wondering whether 103.6 had fried his/her RAM).

If you are getting a beach ball after every keystroke, it's probably something other than the HD. You might want to try running your hardware diagnostic disk.
Click to expand...

If you remember the post or the person who posted could you let me know? I'll try looking but I have dial-up so it's difficult to search.....very time consuming. Thanks!
 
I ran disk first aid with the cd and there were no problems.

I booted with Command S to run fsck.....but it will not allow me to b/c I have a wireless keyboard. Is there a way around this? Can I shut down my computer with the power button in the back or do I have to type reboot (since I cannot type at all)?
 
I borrowed a USB keyboard from a friend and was able to do the fsck.
Here is what it said:

diskos3: I/O Error
Invalid Sibling Link (4, 4166)
Cannot repair journaled volume

So I rebooted with the OSX install disk and ran disk verify/repair:

Invalid Node Structure
Volume Needs Repaired
Volume Check Failed
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
(-9972)

I repaired:
1 Volume could not be repaired

Verified again:
Invalid Volume Directory Count
Invalid Volume File Count

Repaired Again:
1 Volume could not be repaired

Repaired Again:
Disk Repaired

Restarted:
Things seem fine for now. How could this have happened? I verify permission before/after every install. I keep all video & music files on a seperate partition than OSX. I have 37GB out of 75GB left on the OSX partition. Just wonder how something so drastic could happen all of the sudden.
 
Jovian9 said:
Things seem fine for now. How could this have happened? I verify permission before/after every install. I keep all video & music files on a seperate partition than OSX. I have 37GB out of 75GB left on the OSX partition. Just wonder how something so drastic could happen all of the sudden.
Click to expand...
Drive errors are cummulative, they keep getting worse until it cannot be repaired... if you don't repair them

"verify permission before/after every install" fixes the file permissions (who can read/write/modify a file) -- but this does nothing for the file system/catalog.

Fixing permission without running Disk First Aid/fsck is sort of like fixing the cover and number on a book at the library and then tossing it over your shoulder, but neglecting to do anything about the messy card catalog, or even putting the book back on the proper shelf.

Hey you can read the file fine, if you can "find" it. :p
 
Sun Baked said:
Drive errors are cummulative, they keep getting worse until it cannot be repaired... if you don't repair them

"verify permission before/after every install" fixes the file permissions (who can read/write/modify a file) -- but this does nothing for the file system/catalog.

Fixing permission without running Disk First Aid/fsck is sort of like fixing the cover and number on a book at the library and then tossing it over your shoulder, but neglecting to do anything about the messy card catalog, or even putting the book back on the proper shelf.

Hey you can read the file fine, if you can "find" it. :p
Click to expand...

But this is with an iMac G5 that is less than 2 months old. My last iMac G4 never had this problem and I had it for 18 months. And all video and music files were stored on the 80GB OSX partition (since that was the only partition I had). I did the same things with it with regards to repairing permissions and using System Optimizer X. I've never had this happen with any of my Macs before. I never have ran Disk First Aid/fsck before and this has not happened until now.
Could something else be causing this problem? Faulty Hard Drive? OSX is messed up d/t the archive/install I had to do d/t the OSX 10.3.6 update crash I had? I think I'll use Carbon Copy Cloner and back up my system and see if this happens again. If so I'll be sure to get this thread up and going again.
Thanks for the help everyone!
 
The errors in the file system that you had does not happen very often and it was most likely remains of the failed 10.3.6 install and the following archive and install process.

What caused the failed install of 10.3.6 to begin with is an important question. Since you were able to install it the second time there must be something that messed up the system before the first.

I'm no expert on this, but from other thread on similar topics it seems that a good advice is to be careful about installing programs to customize the behaviour of the system or existing programs. This would include such things as iTunes add-ons and GUI theme changers. Especially if the program isn't from a well known serious/big software house. Don't install little known applications with installers that asks for your password unless you really need that app.

Also, just to be sure, don't work on your Mac while installing an update.

And don't get me wrong, the system sometimes messes up just by "normal" use, so I'm not trying to say that this must be your fault.
 
I had the exact same problem a couple of weeks ago and had to do a complete format and reinstall of the OS (at apple's suggestion) and then today the same thing happened again and now it won't even start up it just hangs on the gray screen with the apple logo. So after an hour or so online with apple support chat, they're sending me a new hard drive. I sure hope this solves the problem. I lost alot of stuff when I had to reformat the first time, and was just getting comforatable again so i'll probably loose it all again. :mad:
 
gekko513 said:
Also, just to be sure, don't work on your Mac while installing an update.

And don't get me wrong, the system sometimes messes up just by "normal" use, so I'm not trying to say that this must be your fault.
Click to expand...

No assumption taken:) I did have the 'You Control Tunes' program installed....so perhaps that could have caused it. Also, my iPod was plugged in during the 10.3.6 update (but not doing anything)......so perhaps that could have caused it. I'm just going to have to back up just in case an erase/install is needed. Thanks for the info.
 
supersize said:
I had the exact same problem a couple of weeks ago and had to do a complete format and reinstall of the OS (at apple's suggestion) and then today the same thing happened again and now it won't even start up it just hangs on the gray screen with the apple logo. So after an hour or so online with apple support chat, they're sending me a new hard drive. I sure hope this solves the problem. I lost alot of stuff when I had to reformat the first time, and was just getting comforatable again so i'll probably loose it all again. :mad:
Click to expand...

Hopefully the new hard drive helps out. Please let me know if it does or if you keep having this problem b/c I'm worried this may happen again to me...and I do not want to reinstall again (just did d/t the 10.3.6 update problem I had).

So far so good after using the install disk to repair. Although when running iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, Safari......they started up like it was the first time they had ever been run (you know when you first turn on your Mac).....but luckily the data is still there.
 
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