Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Can't open 'Security' preference pane !! (video included)

mgpg89

mgpg89

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 31, 2008
970
16
Belgium
I can't open the Security preference pane in System Preferences.
I can open desktop settings, spotlight, exposé & spaces etc just fine, but the moment I click 'Security', I get the spinning beach ball, system preferences freezes and I have to force shut it down.

I made a quick video using Screenflow to demonstrate the issue (the beach ball doesn't seem to appear in the video .. it did though)

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2264334/Preference%20Pane%20Issues.mov

I tried repairing the permissions. Didn't work.
Any other suggestions?
 
celticpride678 said:
Try removing the "com.apple.systempreferences" file located in ~/Library/Preferences.
Click to expand...

Doesn't work.

just found out I can't open the Displays / Keyboard / Audio preference panes either ... weird.

Some work, some don't. But there doesn't seem to be any logic in it though.

I just tried to restart my system, but this won't work either.

It looked like there was a process running in the background, so I checked the activity monitor after I shut down all my apps manually.

There's a process running called 'kernel_task' (PID 0) by the root user. Taking up 4% CPU, 77 threads, 250MB of physical memory and 90MB of virtual memory.
It is supposed to be there, right?
 
kernel task is most certainly meant to be there. It is the task that runs right down at the core of the os.


Can you create a new account and see if the problem affects it. This will determine if it is an account specific issue or a more fundamental problem.
 
xUKHCx said:
Can you create a new account and see if the problem affects it. This will determine if it is an account specific issue or a more fundamental problem.
Click to expand...

I'm kinda scared to do that, because I've read a lot of reports that Snow Leopard will delete everything on the administrator account if you log in as another user ..
 
That issue is to do with Guest accounts and a special case involving them and the upgrade process.

MacRumors said:


Late last week, 9 to 5 Mac noted that a number of users have reported a Mac OS X Snow Leopard bug apparently related to Guest accounts that is resulting in a complete loss of user data. The problem appears to manifest itself on machines which had the Guest account option enabled under Leopard and were subsequently upgraded to Snow Leopard. Users booting their machines have reported that upon start-up, they have been logged into the Guest account. Upon switching to their regular account, the affected users have been finding all of their user data missing and unrecoverable except from a backup.
Click to expand...
.

If it was just normal secondary accounts then the issue would be quite wide spread.

However if you still don't want to do it then I would suggest re-downloading the latest update and trying applying that over the top of your current install, this may resolve it.
 
xUKHCx said:
That issue is to do with Guest accounts and a special case involving them and the upgrade process.

.

If it was just normal secondary accounts then the issue would be quite wide spread.
Click to expand...

Oh OK, you're right. Didn't read into the subject that well.

I just force shut down my MBP and restarted, and now the problem seems to have vanished...
Weird because a restart 10 minutes earlier didn't resolve the issues.
 
Restarts generally keep a few items in memory to speed up the restart process where as a full shut down and then start up causes those items to be fully closed down and opened up again. You didn't need to force shut down.
 
I think the only way to fix this will be an Archive and Install. If it does not help, it is hardware related. Archive and Install's keep all user data and settings, but re-write all system files.
 
celticpride678 said:
I think the only way to fix this will be an Archive and Install. If it does not help, it is hardware related. Archive and Install's keep all user data and settings, but re-write all system files.
Click to expand...

How do you do an 'Archive & Install' and what are the consequences?
 
If the problem has gone away for now I don't see that an archive and install is necessary step at this point. If it re-occurs in future then perhaps but still it is a step that would be a little down the list of things to do.
 
It seems I found what was causing the problem ... (because it happened 2 more times after I last replied)

Yesterday was one of those days where I would look for new software to enhance my Mac and I installed about 5 different things, so I couldn't narrow down what was causing the problem.

It turned out to be Sapphire for Front Row plugin

From the moment I tried to launch Front Row, my system started acting strange.

Couldn't use the transport media keys, volume keys, system prefs locking up, unable to shut down/restart etc ...

All the signs of 'something' running (or trying to run) in the background ... which turned out to be the Sapphire plug-in for FrontRow.

Deleted it from the Front Row plugin folder and now everything seems fine...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back