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funky Finder going ons

0098386

0098386

Suspended
Original poster
Jan 18, 2005
21,574
2,908
this is going to be hard to write. the window loses focus ever few seconds. Finder has crashed. its trying to reboot. no destop, nothing. just safari. happened when i dragged an image from a website onto the desktop from a .mac site. the little up arrow under finder keeps flashing on and off.

could this be part of those critical security issues mentioned a bit ago? this is very funky. if i were on a PC id be screaming VIRUS!

hmm.
 
Just back. rebooted mac. SAME. Finder is not working. The up arrow problem is gone but Safari keeps losing focus. WHICH MAKES TYPING VERY HARD.
Under Force quit applications I keep seeing Finder popping in and out of existence.

What the hell is wrong. Really am starting to think "VIRUS!" This isn't right at all.
 
Ok I have a little idea. how do I delete a file without using Finder? is there a terminal line I could use? going to try and get rid of the file I downloaded on my desktop.
 
It's definitely not right, but it's also [almost 100%] definitely not a virus. Billions of non-virus things can go wrong with any computer, be it Mac, Windows, Linux, Unix, MS DOS, or whatever. I know that doesn't seem like much help, but telling you where not to look is almost as important as telling you where you should. You have a very real problem, but you should not be looking for a virus.
 
WHAT?! Terminal window is just teeny tiny. Zoom has no effect. dragging corner doesn't work.

what the hell is going on.
 
Just taking a guess here, it may or may not be a screwed up system pref. Like maybe the OS thinks you monitor is 10 x 10 resolution or something. But the first thing I'd try is to startup from the install cd and run disk utility to verify your disk and repair your permissions.
 
It can't be that bad actually, I'm logged into another account and all's fine here. I just can't access my original desktop and delete the bad file.
I'm hoping my network can see my PowerBook, I could use another machine and remove the bad file.
I think my fonts are just plain corrupted. It's happened before. I've inserted my Tiger and Panther instal discs and cannot find the font folder to just copy them out. could someone please upload the default font collection for little ol me :eek:

I googled some bits to find the default font download. But all I found was a torrent with 600mb of fonts, a little overkill!
 
Would archive and (re)install an option here? Seems that would fix prefs, fonts, configs, etc, and retain your user data at least.
 
Clone & Reinstall

You could acces the damaged computer from another Mac via FireWire Target Mode and clone the drive's contents, then wipe the drive and reinstall OS X and copy the files and settings you need back to your PowerBook.

Hope it helps, a sick Mac is NEVER a good thing....
 
Well the fun is over now. I logged onto my account, crossed my fingers in hope another computer on the network could see it. Logged on and deleted the bad file. It's fine now. But that whole experience was really weird. Can I submit this to Apple, they might be interested?

I couldn't have taken a screenshot though. I tried but the file wasn't made.

Archive and Install? Seems a bit overkill :eek: I'm only after the fonts. See I installed some fonts from my old system and they corrupted a lot of other fonts. Taught me a lesson though - never mess with old fonts!
 
raggedjimmi said:
WHAT?! Terminal window is just teeny tiny. Zoom has no effect. dragging corner doesn't work.

what the hell is going on.
Click to expand...

This happens when someone disabled Helvetica.
 
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