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How to Switch Off iMac that is Frozen

I

ICEBreaker

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Aug 12, 2007
270
3
Dear forum members,

I've just bought an iMac and am not familiar with how to use it. The iMac goes into sleep mode if I leave it unattended for a while. This is usually fine, except just now, it won't recover.

When I switch on the iMac by pressing the on/off switch, the screen comes on, but all I see is a multi-coloured swirly mouse cursor. Otherwise the background is blank. When I press the on/off switch again, it just goes back to sleep. How do I reboot??

Can anyone help?

Thanks!!
JC
 
Hold the power button down for 5 seconds, then release. This will shut down the computer.
 
I did that before (just like PC) but it didn't work. But I tried it again, after reading your message, and it's OK now. Thanks a lot.

Is the problem I described above a common issue? I thought iMacs don't crash for no reason at all (unlike Windows).
 
ICEBreaker said:
I did that before (just like PC) but it didn't work. But I tried it again, after reading your message, and it's OK now. Thanks a lot.

Is the problem I described above a common issue? I thought iMacs don't crash for no reason at all (unlike Windows).
Click to expand...

I dont know if the issue is with "iMacs" in particular. It did not crash... its just hanging because you prbaby put it to sleep, woke it up again, and then quickly put it to sleep again.. this always makes my powerbook hang, but not my mac pro. both are running 10.5
 
I am replying from my Mac now!!

OK, I hope it won't crash too often, since I will be keeping it quite clean.

The hardware is just great. Love it. But I am finding it quite difficult to adjust to the OS and the keyboard+mouse, having been a Windows/Solaris user since the late 80s.

Either way it's fun to have a new OS with beautiful hardware to play with for a change. Love the 24inch screen.
 
Tenwamarukun said:
Or just pull out the power cord. :)
Click to expand...

True... but I didn't want to take the risk of harming the system (HDD etc), no matter how low the risk is. Besides, I knew there MUST be way to reboot. Perhaps I didn't hold the power button down long enough the first few times.
 
ICEBreaker said:
I did that before (just like PC) but it didn't work. But I tried it again, after reading your message, and it's OK now. Thanks a lot.

Is the problem I described above a common issue? I thought iMacs don't crash for no reason at all (unlike Windows).
Click to expand...

They don't. The key is for you to stop being so impatient and allow the 'thinking animation' to continue until the desktop is loaded. If you were 30 minutes for the desktop to load, then I suggest there may be problems.
 
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