mail won't launch on first attempt

[ShyMAc]

Hello all,

I'm new to the MacRumors Forums and fairly new to OSX. I searched for related information and couldn't find anything. Hope this isn't a repeat.

I'm running 10.3.3 on a Dual Ghz G5. I use Mail. I have my machine set to start up before I arrive to work. When I double click the Mail icon it bounces around but seems to crash at launch. I open terminal to check for memory hogs: Mail, SystemUISe (always). I kill mail and SystemUISe. I restart. Won't restart. Recheck memory hogs in terminal. This time it's Login (or something very like, sorry I can't be more specific for this one). I kill login. Machine seems to reset? I restart and launch mail.

Earlier I had this problem and disabled Norton. Which helped for a little while. But it's acting flakey again and Norton doesn't seem to be the issue. Now what?

Here's a less significant issue: On Mondays the G5 does not launch automatically. I checked the settings and they are in order. Any ideas?


Thanks for any suggestions.


Sherry

 

[Makosuke]

I can't help you with your root problem, but I can give you a little info about what you were killing: the loginwindow process you killed is basically the process that is your user login session. When you kill it, your session ends immediately, killing all of the apps you had open instantly and kicking you back to the login screen. This is an ungraceful way to "force quit" a stuck session, but it does work.

SystemUISe is actually SystemUIServer which is, if memory serves, the user interface for your current login session. Killing that kills the display of aything that's going on, I think, though it might relaunch automatically. I assume it's RAM is caching whatever is open and visible, so it's normal for it to show as using a lot of memory--that's not necessarily an issue, and is unlikely to be related to your Mail problem.

In fact, looking for "memory hogs" in general under OSX is futile, unless some program is specifically using more and more memory the longer it's open (indicating a memory leak). Programs using a lot of processor time are more likely to be frozen or misbehaving, if you can't quit them normally.

Your Mail problem sounds more likely preference related--I'd start by trying it in a different user account, to eliminate that sort of thing first.

Oh, and I seem to remember somebody else somewhere complaining about the Monday thing, but I don't remember any specifics.

 

[ShyMAc]

Makosuke,

Thanks for the info, every little bit helps. Ironically, I did not have the problem today and for one reason and another I've restarted the machine several times.

I'm the only person who uses this machine and the files on it so I don't pay too much attention to user account information (it's all me). I don't use a password to login. Could this be the cause of the loginwindow problem?


Thanks for your input.

Sherry