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What's Wrong With Mail?

Annndy!

Annndy!

macrumors regular
Original poster
Dec 4, 2006
186
0
Halethorpe, MD
Hey all, got a little problem here and hoping you can help. This morning I attempted to send an e-mail through my Mail application. Only problem is, every time I try to do anything, all I get is the "beach ball". I have to Force Quit out of it. Everything else still works fine, and I know for a fact that Mail was working without problem yesterday. Anyone have any idea what the problem may be, or how I might go about repairing this? I already tried a simple restart which seemed to have no effect whatsoever.

Thanks in advance,

Andy
 
Sifting through Apple's support forums, I came across quite a few people who've been having the same issue recently. Someone suggested holding down the Shift key while opening the application. This worked for me (for whatever reason), and everything seems to be back to normal for the time being. If anyone else has this problem, I'd suggest holding down the Shift key while opening before trying anything else.
 
What's Wrong With Mail?

Annndy...
Yep, using the Shift key while starting Mail also got me outta trouble. And then further openings of Mail worked properly, w/o/ Shift key. Go figure - incomprehensible indeed! Perhaps this is a part of the many bugs reported by folks who have switched to safari 3 Beta (really an Alpha only apparently!). Lucky I found your posting, but what a waste of time to have to LOOK for such things. Bizarre!

I am new to Mac altogether - just bought a brand new top of the line MBP 17". I do have a couple of decades' experience with working computers of all kinds into my businesses (starting with radio Shack TRS80 - Note: the heavy reliance of Mac OS upon key combinations to issue some simple commands reminds me of the TRS 80 days. Since then, I simply have abandoned all efforts to remember such trivia such as Control V for paste?!!!).

I have not even installed any new apps yet - Too busy going through the motions of finding remedies to the many bugs affecting the entire Mac - OS, compatibility with Web sites, and all. I am really very frustrated to discover 3K$ too late that this Mac mystique, and corresponding virulent put down of anything Windows-like (as if the world of Business, for one thing, could even try to run on Mac stuff!!).

I am still trying to get to the much vaunted audio/video capabilities of the Mac, even though I am starting to feel shaky about the whole mac thing.
I yo-yo through periods of satisfaction and disappointment with this apparently wonderful machine! I run a B&B Inn among other businesses, and I need much print and DVD type of info to be put together and distributed to travel organizations: I still hope the mac will help with this.
It's a nice system, I know it - after all, Mac does have about 5% of the share of computer system sales. It is very small indeed, but not insignificant. I have seen some of our Guests work great a/v productions with Macs.

Some other observations: the huge size of Mac apps (iPhoto - 1/2 gb+ - wow), and the incredible number of files and folders present on the Mac before anything else is even installed (422000+ files and 101000+ folders - wow, I am just used to poke around my computers, just to see what;s there!)

Anyhow, I'll just forge on, and continue to hang out at this forum to learn everything I can before starting to get into something useful Hey: I am not just ranting here - I have 3K$ on this venture already!

- Roger T
 
Annndy! said:
Sifting through Apple's support forums, I came across quite a few people who've been having the same issue recently. Someone suggested holding down the Shift key while opening the application. This worked for me (for whatever reason), and everything seems to be back to normal for the time being. If anyone else has this problem, I'd suggest holding down the Shift key while opening before trying anything else.
Click to expand...

What does holding the shift key exactly do?
 
I notice this happens to me if I'm using a network other than home, and the SMTP server doesn't allow me to send mail. If I try quitting Mail, it gets slow and unresponsive, but eventually quits after 2-3 minutes.
Say my default SMTP is bellsouth but I can't send because I'm on a Comcast network - switching my SMTP to .Mac's won't work - and Bellsouth's either; so when trying to quit Mail it will lock up.
 
Mac Applications > What's Wrong With Mail?

Following up on the cmd-F incident: i have used it once - see my message above - upon fortuitous recommendation from Annndy (He WAS here at the right time, since I was ready to uninstall Safari 3, etc...!!!). Mail has not frozen since. I have no idea what happened in the first place.
- Roger T
 
I had a similar problem a few months ago. It got so bad that I phoned AppleCare. Thankfully, my MBP was new so it was free.

Anyway, they were awesome in helping me troubleshoot the annoyance.

We narrowed it down to Parallels being installed on my machine. Apparently, when you install parallels, it actually messes with your system settings which is a big no-no.

A fix can be found here: http://forums.parallels.com/showthread.php?p=57947
 
I was experiencing a similar problem. My Mail app would not load up each time after just working fine the day before (with no modifications or plug-ins installed). I held shift while starting it up and Mail opened fine ! :cool:

Thanks for the advice,
keyshawn
 
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