Greetings All,
Well, after years of switching PC types to Macs, I got my first backfire. A friend got one of the first MacBooks, and she's been in Kernel Panic Hell for months. She's not giving up yet, but we're... umm... running out of time. I desperately need a little help.
Okay, one basic question is would a crash log in the Console utility help us find a problem? If the answer is yes, could you direct me towards WHICH crash log, or which report in the console that is most helpful?
I've been trying to help her, and one thing that confuses me is that I'm not certain she's having the random shutdowns. Those - I believe - are literally the screen goes back and the unit is off. Instead, she has constant kernel panics, to the tune of many in a day.
We've already tried these basics:
1. Repairing permissions, running fsck
2. Checked RAM (it's Apple ram, passed test)
3. Brought it to the store, they 'looked' at it (they sent her away with shrugged shoulders)
That last one concerns me, because where these hardware buggy early MacBooks are concerned, I don't trust Apple to tell her she has a lemon.
I'll share two software things, in case you think it matters:
a. for the longest time, each time she'd boot up, MSN Messenger would ask her to update. Each time. Like it was goofed up. I've been trying to get her to switch to Adium.
b. MY CONCERN: she's been using an OS9 screenwriting program regularly. So she has classic open, and probably isn't watching her RAM usage properly. There is no native version of what she uses, and switching to pricey FINAL DRAFT is the last thing she wants to hear after her pricey MacBook that doesn't work right.
If it was the software causing a problem, would it show up in a crash log?
Your help would be appreciated. And I'm going to try to get her to join this thread for your followup questions.
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