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webcookie · Jan 22, 2007, 10:26 PM

Yesterday and today I had this strange occurrence. I'm in Firefox doing stuff minding my own business and I decide that I want to open another program, so I click on the dock icon and it bounces bounces bounces and never opens. All of my open programs are fine, until I try to do anything on the menubar, then they all beachball, including Finder, which won't relaunch. I end up having to push the power button to turn the computer off and restart. Then everything is fine. This is two times now, both around this time of night. What the hell is going on.

Tiger 10.4 (no updates)
iBook G4 (first ever bought 3 days after release)
running Shapeshifter, Cleardock, etc which have never caused problems
no weird hdd noises or anything, disk utility says hdd s.m.a.r.t. status is verified
most recently installed: dockstar mail demo, uninstalling now.

TETENAL · Jan 22, 2007, 10:36 PM

Sort of off topic probably, but why do you run 10.4.0? The newer versions contain bug fixes and security updates.

Tomchu · Jan 22, 2007, 10:39 PM

First of all, I would consider updating to 10.4.9. :-\ There is no reason not to.

webcookie · Jan 22, 2007, 10:43 PM

I should also add that if I am recalling yesterday, this happens when I am editing my profile on MySpace. Not just being on MySpace, but the act of editing my profile. It just happened again.

The other day I tried to log out and log back in, but the login screen never came up after logging out so I had to do with the power button again.

Well considering that not updating to 10.4.9 did not suddenly cause me problems, I'd like to take care of the problem at hand before worrying about that.

Thinine · Jan 22, 2007, 10:53 PM

Run software update and get everything there. Then get the latest Firefox update. Then see if the problem continues.

TETENAL · Jan 22, 2007, 11:34 PM

Originally Posted by Tomchu

First of all, I would consider updating to 10.4.9. :-\ There is no reason not to.

Except maybe that it's not yet available.

webcookie · Jan 27, 2007, 12:51 PM

This happens when I try to edit my MySpace profile in Safari as well. Finder becomes unresponsive and cannot be relaunched, no other programs can be launched, other open programs become unresponsive if I click the menubar. I have to reboot the computer from the power button. Being that this happens in both Firefox and Safari, it can't be a problem with the web browser. And not updating every point update to 10.4 isn't suddenly going to make MySpace want to kill my computer. There are people out there going about their daily lives with 10.2 or 10.3 installed on their computers and it works fine. Not upgrading to 10.4.8 isn't magically going to make MySpace eat my computer. I was looking for perhaps some sort of explanation of just HOW MySpace is suddenly making my computer freeze, because that is exactly what is happening, not that upgrading to 10.4.8 will solve all of life's problems.

Chips G · Jan 27, 2007, 01:28 PM

While I don't know why you are having the problem that you are having, upgrading to 10.4.8 MIGHT include a fix for that problem.

msuper69 · Jan 27, 2007, 06:15 PM

Originally Posted by webcookie

...
running Shapeshifter, Cleardock, etc which have never caused problems
...

That's exactly the kind of crap that hoses up an OS. They don't use approved APIs and go around the back door.

It's not nice to fool Mother Nature (or Mac OS X).

Don't use that junk.

analogika · Jan 28, 2007, 11:48 AM

Agreed with msuper69.

Also, myspace will **** up almost any browser. MySpace is a complete piece of ****, and it's a crying shame that that ****ing code abomination has become so indispensible and widespread.

The reason most myspace pages are so bdonka-donk butt-ugly is precisely because the code is so ****ed-up that there's almost no way to make it look good.

Gah.

webcookie · Jan 28, 2007, 01:37 PM

Well, that was so totally helpful. Except, not at all.

MySpace isn't ****ing up just the browser, it's making my entire computer unresponsive. Shitty code or not, that shouldn't be happening. A website should not kill my iBook, whether MySpace is great or crappy doesn't matter. It shouldn't be happening.

But what else could I expect here but "MySpace sucks" and "upgrading to 10.4.8 will solve all of your problems".

butterfly0fdoom · Jan 28, 2007, 01:57 PM

Try getting more RAM or save up for a MacBook. You're running two programs in the background and accessing MySpace on 640 MB?

TETENAL · Jan 28, 2007, 02:31 PM

a) Uninstall/remove all 3rd party hacks from your user account.
b) Do an Archive & Install of the operating system.
c) Update your operating system to benefit from bug fixes and security fixes.
d) Refrain from installing 3rd party hacks again.

TheoCryst · Jan 28, 2007, 03:07 PM

Originally Posted by webcookie

MySpace isn't ****ing up just the browser, it's making my entire computer unresponsive.

Actually, yes, MySpace is ****ing up the browser, which in turn is bringing your system to its knees. I agree 100% with TETENAL's suggestions: you'd be amazed by the damage that those 3rd-party hacks can reap on a poor, unsuspecting Mac.

webcookie · Jan 29, 2007, 07:23 PM

I just wanted to share that my dad's computer, with the exact same specs, but isn't running any hacks, DOES THE EXACT SAME THING. With three programs running: Finder, Dashboard, and Safari. The exact same thing happens, and he has no hacks installed. So I guess it has nothing to do with that at all then, huh.

steve626 · 01:13 AM

Well, the problem is that there are many many thousands of other users of the same model of computer, same OS, who do not have these hangs, forced restarts etc. when using Safari to access Myspace. My daughter, being one of them, accessed Myspace starting with 10.4.0 (on her iMac G5 -- not the exact same model as yours) and continues to do so with 10.4.8 and has never had a kernel panic, hang or forced restart since the computer was new nearly two years ago.

When two computers are set up the same way by the same person/people, they often exhibit the same problematic symptoms. It's hard for people here to assist you because you seem very defensive and angry and out to make some sort of point about never upgrading. When you run the combo updater to 10.4.8, not only does it update the system but it also replaces components that might be missing or faulty due to things that had been user installed in the past or due to damage that could have happened during one of those freezes. The suggestion to "Archive and Install" was even better because that installs a fresh new system. There is an option to preserve user settings when you archive and install. Have you tried any of these things?

When I read

"running Shapeshifter, Cleardock, etc which have never caused problems"

I almost stopped reading any more of this thread because to me that sentence provided the most probable answer. While your Dad's computer may have "no hacks installed," my guess is that your two computers do have similar or the same sets of utilities or extensions installed and something is conflicting.

First thing to try is to login to the computer(s) as a different user and see if the problem is there. If not, then there's something in your user settings and there are ways to track those down methodically; if it persists, then it's a system wide problem. For the system-wide problem situation, you could try installing a fresh new vanilla system on a firewire drive and nothing else and boot into that and see if the behavior persists. If it does, then I'd suspect hardware, such as faulty RAM -- you added RAM, where did that RAM come from?

You did not mention running Disk Utility or Disk Warrior to check the file system or repair permissions. These are standard steps that frequently cure symptoms like those you are experiencing.

analogika · Jan 30, 2007, 06:22 AM

Originally Posted by webcookie

But what else could I expect here but "MySpace sucks" and "upgrading to 10.4.8 will solve all of your problems".

God forbid we try to be helpful.

Upgrading to 10.4.8 WILL solve a number of problems. That's what updates are written to do. What the hell is YOUR problem?

And MySpace is so badly coded that it WILL bring your system to its knees, particularly if you're only running in 640MB of RAM.

Also, are you running the latest version of FireFox? I hear it got a LOT better - the previous versions were prone to sluggishness and bogging-down.

voo · Jan 30, 2007, 06:39 PM

Originally Posted by analogika

God forbid we try to be helpful.
And MySpace is so badly coded that it WILL bring your system to its knees, particularly if you're only running in 640MB of RAM.

No kidding, but it doesn't crash the system just sucks up lots of CPU and makes the browser unresponsive, no matter what browser.

Also, are you running the latest version of FireFox? I hear it got a LOT better - the previous versions were prone to sluggishness and bogging-down.

Are we talking FF2.0 or nightly's?

kick52 · Jan 30, 2007, 07:00 PM

myspace (is fine when people use clean designs, but when they get all flashy designs with text runnig down the screen, etc) is a load of ****.

basicly, most sites run better on windoze.

SMacTech · Jan 30, 2007, 07:09 PM

I never have any problems with MySpace except certain users with heavy graphics and ' transparent like ' themes.

Visualize · Jan 30, 2007, 07:16 PM

I think I heard somewhere that MySpace uses alot of Flash thingys- so maybe updating that. There have been some enhancements to Flash in the last couple of updates. Not that I know which but just something I read/heard. And using the latest Firefox is a good idea also. Safari is not good with MySpace the times I've been there with that particular browser.

I'm all out of ideas since you're not willing to listen in general.