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You are here: MacNN Forums > Hardware - Troubleshooting and Discussion > Mac Desktops > 2 Hard System Freezes in One Day

2 Hard System Freezes in One Day
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l008com
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Feb 2, 2015, 04:24 AM
 
My primary workstation is a 2012 2.6ghz i7 Mac mini with 16 Gb of RAM, and an SSD/HDD combo drive setup.
It's been a champ since I got it two years ago. But today something weird happened. Totally out of the blue, the system froze solid. No kernel panic, just a totally frozen solid screen, even the cursor. The last 1 seconds of the current iTunes song kept repeating. After about 30 seconds or so, the system self-rebooted, and started up normally.

Then, about 2 or 3 hours later, the same thing happened again!

I ran the hardware test with the extended check, and it found no problems. My guess is bad ram or a failing SSD. Unfortunately, these things are hard to really check for. Because they are functioning normally UNTIL the crash happens.

Just so happens, I always run SMCFanControl, so I can tell you the machine was 145° one time it crashed and 160° the other, not particularly hot at all. And it was not under a significant CPU load either. Totally normal relatively light use.

So if it crashes twice a day, every day, that will make troubleshooting the problem easier. I hope it doesn't settle into a pattern where it just randomly crashes every few days or weeks. That kind of problem is almost impossible to hunt down. UGH. I don't have time for an unreliable computer!
     
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Feb 3, 2015, 10:52 AM
 
Check Console.app to see what was going on just before it crashed.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
Kensington
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Feb 3, 2015, 02:36 PM
 
Probably just mercury retrograde
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 03:01 PM
 
I did check console and there was lots of entries but nothing particularly meaningful. I don't remember the exact time of the crashes now so I can't look back again but if it happens again, I'll post what I see.
     
Mike Wuerthele
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Feb 3, 2015, 03:04 PM
 
That feels like an I/O problem, based on the last second of audio repeating.

Need more input.
     
bdmarsh
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Feb 3, 2015, 07:37 PM
 
Originally Posted by l008com View Post
I did check console and there was lots of entries but nothing particularly meaningful. I don't remember the exact time of the crashes now so I can't look back again but if it happens again, I'll post what I see.
in Console do a search for "I/O" (without the quotes)
if it is bad blocks on the hard drive, it would most likely show up as a Kernel: I/O error.
I've also seen "Kernel: error (undefined)" show up for hard drive problems.
if the first 2 show nothing, you could also try a search for "panic"
(I've also done searches for "boot" to see when a computer was started, to then find the time/dates to look for errors before the bootup)

If there are no hard drive read/write (I/O) errors, or kernel panics then it is possibly ram.
There are tools available to do ram tests - one such is memtest 86+ version 4 or later supports Macs, it can be burned to a CD (if you have a CD burner - this can also be used to boot the Mac to run the CD) Apple used to have a hardware test CD, but the new recovery partition doesn't appear to have this option - memtest 86+'s ram test is also far more extensive than apple's was.
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 08:12 PM
 
I did run the apple hardware test. It's not on the recovery partition, it's built into ROM somewhere on the logic board. I did the extended test and it found no issues. At this point, I'm going to wait for now. And if it happens again, i'll keep track of the exact time and scour the logs, and possibly run some more memory testers.
     
npalardy
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Feb 4, 2015, 10:30 AM
 
Running 10.10 ? Showing the Finder in Icon view ?
There's radar reports about just leaving the machine sitting in this view causing things to completely freeze your machine.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6739866
     
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Feb 4, 2015, 11:21 AM
 
Originally Posted by npalardy View Post
Running 10.10 ? Showing the Finder in Icon view ?
There's radar reports about just leaving the machine sitting in this view causing things to completely freeze your machine.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6739866
Doesn't sound like the same issue at all. That is a Finder freeze - and I suspect that the root cause is an old Quickview plugin - while what the OP has here is either hardware or kernel.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 02:32 PM
 
My issue has not repeated since the two freezes. Very odd.
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 6, 2015, 01:36 AM
 
Ok here we go, it happened again. I didn't notice the freeze because I was reading something on the page. But I did notice the auto reboot. So I don't know the exact second of the crash, but I know the minute: 12:14am. Here is my system log from both sides of the crash. I don't see much to go on

Code:
Feb 6 00:13:02 Mac-mini kernel[0]: Sandbox: com.apple.WebKit(8363) deny file-read-data /Users/johnm/Caches/Adobe/Flash Player/AssetCache Feb 6 00:13:02 --- last message repeated 1 time --- Feb 6 00:13:02 Mac-mini kernel[0]: Sandbox: com.apple.WebKit(8363) deny file-write-create /Users/johnm/Caches/Adobe/Flash Player/AssetCache/K8F3QCT2 Feb 6 00:13:02 Mac-mini kernel[0]: Sandbox: com.apple.WebKit(8950) deny file-read-data /Users/johnm/Caches/Adobe/Flash Player/AssetCache Feb 6 00:13:02 --- last message repeated 1 time --- Feb 6 00:13:02 Mac-mini kernel[0]: Sandbox: com.apple.WebKit(8950) deny file-write-create /Users/johnm/Caches/Adobe/Flash Player/AssetCache/RXQQFMKP Feb 6 00:13:02 Mac-mini.local nsurlstoraged[249]: Error: stepSQLStatement:toCompletionWithRetry - stepping returned unhandled result=11, DB=/Users/johnm/Caches/com.apple.Safari/Cache.db Feb 6 00:13:03 --- last message repeated 90 times --- Feb 6 00:13:03 Mac-mini kernel[0]: ARPT: 149698.139748: wl0: 802.11 driver reinitializing, total count of reinit's[414], @'wlc_dpc':472 Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: Entered:_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:2886 Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: Entered:__thr_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:2886 Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: tid:1e3c7 - Mux ID not found in mapping dictionary Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: tid:1e3c7 - Can't handle disconnect with invalid ecid Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:05 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:06 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:06 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found) Feb 6 00:13:06 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found (negative cache)) Feb 6 00:13:06 Mac-mini.local Mail[6491]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Matching credential (krbtgt/ORG@WELLKNOWN:COM.APPLE.LKDC) not found (negative cache)) Feb 6 00:13:07 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: Entered:_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:2885 Feb 6 00:13:07 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: Entered:__thr_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:2885 Feb 6 00:13:07 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: tid:1e3c7 - Mux ID not found in mapping dictionary Feb 6 00:13:07 Mac-mini.local iTunes[1132]: tid:1e3c7 - Can't handle disconnect with invalid ecid ### I BELIEVE THIS IS THE MOMENT OF CRASH. NO KERNEL PANIC, JUST A HARD CRASH FOLLOWED BY A SELF REBOOT ### Feb 6 00:14:30 localhost bootlog[0]: BOOT_TIME 1423199670 0 Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.AccountPolicyHelper" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.authd" sharing output destination "/var/log/asl" with ASL Module "com.apple.asl". Output parameters from ASL Module "com.apple.asl" override any specified in ASL Module "com.apple.authd". Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.authd" sharing output destination "/var/log/system.log" with ASL Module "com.apple.asl". Output parameters from ASL Module "com.apple.asl" override any specified in ASL Module "com.apple.authd". Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.authd" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.awdd" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.callhistory.asl.conf" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.cloudd" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.clouddocs" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.commerce.asl" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 6 00:14:33 localhost syslogd[23]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.CoreDuetAdmissionControl" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database.
Thoughts?
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 6, 2015, 01:53 PM
 
In addition to the apple hardware test finding nothing, I ran memtest86 for about 8 hours and it also found nothing.
     
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Feb 7, 2015, 07:02 AM
 
It tries to write to something and fails. Then starts acting like that device is disconnected and tries to recover, and fails. I note that it is Flash that appears to trigger it. Try installing a Flash blocker and see if that helps? Not a real root cause fix, but it can be a workaround.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 8, 2015, 12:22 AM
 
Would a bad drive or a bad program (flash) be able to cause the kind of hard crashes I'm having though? Seems like I would, at the very worst, get a kernel panic if that was my problem. But I'm getting System 7 style hard freezes. And in fact, I just had another one. Here is the log. The freeze happened right at 11:04:05. I was browsing the web when it happened. No flash on the site I was on, although with ads, who knows. You can see that there is not a thing in the logs for the 15 seconds before the freeze. I'm thinking bad RAM.

Code:
Feb 7 23:03:50 Mac-mini.local Mail[774]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Ticket expired (negative cache)) Feb 7 23:03:50 Mac-mini.local Mail[774]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Ticket expired (negative cache)) Feb 7 23:03:50 Mac-mini.local Mail[774]: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Ticket expired (negative cache)) Feb 7 23:03:50 Mac-mini.local Mail[774]: Failed to start the SASL connection SASL(-1): generic failure: GSSAPI Error: Miscellaneous failure (see text (Ticket expired (negative cache)) Feb 7 23:03:50 Mac-mini.local nsurlstoraged[369]: Error: stepSQLStatement:toCompletionWithRetry - stepping returned unhandled result=11, DB=/Users/johnm/Caches/com.apple.Safari/Cache.db Feb 7 23:05:04 localhost bootlog[0]: BOOT_TIME 1423368304 0 Feb 7 23:05:07 localhost syslogd[21]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.AccountPolicyHelper" claims selected messages. Those messages may not appear in standard system log files or in the ASL database. Feb 7 23:05:07 localhost syslogd[21]: Configuration Notice: ASL Module "com.apple.authd" sharing output destination "/var/log/asl" with ASL Module "com.apple.asl". Output parameters from ASL Module "com.apple.asl" override any specified in ASL Module "com.apple.authd".
     
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Feb 9, 2015, 07:51 AM
 
Well, there has to be a kernel bug or hardware to cause a crash, but Flash might be the trigger.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
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Feb 10, 2015, 09:35 AM
 
Flash seems to play "fast and loose" with hardware sometimes. Depending on where the Flash content is coming from, both the external source and what app is trying to use Flash, it could easily cause enough of a memory management or acceleration problem to cause a crash.

The key to look into this bit is to find a way to make it happen. Opening Flash content with Safari, with some other browser, and invoking Flash directly (start with the same Flash content) is what I'd try first. While it seems to be a very intermittent issue, it is most likely that the intermittent part is just not getting all the conditions lined up most of the time.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 11, 2015, 10:16 PM
 
Happened again yesterday. Its hard for me to declare its definitely not flash, because i always have lots of browsers open so theres probably always one or to flash applets running. I still put my money on a RAM problem, but it does seem to be crashing more often. So if it is RAM, it should be getting to the point soon where it is testable.
     
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Feb 13, 2015, 05:29 AM
 
Just make a Memtest86 disc and leave it running over night.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 13, 2015, 05:45 AM
 
I already did that and it found nothing
     
l008com  (op)
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Feb 28, 2015, 01:18 PM
 
Ok so I went a few weeks with on issues, then the other night, it happened again. Exactly the same as before, the whole computer froze rock solid, the last half second of audio kept playing in a loop, then after a few seconds, the computer rebooted itself.

ONLY GET THIS, it didn't happen on my Mac mini, it happened on my MacBook Pro! How suspicious is that! I have very little 3rd party software running, and nothing at all that is 'sketchy'. Now I was watching a flash video when this most recent one happened. But that doesn't mean flash is causing the crashes.... i mean almost all websites have some form of flash or another, between content and ads. Point being that theres almost always going to be a flash something open when a crash happens even if it's not caused by flash. But that said, I do no longer believe this to be a RAM problem. No way the RAM in both of my Macs is going bad at the same time. Very very strange.
     
Thorzdad
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Mar 1, 2015, 09:03 AM
 
You say you usually have lots of browser windows open...Could this be a semi-sketchy website you regularly visit? How about sites with tons of animated gifs? Like a Tumblr page?
     
l008com  (op)
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Mar 1, 2015, 04:50 PM
 
Well, the mini always have several windows open in various spaces, in addition to the main space that has whatever I'm doing at the time. The laptop does not though, it only had one browser window open at the time, and it was I think a youtube page. You would think that a sketchy web page wouldn't even be able to crash the whole browser app, let alone the whole machine.
     
iMOTOR
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Mar 8, 2015, 04:30 AM
 
Originally Posted by l008com View Post
i mean almost all websites have some form of flash or another, between content and ads. Point being that theres almost always going to be a flash something open when a crash happens even if it's not caused by flash.
I'd say very few pages have flash content these days, especially considering iOS has no access to flash player. And according to Jobs, the fact that flash was the number one cause of crashes to Safari was the main reason they prohibited flash player on iOS.
     
residentEvil
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Mar 20, 2015, 08:45 AM
 
You didn't post logs from the other machine, so I can't compare. But just before the "reboot" in the above samples, this happens:

nsurlstoraged[249] errors in your browser's (Safari) cache.db

i would suggest not only deleting cache.db (it creates a new one), but go through Safari on both machines and do a clean-up/clear cache/etc as well as remove any extensions/third-party add-ons.

go until it happens again for a few days. if not, then slowly turn on an extension/third-party stuff until it happens again. you will find it.

it's a safari issue, several threads about it via google/apple searches. something corrupted your cache is keeps corrupting.

to prove it: you could always create a new user too, login with that, and surf about for a few days (but don't install any extensions/third-party stuff). i bet it doesn't reboot with that new user.

edit: i assume you have all the latest Safari patches installed as well.
     
l008com  (op)
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Mar 20, 2015, 01:56 PM
 
What makes it hard to diagnose is that it regularly goes days/weeks without happening. It hasn't happened since my last post. Also I have no 3rd party stuff to disable. If it is a safari thing, hopefully that last update fixes it.
     
   
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