I've been using PC for a long time and i decided 3 months ago to buy an Imac dvse.
Everyone around me said i did a good choice, that i will see the difference of the OS...now i have seen!
After 3 months this bloody computer is more instable than a boat in the middle of an hurricane. Netscape 4.7 is always blocked, the Finder is always blocked to, and sometimes i don't do anything and the system gets freezed by itself!!! waow !!
What can i do to solve this problem ? ( don't tell me please i will have to bring it back to an apple center, it's Paris )
Finaly i'm begining to think that wintel is not this bad ( espacially under win NT )
Good vibes from Paris

[disectamac]

When you say blocked...What exactly does that mean.....being more specific with the troubles you are having can help others in the forum solve your comp troubles.
I have an iMac DVSE and in all honesty....It's the best machine I've ever used. Yes that's comparing to a 650Mhz PIII etc etc.

[fletch521]

If your that unhappy you could sell your iMac to Aqua4Me. At last count I think that he was up to about $825.00 and at 14 years old I'm sure that he'll do much less winning

Fletch

Hey "Francois"

You're not being to specific but let's give this a try. Now this is assuming that you haven't added more memory which may in fact be incompatible with the iMac...

I would recommend reformatting your drive and starting over.

The most thorough "wipe" would be to boot up with your "restore" cd and when you get to your desktop open the utilities folder located on your restore cd. Next select drive setup--> the from the menu select "initialization options"----> select "low level format" AND "write all zeros" this may sound extreme to some but I have seen this problem before (I'm a certified mac tech @ an apple authorized service center) and this has alleviated the problem. Once you've made your selections select "Initialize" and it will ask you are you sure and you say "intialize" and it may take a little while to complete this process.

Once this is complete select retore all software, and you should be set!

Now if you still have problems make sure all of your device drivers (scanner, external drive, etc.) are compatible with OS 9.

Good Luck!

[Feathers]

The original message in this slot has been removed due to a lack of humour - we apologise for any inconvenience - normal service will resume shortly.


[This message has been edited by Feathers (edited 03-04-2000).]

[penginkun]

Netscape can also become unstable if you give it too much memory. If you do a get info, and look at the preferred size, it should be about 14 to 15 mb (that's 14336k or 15360k) and minimum should be set to 6144 (12938k if you have VM off).

One other thing to look at is the Internet control panel. If it's set to use IE as the default web browser, you're going to need to change it to Netscape Communicator if you want Comm as your default browser.

First of all, I think everyone should be more friendly to our guest. This is, after all, the World Wide Web.

He is from France, and English may be a second language to him. We conduct our daily affairs in english, he may not. Many terms, especially computer terms, are different in other languages.

That being said, I would suggest the simplest thing to do if you have no idea the could of the problem, re-install the OS from the system CD.

Be careful to keep track of what programs you install and try to avoid installing too many new programs at once. This way it your iMac begins behaving strangely, it is easier to say it started doing 'this' when I install 'that'.

There are plenty of knowledgeable people on this discussion, let's be kind and share our knowledge.

[Barney]

Just for curiosity. How old are you, Feathers?

I miss win-doze too (especially NT). I want nothing more then to see that reassuring "blue screen" again. Stick with the mac buddy. Once you get it working right, you won't regret your choice. Do you know what would happen if Microsoft made cars? You would be driving down the road, your car would turn blue and just stop. You would accept this and just restart it and go on your way...

[MAlan]

Felix...I have an iMac DV/SE and I'm not having the same problems as you so you can feel good about the fact that your experience can get better.

Firstly, what OS are you using...Mac OS 9.0 or Mac OS 8.6? Secondly, when you bought the computer did you just start using it like it was or did you reformat the hard drive and reinstall things? I reformatted and repartitioned the hard drive so I would minimize problems.

I have experienced system freezes but have since corrected them. Sometimes your system will freeze for different reasons. For instance...my computer would freeze after waking up from sleep and using Remote access.

I solved this by allocating more memory to Remote access. My system also would freeze when opening Virtual PC sometimes...Virtual PC is not a very predictable application in my view.

Anyway...there are software fixes for the DV/SE available from Apple that you can just Download. There are also lots of people will ing to help you in the Mac community. So write back and tell us what exactly is going on.

Could you explain what you mean by blocked? Do you mean crashed...i.e. when a program just stops working for apparently no reason?

-Mike

[MAlan]

Also...what kinds of things do you have hooked up to the iMac i.e. printer, scanner, zip drive, cd writer etc.

i had the same problems after installing netscape 4.7, so i work withthe version that comes with the imac, i formatted my HD just to get rid of all th e netscape extensions and start clean. it hasnt crashed much since, maybe just 2-3 times, and i did the reinstalliation over a month ago. it seems extremely frustrating at times, but i think, its very rare to find bad software for the mac.....on the other hand....whe the OS itself is so complicated(NT,98,95,2000), u cant expect the 3rd part software to run smoothly.
Anyway.....both sides have their good and bad. i dont want to start that damned argument again, so ill leave it at that. take care.

Macs rule......most of the time....

email me at [email protected] if you want to sell your imac dvse. all computers crash.-use your free apple support and call them. they will help you solve most problems-al

First thank u all for your answers.
I'm gonna try being more precise and in a good technical english.
I'm using mac OS 8.6 (in french) ,netscape 4.7 (in english), and i also have a floppy disk.
Now it's getting worse and worse everyday, the finder is always freezing , netscape too and a lot of other programs. The problem is that i can't reformat my HD because i have a lot of programs in it...and i can't reinstall all of them
I didn't have the time yet to try what u gave me, i'm gonna tonight...
I'm still a little bit disapointed but don't worry, even with all this problems i'm still convinced Mac has the best OS (even if Unix/Linux is as good), the best computers ( u got the look man) and the best community of users.
Thank u all guys( and girls?) and come in Paris we're having a lot of techno/house/drum/dub parties with nice girls...
Good vibes from Paris
FelixZeKat

Felix
The 'learning curve' is a fact of life. First of all, use Sherlock and find the 'Talkback' files/folders and trash them immediately. It is notoriously unstable and freezes often causing the 'Finder' to NOT work. Try that first, then the other excellent hints others are more adept at than me. Good luck, and patience pays.

[drg]

Make sure you don't have both RAM disk and Virtural memory on. Then try starting with the shift key down to see if it works without extensions. If it does, try turning half of them off and see if that makes it work. Make sure Netscape doesn't have an extra large cache, keep it down to 5 megs at most. If these don't help, do a clean install of the system. I run about 80 Macs and don't have these problems.

Hi all

I recently bought a iMac DVSE and have experienced some quite annoying "quasi-system crashes". Let me explain what I mean by that. From time to time, I would experience some system lock-ups of the following:

1. Mouse locks up but I can still type.
2. Keyboard locks up (ie cannot type), but can still move the mouse around and switch to or open new applications.
3. Both mouse and keyboard lock up.

The lock-up will disappear if I unplug my USB keyboard from the iMac and then plug it back again.

I suspect (pretty sure) the problem is USB keyboard driver or something along this line. Has anyone experienced the same problem and would like to share it?

BTW, I'm running MacOS 9 pre-installed and do not have any other peripherals connected.

Any suggestions are welcome. Thanks in Advance.

pengo

I too was a long time PC user who switched to iMac because he believed the hype. I miss the smooth multitasking and dynamic memory management and stability of Windows 95 (2nd ed.) On the other hand the hardware is fantastic. It looks great and speedwise, beats my office 's 500 MHz Pentium III hands down. All said it's a computer I can live with.

[edavis]

Pengo, just for grins, try pressing the "esc" key when the input devices start acting flaky...I have a 3rd party mouse, and occasionally I press some key combination that puts me in a funky mode. Pressing escape puts me back to normalcy, and I can continue.

Your problem may be completely unrelated, but what the heck, it's a cheap test, and may work!

Apple ships the imacs with way too many extensions turned on. You can make i t a lot more stable by opening the extension manager and turning off a lot of stuff you don't need . Especially faxSTF and aol. Speech and file sharing if you don't use them, all of the apple printers and desktop printing, printer sharing. web sharing too. There is a description of most items available while you are in the extension manager. Make a test set while you are getting it figured out, then make that your standard setting and make groups with the others if you need them, like for faxing.
Good luck, it really is a nice machine. A web browser is about the only thing that crashes my mac now. It's a lot more stable than my pc with win98.

[namannik]

chopbert-

Just wait 'till MacOS X!

Netscape version 4.7 does not work with OS9. either remove the "talkback" folder from within the nescape folder or reinstall 4.6 from the Mac OS cd. My new G4 locked up like crazy trying to run 4.7 but since I downgraded to 4.6 it's been a gem.

On instability....

The macintosh browser market at the moment is not the hottest. My experience is that if I have either netscape or explorer running, it is only a matter of time before my imac crashes. This is as much a fault of the people who produced the software as the mac. I won't even get into MacOS X, because we really don't know what that will look like, but Explorer 5 should hopefully help the mac browser problem.

For all the people that recommend reformatting -- to me that seems a little extreme. A last resort tactic. If you have rebuilt your desktop, resinstalled your system software (trashing your preferences), and tried using alternatives (icab or explorer instead of netscape, or a more or less current version of the same), and you still have problems... only then would I consider reformating.

On windows vs. mac stability: I would say the mac software is generally more stable, but windows handles instability better. That is, mac apps should crash less frequently, but when they do, they bring everything down with them. I'm not going to pretend then that stability is really an issue here: the platforms are about equal in that regard.

So...
Rebuild your desktop
Delete your preferences files
try a different browser/ version of browser
reinstall your system software

...
I recommend you get advice on these, but I don't have time to explain them right now.

Good luck.
you can email me at [email protected] if you have questions or need help.

[MAlan]

I have a feeling it might be that floppy disk drive. Maybe you can turn the extensions for that floppy disk drive off from the extensions manager and unplug the drive from the computer.

Nevertheless... you have a lot of things to try out but sorting through them all might be tough. If it was me I would prioritize these things from the most likely solutions that are easy to the most unlikely and harder solutions.

For example if it were me I might do something like this...

1. Check RAM disk and Virtual memory...try running system with both off.

2. Try the Netscape thing...i.e. revert from 4.7 to 4.6.

3. Try booting up with extensions off (hold down shift key as system starts) and floppy drive unplugged.
a. If this works gradually add the extensions back one by one by using the extension manager until the system becomes unstable again.

4. The talkback files suggestion from Dr. Derm.
5. Re-install the system software without reformatting and re-partitioning.

Good luck!

-Mike

Try this to solve your problems!

Rebuild your desktop file.
To do this hold down the Apple Key and option key during startup until you are given an option to rebuild your desktop. Next run apple disk first aid. This is located in the utilities folder on the Macintosh HD. If this does not find any problems or it finds one that it can't fix I suggest getting Norton Utilities for Mac Version 5.0. Any less and it wont start your iMac up from the CD.
Norton should solve all problems. Run speed disk too. I doubt you need to but it won't hurt. But, all your problems including crashes could be caused by an extension conflict. Some older extensions do not work with newer OS's and some porgrams will install a bad extension. To weed out a bad extension do this. Remove 50% of your extensions. If you stop crashing then the problem is in the 50%. If you still crash then remove the other 50% and put the first 50% back into the extension folder. Do same with control panels. I think you get the idea, this will be repeated until you are down to a few extensions or control panels. If you still have a problem after all this then if you are using OS 8.6 and less see how may fonts you have. if you have more then 128 you will have crashes. OS 9 handles more. Netscape, all I can tell you is netscape it self can cause many problems. I find Microsoft Internet Explorer better. Almost any MS product for the Mac is better than the counter part except Windows but it is Apples fault for not making it run on PC's, Windows is the only choice in that end. (that will get me in trouble). You are new to Macs so you dont have the general idea of how to solve problems or what software is out there. I am sorry if you feel you made the wrong choice, for you it might have been, a Mac is more for Mac People like me cause I can do any thing with it. To make you feel more at home with a Mac install Actions GoMac, this adds a functianl Start task bar.

When your computer starts up how many icons are at the bottom of the screen? You want to try and limit this to one row. To many of them causes problems. These are the extensions in the extensions folder. Look in the extensions folder and try and limit the extensions to 150 and the control Panels to 50. If all else fails do a clean install of the OS, and if you can you might find OS 8.6 more stable because OS 9 has some bugs. I hope I have been some help to you.

i have an imac dv se and it is the best computer i have ever owned! it never crashes since i updated to mac os 9

[Miniryu]

As far as browsers go, you're not going to be able to find anything at the present more stable than iCab. It's an amazing piece of software with some nifty features not available on any other browser (can you say image filtering!). Use sherlock to find the iCab homepage. It's still in beta, but it's more stable (and not to mention faster) than IE or Netscape.

[slboett]

I concur with the last two posts - my DV SE has crashed twice in almost 2+ months and iCab kicks butt! Even IE 5 is missing some great iCab features!

Scott

[ThinkInsane]

I was crashing quite a bit with netscape. Since I started using iCab, not one crash. I down loaded Eudora for my mail (works much better then netscape's built in junk mail reader) and am a much happier mac user for it. iCab won't load chat rooms for me, but I guess I can live without being asked three hundred times a day if I wanna "cyber". lol

[ThinkInsane]

Just for the record, right after I posted that last reply, about how since I dumped Netscape I hadn't had any crashes, I crashed... Error message came up with a restart button, and when I clicked restart, everything froze. I had to unplug the comp. Nothing else would work! I guess that's what I get for making boastful claims lol

I love iCab, but I don't tell many people to use it until it has been finished. But it is the best browser, and the fastest.

DONT UNPLUG THE iMAC!!!! Get a paperclip, there is a restart button in the panel that you plug the usb and stuff in. On the right side. Take a close look and you will find it. Not crashing alot now, but if you restart it from a crash like that, you will start to crash all the time.

[micha schraven]

This guy has not got an imac DV. I bet he has an old pc that stumbles on win98.
He just wants to say that NT is better than macOs. By saying he has the top-of-the-line consumermodel he tries to make himself heard.

poor guy.

On the day that I put all my savings in my pocket to buy a P3, I bought an imac 233. I never regretted this sudden change of mind. i am now the happy owner of 2 powerbooks.
At work we use NT, and damn it looks boring.
I can hack into almost every NTmachine because I have a mac and security only has firewalls for pc's. (no kidding) I love my mac. and everybody at work is jaleous.

so is this crappy guy that claims he has a bad imac.

I am the proud owner of three iMacs and five other macs, and I have found my iMac to be the coolest machine ever. The system is stable and I can't find a problem. If you are having problems, try reinstalling Mac OS nine on the CD boot. Make sure it is a clean install and first erase the whole hard drive. Then get a better internet connection. I take it you have a 56K modem? I am not sure if they have them in france, but get cable. Its cheap and reliable. Plus its about 100 times faster.

[micha schraven]

cable is NOT 100 times faster than that 56k thing inside the mac.

I used to use a standard dial-up account with a 56K modem. At work I have ISDN. Recently I got cable internet service. The numbers below are typically what I would see when downloading large files:

56k modem ~1.2K/sec
ISDN ~15K/sec
Cable ~200K/sec

You do the math.

Pengo-I have the exact same problem! Same machine, same issues, everything! (I posted a query about this before I read yours) Doesn't it drive you crazy? You're in the middle of typing a word and suddenly, nothing is happening! I've tried turning off the unnecessary extensions, but nothing seems to have changed. Most annoying as it is a wonderful computer.

micha schraven said -

"This guy has not got an imac DV. I bet he has an old pc that stumbles on win98.
He just wants to say that NT is better than macOs. By saying he has the top-of-the-line consumermodel he tries to make himself heard."

Micha, what exactly is your justification for calling FelixZeKat a liar? It sounds to me like all he or she did was ask some questions, express some frustrations, get some answers and says thanks. What's wrong with that?

hi felix,i had the same problem with my imac dvse.finally i've reinstalled my os 8.6 and everything works fine since this time.

p.s. quand tu download netscape ou tout autres applications ne la place pas au meme endroit comme ca si tu as un probleme tu pourras toujours la mettre dans la corbeille.

salut du quebec!

Logic Board Problems? USB Port problems?
Keyboard Problems? Mouse problems?
After testing our computer with Apple over the weekend and swapping out
keyboards and mice we have now taken it in for diagnostics and possible
logic board replacement. Original out of box config (with no
pereipherals - just keyboard and mouse) had periodic cursor freezes
which were remedied by removing keyboard USB connector and plugging it
back in (either port). Our machine even froze when booting from the OS9
CD. When we got our new keyboard from the apple fulfillment center we no
longer had the cursor freezes - instead we started experiencing typing
freezes (Apps, Sherlock, Naming Files whatever) once again this new
problem was remedied by removing Keyboard USB connector and plugging it
back in (either port). Apple told us it sounds like we need to replace
the Logic (Mother) Board - O.K. we will. For my money 0S 9 seems pretty stable to me - of course i checked all the software we suse to see if its compatable before aquiring the new computer. Xian.

xian you forget 1 problem???

USER PROBLEM!!

I have been checking into this forum from time to time to get a sense of other iMac user's level of satisfaction. Why? Because I'm so frustrated with the darn thing that I'm beginning to wish I had purchased a Windows PC. I've had too many problems, too many freezes, to many bombs, too many crashes to identify anything specific to discuss right now. But one thing is for sure: my PC at work is 50 times more stable than my new iMac (64M, 350Mhz Blueberry, 6 Gig HD).

I'm strictly a casual, but educated (or educatable?) user. I got the thing so I could have internet access and email at home, rather than burning company time between 9 to 5 cruising the web. I have Earthlink. It comes with the new iMacs. It's also extremely problematic. The real hassles started, with all things, the Dr. Solomon Virex anti-virus software. Almost as soon as I installed it there were extension conflicst that it took me days and too many hours to solve by searching MacAfee's website.

For what I paid for this thing, should I have to spend so much time trying to resolve conflicts? I don't think so. I bought the iMac because of Apple Computer's reputation for easy-to-use products. The only thing easy to use on this machine is the reset button.

It's not all frustration and rage, however. One of my favorite glitches was the day the iMac spontaneously turned itself on and off while I watched in astonishment, all the while sharing my disbelief in it's behaviour with another sometimes-frustrated Macintosh user on the phone. I got a kickout of that, but not much else about it's erratic behaviour is so endearing.

End of rant. Still, almost wish I could get my money back and start again. And please, don't tell me about reinstalling the entire system software.

Where did my money go?

[wlonh]

weeder2000, if you live in or very near NYC i will personally put that Mac right or see that it is put right.

Look. You're complaining about extension conflicts. Well thats not entirely Apple's fault. From my experience software programmers are slow to update their buggy software. This is why Apple sends out beta versions of their upcoming operating systems, so that 3rd parties can work out bugs and conflicts ahead of time. Some do, and some dont. For example, newer technology is just today announcing that their OS 9 drivers are ready. Cmon, OS 9.0.1/2/3/4 is in final canditate stage already.

Thankfully, there is light at the end of the tunnel. OS X will not use extensions. Personally, my iMac runs great with no conflicts. This is strange concidering that I've screwed around with it (mezzanine card & overclocked) and i have every 3rd party software product known to man. My OS takes up over 70MB of RAM.

wlonh: Wow! Thanks, but why on earth would you want to personally help me with my iMac? Forgive me if I seem suspicious, but this is the first time I�ve actually complained in an online forum, and I certainly wasn�t expecting such a response. In fact, I live in Brooklyn, so I may be interested in taking you up on the offer. I must confess that I have not tried Apple technical support, mainly because I dread getting on the phone and spending time either waiting for a live person to pick up or trying to explain, over the phone, what's been going wrong with my little blueberry pain in the neck. There have been so many glitches that I really must begin to keep a written log so that I don't forget anything.

And to iMacMan: I wish it were simply a question of extension conflicts, but I suspect it is worse, or more complicated, than that. If the problems were strictly the result of extension conflicts, how would I know? I would have to spend days, literally, turning them off and on to try to figure it out. I was stunned when I first looked at the collection of extension in my system folder, half of which provide no information regarding their purpose. Apple provides no software (control panels or whatever) to help one diagnose such problems, or if they do, I am not aware of it. I took a quick look at some software in a store that claims to do just that (can�t remember the name), but I can't afford $80 just to fix an operating system that I feel I have every right to expect to work without expensive, time-consuming maintenance. You don�t even want to hear what happened when I tried to add a Keyspan USB Hub to my system so I could use the scanner, printer, and the Palm HotSync cradle without plugging, unplugging, and re-plugging. It was a fiasco. I finally got an Entrega Hub which seems to work OK, but still, the HotSync doesn�t always work and I have to frequently restart and try again, which usually works.

Perhaps this discussion is getting far to specific when the original topic was �I shouldn�t have bought an iMac�� I have absolutely no interest in bashing Apple, but so far in my experience the frustration and disappointment has overtaking the pleasure and productivity I was looking for by purchasing an iMac.

[wlonh]

no need to be suspicious... it just struck me that there was also no need for you to be having such trouble and i imagine that i could give your iMac a good going-over... the once over, twice.

get you going right. that's all. i've been known to do these things. i'm older and i don't work so hard anymore and it doesn't take too much time to do these things occasionally

[slboett]

By all means, if you have the time and desire to do this - go for it. I'd love to have you prove to a non-believer that this IS how it should be and normally is. It may be bad hardware, but my experiences show that 90+% of the time, it's the user (don't be upset weeder2000, it's just the way it is)
If you do it wlonh, please report back...

Scott

[wlonh]

"It may be bad hardware, but my experiences show that 90+% of the time, it's the user"

umm er ahh, precisely. that is my experience too...

All of the above suggestions and fixes are good - let me add the following which willl give you rock solid performance on your iMac. We have peformed this "fixes" on hundreds of iMacs (we are an Apple Dealer), and it works almost every time.

Bombs and crashes are almost always caused by third party control panels and extensions. Use your Extensions Manager Control Panel (under the Apple Menu->Control Panels) and set it for OS 8.6 All and then Restart your iMac. This sets the iMac back to its default configuration from the factory. Your iMac will now run smoothly, but your external devices will be disabled, like your floppy drive. Once it is restarted, you will need to reinstall the software for whatever you have plugged in (ie floppy drive). Go to the manufacturer's web site (if you have a VST floppy drive, go to VST's website) and download the latest version of the software for the device.. DO NOT install the software that came with the device.

More Tips:
1) If you have installed Netscape 4.7 - go to you extensions manager and disable Idle Time and AIM menu - I know they are handy but they cause instability. If you have set your extensions manager to OS 8.6 all (as per above), these will already be disabled.

2) If you have a Umax scanner - go into your System Folder and locate the Control Strip Modules folder. Trash the Scanner Control Strip Module ONLY.

3) There is a known (but not announced) issue with AOL and Mac OS 9. ie - crashes, doesn't allow you to access the internet etc. The fix is: Don't use AOL until they get their software fixed and/or get a different Internet provider.

4) If your mouse cursor suddenly only moves in one direction, horizontally or vertically, unplug it and then plug it back in. If it works normally after that, then you may have an issue with your logic board - contact your local Apple Dealer.

5) Purchase your iMac and equipment from your local Apple Dealer (if you have one) instead of mail order or superstore. MOST Apple Dealers will provide you with great support (unlike mail order) and are there to help you instead of just selling you a box.

By the way, do NOT switch to a French version of OS8.6 on an iMac - you may have severe problems with the "Folder from Hell" when you try updating any software with the date set at more than the year 2000...

Sounds weird but its true - maybe only French-specific, maybe not, but it smacks to me of a year 2000 bug.

[Feathers]

Hey Barney,

First time I've been back to this topic. Well there's no way a Penguin's goin' to get into an arguement with a big purple dinosaur but age has nothing to do with a sense of humour and if you don't think it's funny - lighten up

P.S. If you're having a lot of trouble with your Mac (or PC) try dropping it off a tall building. It won't solve the problem but you'll have ten years in jail to glue the pieces back together!

[This message has been edited by Feathers (edited 03-04-2000).]