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Troubleshooting Extension Info Control Panel Info
Sad Macs, Bombs, And Other
Disasters
Update Highlights
(Second Edition)
The following items are taken from what was originally a much larger collection of items
that represented an update to the second edition of Sad Macs, Bombs, and Other
Disasters. Now that the third edition is available, the original update has been
removed. These remaining highlights are the items that have the most general and continued
relevance.
- Mac will not shut down If you try to shut down your
Mac and all applications have quit but the Mac sends you a message that says "can't
shutdown because the 'unknown' application can't quit," it is probably due to a
"background" application (the sort whose name does not appear in the Application
menu, giving you the impression that nothing is left open) or some similar process. On the
PCI Mac List where this was discussed, some users reported Microsoft Office Manager as a
potential culprit. Others reported HP Backgrounder, AppleScript, or documents left in the
PrintMonitor Documents folder. One user claimed the problem disappeared after installing
the SpeedDoubler 1.1 update. In any case, System 7.5.3 is supposed to fix this. Otherwise,
a utility that allows you to quit the Finder (such as Terminator Strip
2.5) may help to close those pesky applications.
If you have this shut down problem on a Power Mac, together with frequent crashes and freezes, make sure you have upgraded "Office 4.2x Update for PowerMac" from 1.0 to 1.0.1 or later.
- Unexpected Quits For unexpected quits, if increasing
the applications Preferred Memory Size does not work, make sure that there is adequate
memory in the Font Cache of Adobe Type Manager. This is set from its control panel. Adobe
recommends 50K-80K for every font that needs to be rendered on screen at one time
(including italics, bold, etc.).
- Battery dead; Mac dead? There have been reports that
if the battery installed on the logic board of your Mac (the one that maintains the PRAM
settings etc.) goes dead, you may not only lose your PRAM settings but you may be unable
to startup your Mac at all. Fortunately, replacing the battery fixes the problem. No major
repair is needed.
- Long startup times If your Mac suddenly starts
taking an unusually long time to startup (with lots of disk activity taking place), it may
be that the AppleShare PDS file can become corrupted. To fix this, delete the file and
recreate your access privileges as needed. Since AppleShare PDS is an invisible file, you
will need to use a utility, such as DiskTop, that lets you view invisible files.
If you are having unusual delays at startup, especially prior to the appearance of the smiling Mac, check your Startup Disk control panel. If no volume is selected, select your desired startup volume. Your startup time should now improve.
This is especially likely to happen if you had temporarily set a CD-ROM or removable cartridge to be the startup disk and that volume is no longer available.
- Less common causes of startup crashes
A corrupted preferences file. I personally had a problem where startup halted prior to the appearance of the Finder's menus and icons. Only a blank menubar and the desktop pattern appeared. A Force Quit succeeded in getting the Finder to load (restarting with extensions off also would have worked). But the problem kept recurring when I restarted with extensions on. Ultimately, I discovered that the problem was due to a corrupted Now Toolbox Prefs file (needed for Now Utilities). Deleting the Prefs file (after starting up with extensions off) fixed the problem. Now Utilities is especially notorious for these sort of problems.
More generally, if you check for extension conflictsand isolate the conflicting extension, you may find that deleting the file's preferences file (rather than replacing or disabling the file itself) solves the problem.
Apple Menu Options Prefs and PC Exchange Prefs are two other prime candidates for the Trash when problems appear. For example, corrupted Apple Menu Options Prefs may lead to a "There is not enough memory to load all of your extensions..." message at startup.
A buggy control strip module. In another case, a third-party control strip module, called Control PPP, caused a system freeze at startup. This was a somewhat hard to identify cause. My startup manager initially identified the problem as a triple conflict involving ATM, MacTCP and Control Strip. However, listing Control Strip as a conflict suggested to me that a Control Strip module may actually be the cause. As I had recently added the Control PPP module, this seemed like a likely candidate to try. Deleting it eliminated the problem.
- Energy Saver There are now at least four different
energy-related control panels in System 7.5: Auto Power On/Off or CPU Energy Saver (which
turn the computer itself on and off) and Energy Saver or Screen (which just put the
monitor into an energy-saving mode). Each control panel works only with certain models. To
play it safe, stick with the control panels that came with your hardware. Otherwise, Apple
maintains a tech info file, titled "Energy Saving Control Panels: Description &
Compatibility" (available at Apple's online locations; Web users can go to http://til.info.apple.com/til/til.html),
that describes what control panel goes with what hardware.
By the way, the Energy Saver 2.0.x "control panel" that ships with System 7.5.2 and 7.5.3 is actually an ordinary application, not a true control panel (cdev). It works in conjunction with a separate Energy Saver extension. To disable it, set the control panel's settings to "Never" and restart. Then, disable the extension.
- SimpleSound SimpleSound can create two types of
sound files:
It can create SimpleSound documents. These are standard AIFF files that can be used by most applications that can edit sounds (such as Avid VideoShop or SoundEdit 16). To do this, select New from SimpleSound's File menu.
It can create "system" sounds. These are files that play directly when you double-click them from the Finder. To do this, click the Add button from SimpleSound's Alert Sounds window. The newly recorded sound file will be stored in System file initially (where it can be used as an alert sound), but you can drag it out from there.
- Sound volume problems You may have a problem where
your Sound volume setting is not saved after a shut down, reverting to some default value.
While there are a number of possible causes and cures for this (zapping the PRAM may help,
reinstalling system software or even a hardware repair may be needed), the first thing to
try is wonderfully simple: delete the Sound Preferences file in your Preferences folder
(ideally do this after restarting with extensions off). Most of the time, this will solve
your problem.
- Word 5 memory bug There is a bug in Microsoft Word
5.x that causes the application to fail to open occasionally, especially on newer Mac
models. Instead, an error message appears that says that Word would not open because
"System memory is too low." It advises you to reduce Word's memory size.
Typically, you can ignore this advice. This is just a bug and has little or nothing to do
with how much memory you actually have. This most often happens when Word is the first
application you try to launch after startup. If you launch another application and go back
to Word, or if you simply retry launching Word a few times, the problem is usually
resolved.
There is a freeware extension, called Word 5.1. Memory Fix, that supposedly eliminates this problem. However, when I installed it on my Power Mac 7500, it had no effect. Some users report that OptiMem can solve the Word 5.1a bug. Otherwise, increasing the size of the system heap (such as via Conflict Catcher's Guarantee System Heap command) may resolve this problem.
- Printing damaged files If, when trying to print a
file, you get a message that the file could not print because it was damaged, the damage
may not be to the original document. Instead, it may be with the "spooled"
version of the document that is created when background printing is on. The solution is to
go to the "spooled documents" folder in the System Folder and delete the
document (if you use desktop printers, you can try to delete the document directly from
the desktop icon's window). Then try to print again.
- StyleWriter printing problems When using
StyleWriters, system software memory allocation will likely increase by several megabytes
when printing. This is normal. If you do not have sufficient free memory, you will get a
message that says you are unable to print until more memory is made available. If this
happens, quit any open applications and try again.
Also, remember that StyleWriters use the Mac's processor to do all their image processing (unlike PostScript LaserWriters, which have their own processor). This means that if you continue to use the Mac while the StyleWriter tries to print in the background, the StyleWriter's printing can slow to a incredible crawl. If this happens, just stop using your Mac until the print job is done.
- SimpleText and Graphics Did you ever wonder how the
SimpleText Read Me files that come with some software include pictures in them? It seems
impossible because the SimpleText program itself doesn't let you paste graphics. It can be
done, although (considering Apple's pride in its ease of use factor) it is amazingly
complicated and requires ResEdit. However, Apple has a Technote file that
spells it all out.
By the way, if you convert a read-only SimpleText file to an editable one (as described in Sad Macs), any editing changes you do may result in the document's graphics being lost or not displayed properly.
Finally, note that while you can't edit graphics files (such as screen snapshots) in SimpleText, it is still great for quickly copying a selected portion of the file's image to the clipboard. In most "draw" programs, you either cannot do this at all or must first paste the graphic into a special "paint" window to do it.
- System software installation failure Installation
failures may result in messages such: "There is a problem with the disk you are
trying to install onto" or "An error occurred while installing onto the active
startup disk..." These errors are most often caused either by an extension conflict
or a corrupt font. To check for both, attempt to reinstall with extensions off (a good
idea in general) and the Fonts folder out of System Folder. A corrupt font will likely
only cause problems if the Installer attempts to install a font (particularly common with
printing software installations) that has the same name as a corrupt font currently in
your System Folder.
- Memory issues A new bit
of jargon that is increasingly seen these days is memory leak. This refers to a
situation where when, after an application quits, it does not release part or all of the
memory it had been allocated. This, especially if it happens repeatedly, can severely
restrict the amount of free RAM you have available over the course of a session. We just
described a problem with shared libraries that can cause this. However, it has become
apparent that there are also other more subtle causes of memory leaks, typically due to
bugs in the relevant software.
Otherwise, a force quit (Command-Option-Escape) from the Finder sometimes frees up the memory. Or you might try a freeware utility called Mac OS Purge or even one called Fix Heap (which really just defragments the heap). Another possible solution is Terminator Strip 2.5, a Control Strip module that can send a Quit command to the Finder. It's similar to doing a Force Quit, but less likely to have undesirable side-effects. Otherwise, you'll have to restart.
Shared Library files load into the system heap. The memory they use may remain in system heap even after quitting the relevant applications! This is one reason why you may not regain all of your expected free memory even with all applications closed.
Conflict Catcher 3 now has the option to increase the size of system heap. It is called Guarantee System Heap. (Now Utilities has a similar option.). Increasing the system heap should rarely be needed, but may be helpful in certain cases, such as if you cannot load all of your extensions at startup due to insufficient memory or if you get frequent "out of memory" messages while in the Finder (even with all applications quit and all windows closed).
An alternative to increasing the size of the system heap, that may preferable for less chronic memory problems, is to clear the system heap of unneeded data, such as information from extensions that load when used but then are not cleared when they are no longer needed. The freeware utility, Mac OS Purge, can do this.
- Virus information A new form of virus is among us:
scriptable viruses. One category are viruses based on HyperCard scripts (using the
HyperTalk language). They infect HyperCard stacks. One example is the
"Merryxmas" virus, that was inadvertently present in some copies of (a now
out-of-date version of) Apple's SIMM Stack. It does no active harm to your Mac. "HC
9507" is yet another recently reported HyperCard virus. It types the word
"pickle" and makes the system behave strangely.
Many anti-virus utilities, including Disinfectant, ignore these HyperTalk viruses, but latest versions of SAM and Virex do check for them.
Another form scriptable virus can infect Microsoft Word 6.0 documents and templates. One example is a virus named "Word Macro 9508" "WordMacro.Concept" It is written in the Microsoft Word macro-language, Word Basic. It functions when using Word 6 (and is more commonly found on PCs running Windows than on Macs). Infected documents appear with the template icon, rather than the usual document icon. Delete infected files. Otherwise, a file available online from Microsoft, called "mw1222.hqx" at Internet locations, can supposedly eradicate the virus.
The Good Times virus hoax seems to be on the rise again. Basically, if you get email that says to beware of an email message with the subject "Good Times," and that even reading such a file could erase your hard drive or destroy your processor, do not believe it. It is a hoax!
- Generic icons If your
System and Finder icons become generic (sometimes after rebuilding the Desktop),
this typically means that the System file's Bundle bit information has gotten corrupted in
the Desktop files or (more likely) the file's Bundle bit itself has somehow gotten
unchecked. In the former case, rebuilding the Desktop should help. However, you can save
yourself the hassle of a complete rebuild by simply updating the Desktop for the System
file alone (via a utility such as Save a BNDL or by using Norton Utilities' "Add File
to Desktop" command). Otherwise, look to see if the file's Bundle bit is unchecked
(using a utility such as Snitch). If so, check it. While you are at it, also uncheck the
Inited bit. Then restart. This should get your icons back. If nothing else works, doing a
clean reinstall should get the job done.
By the way, Apple's Telecom software is known to be one cause of this problem.
There is a web page, called The Generic Icon Page, specifically devoted to generic icon problems. While most of what is discussed there is also covered in Sad Macs, it is worth a look. One note: it points out that with today's larger disks and multiple disk options (e.g., removable drives) there is an increased chance of generic icons appearing for document icons or aliases on a startup volume that are linked to applications that are stored on some other volume. The problem is that the Finder may check for icon data before the secondary volumes mount. The problem does not occur unless the Finder actually tries to display the icon before the volume is mounted. So one solution is to keep these icons off your desktop and out of any windows that are automatically opened at startup.
Otherwise, a quick fix is to do a Force Quit or otherwise use a utility that quits the Finder (such as Terminator Strip). When the desktop re-appears, the custom icons will be restored. However, the generic icons will return the next time you restart. The same is true if you simply rebuild the deaktop.
The Generic Icon Page also has a helpful explanation of the resources (as seen with ResEdit) needed for icons to display correctly.
- Finder links broken I've seen occasional reports
where rebuilding the desktop with extensions on resulted in the loss of all Finder links
between documents and applications. You may get unusual error messages (with negative
error codes) when you double-click on a document from the Finder. Rebuilding the desktop
again with extensions off solved the problem.
- Write cache problem There is a problem that occurs
with some brands of hard drives (most notably Quantum Fireballs; you can check the name of
your drive from utilities such as SCSIProbe) in some Power Macs (most notably Macintosh
7500, 8500 and 9500) whereby the disk data may occasionally get corrupted at the time of
shutdown. This will only happen if the drive is an internal drive stored on bus 0 (which
is certainly the bus where your drive will be if you only have one internal drive) and is
set to be your startup drive.
Essentially, it is due to the Mac's failure to recognize the action of the write-cache operation on the drive. The write-cache is sometimes still writing data to the drive from the RAM buffer at the time the Mac shuts off. Drives formatted with Apple utilities do not have this problem, as Apple's driver makes sure the write-cache is flushed before the shutdown occurs.
However, it does affect third party drives. The ultimate solution here will be in the form of updated formatting utilities. APS PowerTools 4.0.4 already includes this fix, which also makes sure the write-cache is flushed before the shutdown occurs. Power Computing has a free utility that can turn off the write-cache on your drive. This is a fix of sorts, but you lose the advantage of the better performance with the write-cache on. The solution for Hard Disk ToolKit also apparently simply turns the write-cache off.
- Reformatting problem If you try to reformat a hard
disk after starting up with the Apple CD that came with your Mac, you may get messages
that this cannot be done because virtual memory (VM) is "on" (even though it is
not) or because files are "in use. The apparent problem is that some versions of
these CDs set VM to on (and thus place the invisible VM file on your disk which then leads
to the symptoms described). A simple work-around is to hold down the Command key when
starting up from the CD. This turns virtual memory off for that session.
- Diagnostic test fails Hard drive diagnostic tests may fail on PCI-based Macs, indicating a problem where none really exists. The culprit is the hard drive spin down feature of the Energy Saver control panel. If the drive spins down during the test, it will indicate a failure. To avoid this, make sure you select "Never" from the Sleep Setup option in the control panel.
Copyright � 1996, 1997 by Ted Landau. All rights reserved.
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