Q: OSX Mavericks System Preference Pane Not Working

Hi dianeoforegon

Question: I have only the normal user account and the guest user account available. I cannot add another user account since the "+"-Button is non-functional, too. Can i use the the guest-account for your proposed migration?

And BTW the advanced options is non-functional, too....

Hi Nemo11,

As you point out you can't use the + button - what you need to do is login to the guest account and then create a new admin account once you are logged in as a guest

Follow these steps::

1. backup everything first

2. Make sure you put all your files/folders in the Share Folder (/Users/Shared) from your old user  account to avoid getting file permission issues (use Option+Command + V to move files is faster)

3. Go to System Preferences, then Users & Groups

4. click on the padlock to let you make chances

5. click "Login Option"

6. Click "show fast user switching menu" checkbox and choose Icon

you should now see a head (3rd icon from the right)

7. Click on Guest User

8. Go to System Preferences, then Users & Groups

9.  click on the padlock to let you make chances

10. click the plus button and create a new administrator account

11. repeat step 6 and choose your new admin account and login

12. now you are logged in to your new admin account, copy the files from the Shared Folder into your new home directory /Users/YourNewAdminAccount

13. once that is all done delete your old admin account

14. repeat backup

Hi there,

thanks a million for the tip. Will try. I hope no other non-functional buttons will block that process ;-)

Cheers!

Unfortunately all the issues have returned even though I have migrated to a new user account

Oh dear, could it be hammertime?

https://discussions.apple.com/message/23692574#23692574

Did you reset the user permissions after migrating files? (See random idea from earlier)

https://discussions.apple.com/message/23678538#23678538

Hey drew

I have tried the following as previously suggested

cd /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration

sudo mv NetworkInterfaces.plist NetworkInterfaces.plist.bak

sudo mv preferences.plist preferences.plist.bak

I have also used the 'resetpassword' command in termeinal in recovery mode to reset file permissions....but on restart I still have the same problem

Drew - you asked:  "Did you check the group id's?" - what does that mean and how do I do that?

Drew here are the results from earlier for:

sudo find / -iname 'ViewBridge'

Here is the EtreCheck report for the bad admin account:

Hardware Information:

          MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012)

          MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro10,1

          1 2.6 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4 cores

          8 GB RAM

Video Information:

          Intel HD Graphics 4000 - VRAM: 1024 MB

          NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M - VRAM: 1024 MB

Audio Plug-ins:

          BluetoothAudioPlugIn: Version: 1.0

          AirPlay: Version: 1.9

          AppleAVBAudio: Version: 2.0.0

          iSightAudio: Version: 7.7.3

System Software:

          OS X 10.9 (13A603) - Uptime: 0 days 0:35:12

Disk Information:

          APPLE SSD SM512E disk0 : (500.28 GB)

                    EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

                    disk0s2 (disk0s2) <not mounted>: 499.42 GB

                    Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB

USB Information:

          Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)

          Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

          Apple Inc. BRCM20702 Hub

                    Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

FireWire Information:

Thunderbolt Information:

          Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

Kernel Extensions:

          com.avast.PacketForwarder          (1.3)

          com.avast.AvastFileShield          (2.0.0)

Problem System Launch Daemons:

Problem System Launch Agents:

          [failed] com.paragon.ExtFS.notify.plist

Launch Daemons:

          [loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.informer.mac.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.privileged_startx.plist

Launch Agents:

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.startx.plist

User Launch Agents:

          [loaded] com.avast.home.userinit.plist

User Login Items:

          CheatSheet

          gfxCardStatus

          Quicksilver

          AppTrap

          BetterSnapTool

          Copy

          ClipMenu

          TomTomHOMERunner

3rd Party Preference Panes:

          None

Internet Plug-ins:

          Default Browser.plugin

          Flash Player.plugin

          FlashPlayer-10.6.plugin

          QuickTime Plugin.plugin

          SharePointBrowserPlugin.plugin

User Internet Plug-ins:

          Picasa.plugin

Bad Fonts:

          None

Time Machine:

          Skip System Files: NO

          Mobile backups: ON

          Auto backup: YES

          Volumes being backed up:

          Destinations:

                    LMS Backup 2.5" HDD [Local] (Last used)

                    Total size: 999.71 GB

                    Total number of backups: 6

                    Oldest backup: 2013-10-29 01:15:50 +0000

                    Last backup: 2013-11-09 06:42:08 +0000

                    Size of backup disk: Excellent

                              Backup size 999.71 GB > (Disk size Zero KB X 3)

Top Processes by CPU:

              76%          mtmfs

              14%          mds

               8%          mtmd

               7%          find

               3%          WindowServer

               2%          opendirectoryd

               2%          kextd

               1%          Google Chrome

               1%          fseventsd

               1%          hidd

Top Processes by Memory:

          205 MB             WindowServer

          156 MB             Google Chrome

          131 MB             Google Chrome Helper

          123 MB             mds_stores

          49 MB              Copy

          34 MB              Finder

          33 MB              Terminal

          33 MB              mds

          33 MB              EtreCheck

          33 MB              TextEdit

Virtual Memory Statistics:

          209 MB             Free RAM

          2.07 GB            Active RAM

          2.05 GB            Inactive RAM

          1.23 GB            Wired RAM

          3.69 GB            Page-ins

          330 MB             Page-outs

=====================================

Here is the EtreCheck for the good admin account

Hardware Information:

          MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012)

          MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro10,1

          1 2.6 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4 cores

          8 GB RAM

Video Information:

          Intel HD Graphics 4000 - VRAM: 1024 MB

          NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M - VRAM: 1024 MB

Audio Plug-ins:

          BluetoothAudioPlugIn: Version: 1.0

          AirPlay: Version: 1.9

          AppleAVBAudio: Version: 2.0.0

          iSightAudio: Version: 7.7.3

System Software:

          OS X 10.9 (13A603) - Uptime: 0 days 0:32:48

Disk Information:

          APPLE SSD SM512E disk0 : (500.28 GB)

                    EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

                    disk0s2 (disk0s2) <not mounted>: 499.42 GB

                    Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB

USB Information:

          Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)

          Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

          Apple Inc. BRCM20702 Hub

                    Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

FireWire Information:

Thunderbolt Information:

          Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

Kernel Extensions:

          com.avast.PacketForwarder          (1.3)

          com.avast.AvastFileShield          (2.0.0)

Problem System Launch Daemons:

Problem System Launch Agents:

          [failed] com.paragon.ExtFS.notify.plist

Launch Daemons:

          [loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.informer.mac.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.privileged_startx.plist

Launch Agents:

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.startx.plist

User Launch Agents:

          [not loaded] com.avast.home.userinit.plist

User Login Items:

          None

3rd Party Preference Panes:

          None

Internet Plug-ins:

          Default Browser.plugin

          Flash Player.plugin

          FlashPlayer-10.6.plugin

          QuickTime Plugin.plugin

          SharePointBrowserPlugin.plugin

User Internet Plug-ins:

Bad Fonts:

          None

Time Machine:

          Skip System Files: NO

          Mobile backups: ON

          Auto backup: YES

          Volumes being backed up:

          Destinations:

                    LMS Backup 2.5" HDD [Local] (Last used)

                    Total size: 999.71 GB

                    Total number of backups: 6

                    Oldest backup: 2013-10-29 01:15:50 +0000

                    Last backup: 2013-11-09 06:42:08 +0000

                    Size of backup disk: Excellent

                              Backup size 999.71 GB > (Disk size Zero KB X 3)

Top Processes by CPU:

              59%          mtmfs

              7%          mds_stores

              6%          mds

              5%          find

              4%          UserNotificationCenter

              2%          WindowServer

              2%          opendirectoryd

              1%          fseventsd

              1%          Copy

              0%          Google Chrome

Top Processes by Memory:

          172 MB             WindowServer

          156 MB             Google Chrome

          106 MB             Finder

          106 MB             Google Chrome Helper

          62 MB              Dock

          49 MB              mds_stores

          49 MB              Copy

          33 MB              mds

          33 MB              loginwindow

          25 MB              CVMCompiler

Virtual Memory Statistics:

          143 MB             Free RAM

          2.18 GB            Active RAM

          2.08 GB            Inactive RAM

          1.34 GB            Wired RAM

          3.59 GB            Page-ins

          284 MB             Page-outs

Does this show anything useful?

luke_aus wrote:

 

Drew - you asked:  "Did you check the group id's?" - what does that mean and how do I do that?

It's the id command in Terminal.

e.g.

id drew

id admin

That will show what groups each user belongs to.

It seems unlikly to be the issue now you have created a new user, but I thought it was worth checking back when this all started incase the user migrated without a group.

The bad and good user have different login items.

User Launch Agents:

          [not loaded] com.avast.home.userinit.plist

User Login Items:

          None

vs.

User Launch Agents:

          [loaded] com.avast.home.userinit.plist

User Login Items:

          CheatSheet

          gfxCardStatus

          Quicksilver

          AppTrap

          BetterSnapTool

          Copy

          ClipMenu

          TomTomHOMERunner

That could be a cause, remove them in 'System Preferences > Users & groups'.

Also I don't know what the following items could cause…

Kernel Extensions:

          com.avast.PacketForwarder          (1.3)

          com.avast.AvastFileShield          (2.0.0)

Problem System Launch Agents:

          [failed] com.paragon.ExtFS.notify.plist

Launch Daemons:

          [loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.informer.mac.daemon.plist

          [loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.privileged_startx.plist

Launch Agents:

          [loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist

          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.startx.plist

Kernel Extensions:

Inside /Library/Extensions/

These also load third party code, but they insert it into the 'core' of the OS. These can be safe, however you must ensure the related tools or apps are up to date, otherwise the system is basically built upon quicksand. Remove them all & see if the OS works better.

Launchd jobs: several types

LaunchAgents          - Stored in /Library/LaunchAgents

LaunchDaemons      - Stored in /Library/LaunchDaemons

User LaunchAgents  - Stored in ~/Library/LaunchAgents

These are all background jobs, they are not necessarily bad, but if they are loading old code it could be doing untold damage to the performance & stability of the entire OS. Focus on the System level jobs (the ones inside /Library - the system level) also look at 'failed' jobs.

EtreCheck gives a status on launchd jobs…

[loaded]                  - a running job

[not loaded]            - jobs that are set not to run, basically harmless, remove them unless you plan to use the associated software (if it is up to date)

[failed]                   - jobs in a crashed or unknown state, it could be forking processes or using all the system resources, remove these.

SOLUTION:

Thanks for your reply Drew

By thinking what has changed since I created a new account that may have caused the problem I figured it out - re-enable shadows (I disabled them to take a screenshot without shadows)

I ran the following commands one at a time in terminal and its all working again:

     defaults write NSGlobalDomain NSUseLeopardWindowValues YES

     defaults write com.apple.Safari NSUseLeopardWindowValues NO

     killall SystemUIServer

no log out required!

YES!  This solved it for me! 

A BIG BOLD THANK YOU luke_aus!

Congrats,

That's great news for both of you.

Many thanks for taking the time to help, Drew. 

macmark2 wrote:

 

Many thanks for taking the time to help, Drew. 

No problem, I hope everyone else tries it & has sucess too.

SUCESS! This fixed it for me as well.