theshadow82

Q: My iMac's computer name keeps changing automatically after Yosemite upgrade

This started happening once I upgraded my iMac to Yosemite. It will add numbers to the name of my iMac.

 

Example: It starts off as say "My iMac"

 

Then a half day later, it changes to "My iMac (2)"

 

Then the next day it will be "My iMac (3)"

 

And if I open the Finder window, it will show "My iMac" and "My iMac (2)" under "Shared" but if you click on them, nothing happens.

 

When I go to System Preferences > Sharing the computer name will have the number there "My iMac (3)" and say it can be found as MyiMac-3.local

 

If I change it back to just "My iMac", the number process starts all over again. I even tried naming the iMac something it was never named before and the same process occurs with the adding of the numbers.

 

Anyone know how I can fix this?

iMac (21.5-inch, Late 2012), OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Oct 26, 2014 3:45 PM

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Q: My iMac's computer name keeps changing automatically after Yosemite upgrade

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  • by janefromnottingham,

    janefromnottingham janefromnottingham Nov 30, 2014 2:48 PM in response to theshadow82
    Level 1 (14 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 30, 2014 2:48 PM in response to theshadow82

    mine is slightly different, it seems to have changed my network name now my network name is different (by one character) to my computer name. Its true for my iPad as well (and the same character).

     

    Could the network name be restricted in some way?

  • by farquaad,

    farquaad farquaad Dec 6, 2014 1:29 PM in response to farquaad
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Dec 6, 2014 1:29 PM in response to farquaad

    Oh crap. It's back.

  • by Colin Sutton,

    Colin Sutton Colin Sutton Dec 6, 2014 1:41 PM in response to farquaad
    Level 1 (30 points)
    Mac OS X
    Dec 6, 2014 1:41 PM in response to farquaad

    Markisttoll's suggestion

    (sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c "Add :ProgramArguments: string --no-namechange" /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.discoveryd.plist)

    stopped ny iMac's computer name changing, but 'computer name (2)'  and 'computer name (3)' still keep appearing on the network.

  • by kathukid,

    kathukid kathukid Dec 9, 2014 12:05 PM in response to farquaad
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Dec 9, 2014 12:05 PM in response to farquaad

    That sounded good, but didn't work.  After repairing disk permissions, clicked on sharing and I could watch my computer name change from iMac to iMac (2).  But for some reason, I was able to get my Macbook to quit changing the name, but I have no idea why.  All I did there was change the name back to MacBook and then turn the wifi off and back on again, and it hasn't changed name since, but that doesn't seem to work with the iMac.

  • by kathukid,

    kathukid kathukid Dec 9, 2014 12:20 PM in response to bwadma
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mac OS X
    Dec 9, 2014 12:20 PM in response to bwadma

    That seemed to work!  I turned off SMB file sharing and then watched by computer name change right in front of me.  Then I changed it again, turned off file sharing and then turned it back on, and the name did not change again.  So far so good.  What a hassle.

  • by farquaad,

    farquaad farquaad Dec 9, 2014 12:21 PM in response to farquaad
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Dec 9, 2014 12:21 PM in response to farquaad

    Well, a few days later and the rename is sticking. Have no idea what prompted the issue, again; hadn't done anything that I know of. Maybe an app update or two.

     

    All I did this time to fix was change the name in Sharing and then repair permissions, all without Safe Mode or reboot.

     

    Still a pernicious OS X Yosemite bug I'd say.

  • by 신영섭,

    신영섭 신영섭 Dec 19, 2014 7:23 AM in response to bwadma
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 19, 2014 7:23 AM in response to bwadma

    This fixed my problem.

    Thank you!

  • by John-Francis Kinsler,

    John-Francis Kinsler John-Francis Kinsler Dec 20, 2014 8:47 PM in response to 213JB
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Dec 20, 2014 8:47 PM in response to 213JB

    You are my hero!

    Thank you for taking the time to provide a detailed step-by-step guide.

    This has been affecting me for months and I was annoyed at the long

    shopping list of useless shared devices... Now all is great.

  • by John-Francis Kinsler,

    John-Francis Kinsler John-Francis Kinsler Dec 20, 2014 8:56 PM in response to Chikiko
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Dec 20, 2014 8:56 PM in response to Chikiko

    Oops, sorry!

    I'm grateful to everyone

    but it was Chikiko's heroic step-by-step process I followed

    that completely solved my problem and erased the list of unwanted devices in the sidebar.

    I didn't try any other remedies suggested except I decided to verify and correct disk permissions

    and repair disk in between before restarting.

     

    (Just to clarify in case others are still having issues and decide to act on my recommendation).

     

    JFK

  • by DonLand,

    DonLand DonLand Jan 4, 2015 7:04 AM in response to John-Francis Kinsler
    Level 1 (40 points)
    Jan 4, 2015 7:04 AM in response to John-Francis Kinsler

    What appears to have worked for me was to go to Users & Group Preferences and delete older no longer used shared users.

  • by Kara Reuter,

    Kara Reuter Kara Reuter Jan 4, 2015 7:18 AM in response to Chikiko
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 4, 2015 7:18 AM in response to Chikiko

    Thanks, Chikiko, this solution seems to have worked for me!

     

    My Mac Mini had maxed out with (11) and I had half a dozen listings under Shared in Finder.  Similar to Chikiko's situation, my problem seems to have started when I switched ISPs.  That's when I started using the ISP's modem/router to create a wireless network and connected my Time Capsule to my Mac Mini via Ethernet in bridge mode as an external hard drive.  I followed Chikiko's steps and the computer name isn't changing anymore and the extra listings under Shared disappeared.

  • by McGroarty,

    McGroarty McGroarty Feb 6, 2015 11:54 AM in response to theshadow82
    Level 1 (51 points)
    Feb 6, 2015 11:54 AM in response to theshadow82

    By chance are you using wifi and a wired connection at the same time? OS X periodically changes the sharing name when a Mac discovers itself via traffic from one port to the other. It mistakes itself for another Mac already using the sharing name and alters the name. I believe you can see when this happens by searching your system logs for "already in use."

     

    The behavior started with one of the last Mavericks updates before the release of Yosemite, and it continues with both releases.

     

    For me, leaving wifi disabled eliminated the problem. It's not a great solution, however. It means Apple Maps, etc constantly pop up dialogs telling me to turn on wifi for better positioning accuracy. Unfortunately I can't turn wifi on and not join my network to avoid the problem either, as wifi connection preferences are synced between my Mac and iPhone as long as I have password sync on.

  • by m0thr4,

    m0thr4 m0thr4 Mar 4, 2015 2:09 AM in response to McGroarty
    Level 1 (117 points)
    Apple Watch
    Mar 4, 2015 2:09 AM in response to McGroarty

    McGroarty wrote:

     

    By chance are you using wifi and a wired connection at the same time? OS X periodically changes the sharing name when a Mac discovers itself via traffic from one port to the other. It mistakes itself for another Mac already using the sharing name and alters the name. I believe you can see when this happens by searching your system logs for "already in use."

     

    The behavior started with one of the last Mavericks updates before the release of Yosemite, and it continues with both releases.

     

    For me, leaving wifi disabled eliminated the problem. It's not a great solution, however. It means Apple Maps, etc constantly pop up dialogs telling me to turn on wifi for better positioning accuracy. Unfortunately I can't turn wifi on and not join my network to avoid the prEs, oblem either, as wifi connection preferences are synced between my Mac and iPhone as long as I have password sync on.

     

    If this is the root cause of this issue (and this does seem to be evident in the system logs) then I suspect this is a DHCP/sleep problem* combined with the ARP table becoming populated with duplicate** entries.

     

    tl;dr

    1.  Make sure all active network interfaces on your Mac have DHCP-reserved (or static) IP addresses.

    2.  Check the ARP table for duplicates** and clean if necessary

     

    * Device1 goes to sleep with a dynamically assigned IP address; DHCP lease time expires and Device1's IP address is released back into the pool; Device2 joins network and is given Device1's IP address; Device 1 wakes up and is told that its IP address is "already in use".

     

    ** run "sudo arp -a", and make sure you're reading the table correctly - what you're looking for is your Ethernet and/or Wifi MAC address appearing more than once with different IP addresses.  Or, the same IP address mapped to two different MAC addresses.

  • by Cam Allen,

    Cam Allen Cam Allen Mar 29, 2015 11:03 AM in response to theshadow82
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 29, 2015 11:03 AM in response to theshadow82

    Just got off the phone with Apple support, where they suggested the following fix:

     

    1. Go to System Preferences > Sharing and manually fix the computer name.

    2. Reboot, and go back into System Preferences to check that the computer name is still what you want it to be.

    3. Assuming it is, go to System Preferences > Network.

    4. Create new location (e.g. home2). Optionally, delete any other locations (so you don't go back to them later).

    5. Hit done, then apply. The computer should automatically reconnect to the network.

    6. Reboot, and then verify the computer name one more time.

     

    I asked him about the files in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/ and he basically said:

    Yeah, that's where they are, but don't mess with them manually, because these files all work together and it's easy to mess things up. In fact, Apple doesn't even give the document (that describes how to do it manually) to their tech support employees anymore since it's way easier to just do the location stuff above and create a fresh set.

     

    He also said that if it doesn't work, call back and they'll help resolve the issue.

     

    For what it's worth, even though it seems like it's an OS X bug, if you tell them your device is an Airport router they'll direct your call to the people who know about this issue. The first time I called, I tried reporting it as a Mac issue and they were a bit confused.

  • by iPadAppoftheWeek,

    iPadAppoftheWeek iPadAppoftheWeek May 2, 2015 2:57 PM in response to theshadow82
    Level 1 (12 points)
    May 2, 2015 2:57 PM in response to theshadow82

    Go to system preference>Sharing and then you can change the computer name.  It will fix it for a while.

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