Q: MAC PRO UNIDENTIFIED CONNECTION PROBLEMS

Please read this whole message before doing anything.

This procedure is a diagnostic test. It’s unlikely to solve your problem. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.

The purpose of the test is to determine whether the problem is caused by third-party software that loads automatically at startup or login, by a peripheral device, by a font conflict, or by corruption of the file system or of certain system caches.

Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed for the test, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards, if applicable. Start up in safe mode and log in to the account with the problem.

Note: If FileVault is enabled in OS X 10.9 or earlier, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a software RAID, you can’t do this. Ask for further instructions.

Safe mode is much slower to start up and run than normal, with limited graphics performance, and some things won’t work at all, including sound output and Wi-Fi on certain models. The next normal startup may also be somewhat slow.

The login screen appears even if you usually login automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.

Test while in safe mode. Same problem?

After testing, restart as usual (not in safe mode) and verify that you still have the problem. Post the results of the test.

1. This procedure is a diagnostic test. It changes nothing, for better or worse, and therefore will not, in itself, solve the problem. But with the aid of the test results, the solution may take a few minutes, instead of hours or days.

The test works on OS X 10.7 ("Lion") and later. I don't recommend running it on older versions of OS X. It will do no harm, but it won't do much good either.

Don't be put off by the complexity of these instructions. The process is much less complicated than the description. You do harder tasks with the computer all the time.

2. If you don't already have a current backup, please back up all data before doing anything else. The backup is necessary on general principle, not because of anything in the test procedure. Backup is always a must, and when you're having any kind of trouble with the computer, you may be at higher than usual risk of losing data, whether you follow these instructions or not.

There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.

3. Below are instructions to run a UNIX shell script, a type of program. As I wrote above, it changes nothing. It doesn't send or receive any data on the network. All it does is to generate a human-readable report on the state of the computer. That report goes nowhere unless you choose to share it. If you prefer, you can act on it yourself without disclosing the contents to me or anyone else.

You should be wondering whether you can believe me, and whether it's safe to run a program at the behest of a stranger. In general, no, it's not safe and I don't encourage it.

In this case, however, there are ways for you to decide whether the program is safe without having to trust me. First, you can read it. Unlike an application that you download and click to run, it's transparent, so anyone with the requisite skill can verify what it does.

You may not be able to understand the script yourself. But variations of it have been posted on this website thousands of times over a period of years. The site is hosted by Apple, which does not allow it to be used to distribute harmful software. Any one of the millions of registered users could have read the script and raised the alarm if it was harmful. Then I would not be here now and you would not be reading this message. See, for example, this discussion.

Another indication that the test is safe can be found in this thread, and this one, for example, where the comment in which I suggested it was recommended by one of the Apple Community Specialists, as explained here.

Nevertheless, if you can't satisfy yourself that these instructions are safe, don't follow them. Ask for other options.

4. Here's a general summary of what you need to do, if you choose to proceed:

☞ Copy a particular line of text to the Clipboard.

☞ Paste into the window of another application.

☞ Wait for the test to run. It usually takes a few minutes.

☞ Paste the results, which will have been copied automatically, back into a reply on this page.

These are not specific instructions; just an overview. The details are in parts 7 and 8 of this comment. The sequence is: copy, paste, wait, paste again. You don't need to copy a second time.

5. Try to test under conditions that reproduce the problem, as far as possible. For example, if the computer is intermittently slow, run the test during a slowdown.

You may have started up in safe mode. If the system is now in safe mode and works well enough in normal mode to run the test, restart as usual before running it. If you can only test in safe mode, do that.

6. If you have more than one user, and only one user is affected by the problem,, and the affected user is not an administrator, then please run the test twice: once while logged in as the affected user, and once as an administrator. The results may be different. The user that is created automatically on a new computer when you start it for the first time is an administrator. If you can't log in as an administrator, test as the affected user. Most personal Macs have only one user, and in that case this section doesn’t apply. Don't log in as root.

7. Load this linked web page (on the website "Pastebin.") Press the key combination command-A to select all the text, then copy it to the Clipboard by pressing command-C.

8. Launch the built-in Terminal application in any one of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.

Click anywhere in the Terminal window to activate it. Paste from the Clipboard into the window by pressing command-V, then press return. The text you pasted should vanish immediately.

9. If you're logged in as an administrator, you'll be prompted for your login password. Nothing will be displayed when you type it. You will not see the usual dots in place of typed characters. Make sure caps lock is off. Type carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you make three failed attempts to enter the password, the test will run anyway, but it will produce less information. If you don't know the password, or if you prefer not to enter it, just press return three times at the password prompt. Again, the script will still run.

If the test is taking much longer than usual to run because the computer is very slow, you might be prompted for your password a second time. The authorization that you grant by entering it expires automatically after five minutes.

If you're not logged in as an administrator, you won't be prompted for a password. The test will still run. It just won't do anything that requires administrator privileges.

10. The test may take a few minutes to run, depending on how many files you have and the speed of the computer. A computer that's abnormally slow may take longer to run the test. While it's running, a series of lines will appear in the Terminal window like this:

    Test started

        Part 1 of 4 done at: … sec
        …
        Part 4 of 4 done at: … sec

    The test results are on the Clipboard.

    Please close this window.

The intervals between parts won't be exactly equal, but they give a rough indication of progress.

Wait for the final message "Please close this window" to appear. If you don't see it within about 15 minutes, the test probably won't complete in a reasonable time. In that case, press the key combination control-C or command-period to stop it. Then go to the next step. You'll have incomplete results, but still something. If you close the Terminal window while the test is still running, the partial results won't be saved and you'll have to start over.

11. When the test is complete, or if you stopped it because it was taking too long, quit Terminal. The results will have been saved to the Clipboard automatically. They are not shown in the Terminal window. Please don't copy anything from there. All you have to do is start a reply to this comment and then paste by pressing command-V again.

At the top of the results, there will be a line that begins with the words "Start time." If you don't see that, but instead see a mass of gibberish, you didn't wait for the "close this window" message. Please wait for it and try again.

If any private information, such as your name or email address, appears in the results, anonymize it before posting. Usually that won't be necessary.

12. When you post the results, you might see an error message on the web page: "You have included content in your post that is not permitted," or "The message contains invalid characters." That's a bug in the software that runs this website. Please post the test results on Pastebin, then post a link here to the page you created.

If you have an account on Pastebin, please don't select Private from the Paste Exposure menu on the page, because then no one but you will be able to see it.

13. This is a public forum, and others may give you advice based on the results of the test. They speak for themselves, not for me. The test itself is harmless, but whatever else you're told to do may not be. For others who choose to run it, I don't recommend that you post the test results on this website unless I asked you to.

14. The linked UNIX shell script bears a notice of copyright. Readers of ASC may copy it for their own personal use. Neither the whole nor any part may be redistributed.

You may have to wait some time due to time-zone differences and regions apart

where your discussion participants are located; as those in North America, for

example are in the range of 12 AM to 4 AM local time.

From what little I noticed across the log files in the attached (linked) pages from

the information generated by method advised by Linc Davis, there are a few items

that can't be any good; one of them which may have damaged or removed System

Files, are product evidence that cleanmymac or other non-recommended software

has been installed and used. These kinds of products may cause unpredictable

behaviors and have no practical purpose in a modern (or ancient) Mac OS X.

macpaw cleanmymac3

Other than this kind of evidence, I'm not going to venture into an overall cure for

the ailments or symptoms exhibited in the GUI or in the report so generated; I

expect that Linc will consider your report and reply when possible, in his location.

If you have a complete backup regimen with a Time Machine file from before

cleanmymac or other bad products were installed, it may be possible to try &

use those files to restore an earlier situation; but that may not cure problems

in a wider array of other evidence that Linc could see by reading the log file.

Good luck in this matter!

A

Some of your user files (not system files) have incorrect permissions or are locked. This procedure will unlock those files and reset their ownership, permissions, and access controls to the default. If you've intentionally set special values for those attributes, they will be reverted. In that case, either stop here, or be prepared to recreate the settings if necessary. Do so only after verifying that those settings didn't cause the problem. If none of this is meaningful to you, you don't need to worry about it, but you do need to follow the instructions below.

Please back up all data before proceeding.

Step 1

If you have more than one user, and the one in question is not an administrator, then go to Step 2.

Enter the following command in the Terminal window in the same way as before (triple-click, copy, and paste):

sudo find ~ $TMPDIR.. -exec chflags -h nosappnd,noschg,nosunlnk,nouappnd,nouchg {} + -exec chown -h $UID {} + -exec chmod +rw {} + -exec chmod -h -N {} + -type d -exec chmod -h +x {} + 2>&-

You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. Type carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you don’t have a login password, you’ll need to set one before you can run the command. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.

The command may take several minutes to run, depending on how many files you have. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear, then quit Terminal.

Step 2 (optional)

Take this step only if you have trouble with Step 1, if you prefer not to take it, or if it doesn't solve the problem.

Start up in Recovery mode. You may be prompted to select a language, then the OS X Utilities screen will appear.

If you use FileVault 2, select Disk Utility, then select the icon of the FileVault startup volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name.) It will be nested below another drive icon. Click the Unlock button in the toolbar and enter your login password when prompted. Then quit Disk Utility to be returned to the main screen.

Select

          Utilities ▹ Terminal

from the menu bar. A Terminal window will open. In that window, type this:

resetp

Press the tab key. The partial command you typed will automatically be completed to this:

resetpassword

Press return. A Reset Password window will open. You’re not going to reset a password.

Select your startup volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name) if not already selected.

Select your username from the menu labeled Select the user account if not already selected.

Under Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACLs, click the Reset button.

Select

           ▹ Restart

from the menu bar.

B

In the Extensions tab of the Safari preferences window, uninstall all extensions.

C

Storing many files on the Desktop may slow down the Finder, especially if the files have custom icons. Move most or all of the files to another subfolder of your home folder.

D

Back up all data before continuing.

This procedure moves to the Trash "semaphore" files that have not been cleaned up by the system and may be interfering with normal operation. The files are empty; they contain no data.

Please triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

find L*/{Con*/*/Data/L*/,}Pref* -type f -size 0c -name *.plist.??????? -exec mv {} .Trash/ \; 2>&-

Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.

Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.

Paste into the Terminal window by pressing the key combination command-V. I've tested these instructions only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, you may have to press the return key after pasting.

Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear below what you entered. You can then quit Terminal.

Log out or restart the computer and empty the Trash. Test.

E

Though I don't like to make this suggestion, the system is so heavily modified by junk and malware that, instead of trying to remove the modifications piecemeal, you should erase the startup volume, reinstall OS X, and then go through the initial setup process, restoring only user data from a backup—not applications or other files. This course of action will be the easiest and most reliable.

Please back up all data to at least two different storage devices, if you haven't already done so. One backup is not enough to be safe. The backups can be made with Time Machine or with Disk Utility. Preferably both.

Erase and install OS X. This operation will destroy all data on the startup volume, so you had be better be sure of the backups. If you upgraded from an older version of OS X, you'll need the Apple ID and password that you used, so make a note of those before you begin.

When you restart, you'll be prompted to go through the initial setup process. That’s when you transfer the data from a backup.

Select only users in the Setup Assistant dialog—not Applications, Computer & Network Settings, or Other files and folders. Don't transfer the Guest account, if it was enabled.

After that, check the App Store for software updates.

If the problem is resolved after the clean installation, reinstall third-party software selectively. I can only suggest general guidelines. Self-contained applications that install into the Applications folder by drag-and-drop or download from the App Store are usually safe. Anything that comes packaged as an installer or that prompts for an administrator password is suspect, and you must test thoroughly after reinstalling each such item to make sure you haven't restored the problem.

I strongly recommend that you never reinstall any "security" products or "utilities," nor any software that changes the user interface, or the behavior of built-in applications, in an unsupported way, nor any unlicensed commercial software. If you do any of that, the problem is likely to recur.

Any system modifications that you do choose to install must be kept up to date.

Before installing any software, ask yourself the question: "Am I sure I know how to uninstall this without having to wipe the volume again?" If the answer is "no," you could be creating a future problem that will be very hard to solve. Never install any third-party software unless you know how to uninstall it.

Please take Step E first, then the other steps.