Quicken 2007 Quit Unexpectedly

Quicken 2007 is not a universal binary and runs under Rosetta on an Intel based Mac. Do you have any other PPC software? If so do these apps also crash? Possibly Rosetta has developed a problem?

1. Try repairing permissions using Disk Utility.

2. Move Quicken 2007 preference files/folders to trash (~/Library/Preferences)

3. Use a utility like Cocktail or Onyx to clean system caches.

4. Try opening Quicken 2007 with an older (backup) copy of your Quicken data file. Possibly the data file has become corrupted.

You may have already tried some or all of these suggestions. If so I apologize.

In reading your original post again I noticed that the Quicken installation program also crashed. This tends to support the Rosetta theory. To gather more evidence you might go to a Mac software site like Versiontracker or MacUpdate, find and download a PPC only application, something simple. See if this crashes too. If it does you have more evidence that Rosetta has developed a problem on your system. How to fix that is another story and may require an archive/install of OS X which would be a headache to be sure.

I just thought of something else you might try. Boot up in Safe Mode. You do this by restarting your Mac. As soon as you hear the startup chime finish hold down the Shift key until you get the grey apple screen with the spinning progress indicator. The boot time will be considerably longer because Safe Mode also performs a bunch of house cleaning routines as well as disabling any third party drivers, extensions, plugins, and the like. When you arrive at the login screen you should see Safe Mode at the top of the login window.

Now try launching Quicken. Does it still crash? If not then you may be looking at some third party conflict OR the safe boot process fixed something.

You could also try creating a new user account and try launching Quicken from that account. If it works okay then something in your user account has gone haywire.

Troubleshooting is usually a process of elimination and educated guessing mixed with a dash of blind luck.

ChrisLong wrote:
Thank you so much for your suggestions. I have tried the safe mode boot suggestion and still have the problem. I have not yet had time to try to download another PPC program to check on the Rosetta question, but it is feeling more like that might be the problem. Are there options other than an Archive and Install?

Do you know exactly when this problem started? Before or after the update to OS X 10.5.5? Sometimes downloading the larger combo update and re-installing an update will cure problems.

I'd also like to know if you tried creating a new user account and launching Quicken from that new account.

Also take a look at your Login Items (System Preferences->Accounts->Your Account->Login Items) and see if there is an application named Quicken Scheduler? There should be. Next, open the Activity Monitor applications (in the Utilities folder) and look for the Quicken Scheduler process to make sure it is active and not hung.

That's about it as far as my suggestions go. I'm interested in your problem because I also use Quicken 2007 under OS X 10.5.5 on an Intel iMac. So far it has performed flawlessly running with Rosetta. Intuit has a beta version of the next Quicken that will be a universal binary but there's no telling when they will be releasing it. Could be next year... or not. That's another story.

The Combo update can be found here...

http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/macosx1055comboupdate.html

In the future just click the Support tab at the top of this forum page. The click the Downloads button near the middle of the page. You will notice, however, that the Combo update for OS X 10.5.5 is some 601 MB in size. Hopefully you have a broadband connection to the internet. Before applying the combo update be sure to run Disk Utility to verify/repair your boot drive and repair permissions. This is to make sure all is well before starting the update. Also back up any important documents (like your Quicken data file) before beginning. Then just follow the instructions.

The Combo update is the total collection of patches, features, bug fixes, etc. issued since OS X 10.5 was originally released. Normally the Software Download application downloads what is known as the delta update. The delta update applies only the fixes since the last update and is much smaller in size. This is almost always quite fine. However, sometimes things can go haywire. Applying the Combo update applies everything ever released and will sometimes fix screwball problems. Some people swear by the Combo update and always apply it instead of the delta. Mostly overkill but it doesn't hurt to try.

Notice that I use the word "sometimes" a lot. Troubleshooting can be frustrating but it's worth it considering the alternative is to start over. An archive/install is the last resort. You would do this by booting from your OS X 10.5 installation DVD and selecting the option. Archive/install re-installs OS X but leaves your data intact. The old System folder is archived and all your applications, preferences and settings are applied to the new installation. Then you apply all the updates (or the Combo update). The ultimate start over is, of course, Erase/Install which erases your hard drive, reformats it, and installs a completely fresh OS X 10.5. Your data is lost and must be restored from backups. I wouldn't go there unless I was forced to.

And last but not least Good Luck!

The only suggestion I can make is to try applying the combo update once again and see what happens. It won't hurt anything. I'm at a loss to explain what's going on with your system. Off hand I haven't seen any other MBP owners complaining about this sort of problem.

Thanks for this discussion. The same thing happened to me a couple of weeks ago after a regular software update, and uploading the Update Combo worked for me!!!!! Thanks Again and Again for your help!