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Missing System Pref

I just installed 10.5.6 then upgraded to 10.5.8 on my wife's G4 IBook. When I went into System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver > Desktop the check-box for Translucent Menu Bar wasn't there.

It is there on my Mac Pro.

Anyone have an explanation and a fix. My wife hates the translucent menu bar.

MAC PRO Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Nehalem”, Mac OS X (10.5.7), Mac user from 1984 to 2009

Posted on Aug 6, 2009 11:13 AM

Reply
5 replies

Aug 6, 2009 12:39 PM in response to RobertJ

Go to the main Apple Download Site, locate the 10.5.8 Combo Updater and download it (759 GBs - she's a biggie) then reinstall the update using the Combo Updater.

I strongly suggest you do the following before reinstalling the update:

Repairing the Hard Drive and Permissions

Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger and Leopard.) After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer. Now restart normally.

If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior (4.0 for Tiger, and 4.1 for Leopard) and/or TechTool Pro (4.6.1 for Leopard) to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.

Also, be sure to quit any open applications. For more security during updates boot into safe mode before any system updates. (Note: There is no wireless available in safe mode. Use Ethernet for any Internet needs until after you have the update installed and have restarted.)

Aug 6, 2009 1:59 PM in response to Kappy

Seems there is one problem. When I try to logout and change accounts after logging out the login screen does not appear. I am now in the process of redoing the update combo. Hopefully that is the issue rather than the original disc install of 10.5.6 over 10.4.x. Fortunately I have a bootable clone of the HD and could go back to square one 😟

Aug 6, 2009 4:31 PM in response to RobertJ

Redoing update combo was of no help. I reinstalled 10.5.6 from the DVD and thus far have gone back and forth between accounts several times with no problem; hopefully that is the cure 🙂

BTW the menu bar continues with no transparency and there is no check box for System Preferences > Desktop & Screen Saver > Desktop Translucent Menu Bar.

My current plan is to Fix Permissions, wait for a few days and then clone the HD using SuperDuper to an external FWD. After that I will try the combo updater and see what happens. If it has the same logout/login problem at least I can restore everything from the clone using SD.

Nov 1, 2018 1:04 AM in response to RobertJ

I have had the missing transparency button on two 14 inch iBooks with the newer Radeon video card. The only thing that has ever worked is the terminal fix I got from this forum.

Missing System Pref

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