Blurry/pixelated icons at random in Finder windows

On top of that, readers should also be aware that few here really know what they're talking about, including me.

*So read cautiously!* Unless the poster is the developer specifically working on that aspect of the software... their comments are unlikely to be definitively true. Heck, many developers don't even know what they're talking about. We are talking about a glitch that has slipped past Apple dev's, right? Either that, or been de-prioritized/ignored I suppose?

*It actually CAN be caused by GraphicConverter and CandyBar* ...and I haven't found any information here or elsewhere that should rule either out completely.

*...But that doesn't mean it's exclusively caused by them*. It could easily be multiple applications that do something similar to the system to provoke the problem—even if they don't have background processes running full-time. Once they've touched it the damage is done, so-to-speak.

Any application that touches the system folder—even just to install an empty folder—can affect global system behavior and muck things up. Both GraphicConverter and CandyBar do. For example, if you are going to change the finder icon to appear differently in the dock (a function of CandyBar), I'm pretty sure a .rsrc file deep in the system folder has to be modified. Modifying that file could affect things elsewhere... so any app that modifies anything like it cannot be ruled-out.

The term "caused" infers that the app in question would be the root of the problem. I think what you mean is that the use of some apps may "trigger" the effect. But as many have shown that this issue surfaces in many different ways, and many have seen the effect without the use of such apps, I think to infer that any 3rd party app "causes" the issue is in error.

I am dealing with the same problem -- I just noticed it this morning. One thing I've noticed is that the pixelated icons shift. Corel Painter 11 was pixelated, and upon restart it is fine -- but System Preferences is pixelated. Sigh.

Hello MNMXML,
I'm just trying to help avoid a sidetrack here when I say that it's not correct to say that one or several applications which "touch" the System Folder (sic) can be the cause of the problem being discussed.

There is only one way to view this problem:
1. Users installed Snow Leopard - be it the original or either of the two updates (.1 and .2).
2. Users began noticing blurred icons.
Ergo: there is something wrong with the way the (Snow Leopard) System is handling graphics.

This explanation includes the elimination of *any applications* since some responding have said they have no 3rd party apps and many have said they do not have either of the two apps mentioned installed.

The other item eliminated is any specific graphics card. Since users are reporting several different graphics cards from two manufacturers - it is more logical to say that Snow Leopard is at fault because it is causing the generation of improper display of icons regardless of what graphics card is installed.

In other words: the most likely thing is that there is a bug in Snow Leopard causing the (intermittent) improper display of icons on SOME people's Macs.

The only further narrowing I can come up with is that the part of the system affected seems to be the Finder. I cannot give any technical details but as one who has been using Macs exclusively for ten years, I can say that I'm not surprised that Finder seems to be involved in this case.

Finally: those who have the Apple Care protection policy (or whose Macs are still under factory warranty) should phone Apple Care with details of this problem. For those not in this category, you can report problems through Apples product feedback page here:

<http://www.apple.com/feedback/>


Hope this helps.

Macnoel, I mostly agree, however, the fact that only SOME of the SL userbase is experiencing this issue logically indicates that there MUST be something common in all affected systems which makes them different than those that are not affected. This indeed COULD be due to the graphics cards on these systems. I am not saying that this is due to one specific graphics card, but that the machines affected may have one of several graphics cards ( or chipsets ) that are somehow affected by interaction with various other hardware configurations ... and that the machines that have NOT been affected have different graphics hardware combinations. Just because various people are reporting the problem with different graphics cards does not eliminate the graphics card as being part of the issue ( along with the way SL interacts with the system ... I also don't mean to imply that the problem has nothing to do with SL ) .

Also, just for the record, many of us have posted that we have reported the issue to Apple. I have been one of them and I am an Applecare customer .... and I have notified Apple both ways you have suggested. But, I think what Macnoel is saying here is that the more people that give Apple feedback on this issue, the better the chance that Apple will fix the issue.

BTW, Almost 1 week since I installed 10.6.2 and I have not seen the issue at all during that time.

This just keeps getting stranger and stranger LOL. That never caused the effect for me.

this issue is just so freakin bizarre ... were all experiencing the same pixelization issue but not in the same way for the most part ... as Eric explained his repeatable process I can say with full confidence that it never came about for myself in that way ... I just tried to see if a fresh install of a new program and also upgrading an old program would cause a pixelated icon and I could not replicate it ... however once I started to create about 20 custom icons and copying and pasting the icons to folders BANG! sure enough icons started to pixelate until my finder crashed ... of which I once again (for the millionth time) restarted the finder and everything was back to normal.

So in other words Eric, no, the issue does not happen to me in the same way you described ... kinda wish it did to be honest.

Dolphbucs,
Re: Graphics Cards involvement:
While your explanation makes sense and could be proven correct over time, I still say that
Finder's intermittent failure to properly resolve icons indicates that Finder is malfunctioning at times in the way it interacts with graphics cards. These graphics cards were evidently operating correctly before Snow Leopard was installed, ergo, the commonality is that Snow Leopard "provoked" this problem for some Mac owners.

The other thing which came to me as I mulled over the issue is that Snow Leopard specifically has been changed to interact with graphics cards in a new way. Snow Leopard uses OpenCL: a feature which can (with the right graphics card) recruit the computing power of a graphics card when the load on cpu(s) is high enough.

So, in a way, you can still be correct but the question becomes, do we want to center attention on graphics cards or on Snow Leopard and its changed character (versus Leopard and previous versions of OS X). OpenCL isn't even in use yet for the great majority of tasks: it was added as a feature "for future use" by Macs made recently and on into the near future. (My Mac Pro is of 2007 manufacture and the graphics card cannot handle either OpenGL or OpenCL. But Snow Leopard (with OpenCL) could still be causing this problem - if I had it installed - because it's been rewritten so extensively.)

Last: It's good to know that you and others are notifying Apple of this issue. You are correct in saying that I was trying to remind everyone that contacting Apple about such issues helps them help us.

Post Script: I have the Snow Leopard Install disk and even bought a new 1 TB drive on which I installed (on a partition) Leopard - in preparation. I guess I'm getting more confident and I'm beginning to think it might help to install 10.6 just to see if any problems do crop up. I run a separate drive with 10.4 installed so I would probably be safe no matter what happened with Snow Leopard. I just haven't had what I think is adequate time to deal with possible issues, but now I'm getting "freed up" a bit and would have time to at least experiment with Snow Leopard.

Macnoel,

I think you need to read my previous posts more carefully. Case in point, from my last post " Just because various people are reporting the problem with different graphics cards does not eliminate the graphics card as being part of the issue ( along with the way SL interacts with the system ... I also don't mean to imply that the problem has nothing to do with SL ) " Note that I said the graphics card was PART of the issue and that I did not think that Snow Leopard was in no way a cause or to blame.

Once again, my theory is that Snow Leopard ( and more specifically the Finder in SL ) reacts with some ( once again not one specific ) graphics cards on some way to cause this on some hardware configurations. My main point was that the graphics card, while not the sole cause of the issue, must have something to do with it. If the problem was solely with Snow Leopard, then everyone would be having the issue. Therefore, it is logical that any solution will involve examining both the change in Snow Leopard AND its interaction with some graphics cards and hardware configurations. I agree that Snow Leopard is the primary cause but you cannot ignore the factor of which graphics cards and hardware configurations this affects while trying to troubleshoot this issue. If you solely look at the SL code you will never find the solution.

Dolphbucs,
Sorry if my post seemed to overlook what you wrote: I do fully understand your point. I should have perhaps specified: given that some graphics cards produce this symptom, they must be involved. But - they are not at the bottom of the problem, they only produce the symptom, they are not the cause of the disease.


Furthermore: my point is that whatever latent problem might exist in various graphics cards: those cards were installed by the factory under Apple specs before Snow Leopard was released. So it makes sense that those re-writing OS X probably missed something when it came to making Snow Leopard play nice with existing hardware ( missed something: as they did with font interactions, etc).


I do apologize for any misunderstanding and for not being more careful in my phrasing. I hope you find this satisfactory as well as helpful.

macnoel wrote:
I should have perhaps specified: given that some graphics cards produce this symptom, they must be involved. But - they are not at the bottom of the problem, they only produce the symptom, they are not the cause of the disease.

Furthermore: my point is that whatever latent problem might exist in various graphics cards: those cards were installed by the factory under Apple specs before Snow Leopard was released. So it makes sense that those re-writing OS X probably missed something when it came to making Snow Leopard play nice with existing hardware ( missed something: as they did with font interactions, etc).

LOL. But that is exactly what I have been saying. I never claimed that the graphics cards were at the "bottom of the problem", merely that the flaw in SL that causes this issue triggers something on some graphics cards and that it is these graphics cards and/or supporting hardware that is the common thread of all those having this issue. As such, you cannot "concentrate" on SL to solve the issue as you suggested ... you must also examine what it is that SL is doing with/to this hardware. If indeed SL is causing these graphics cards to show the pixelated icons and SL is not causing the effect on other graphics cards/hardware configurations you must therefore study differences in the way SL interacts with the different hardware to figure out why it is only happening to some, not all, users. Hence my original statement about this

"It is becoming apparent to me that the issue may well be with the way SL interacts with certain video cards. This would explain why the different "solutions" we have found don't seem to work for everyone either. Obviously, this issue is not affecting everyone."
Posted by me in this thread on Nov 11 @ 2:10 PM

Sigh... it's too bad that people are so ready to criticize others and their attempts to helpfully contribute (with splitting hairs, hypocritical sidetracking, subjective semantics arguments, etc.) when they don't even know who they're speaking to... or the fact that they may have significantly more applicable knowledge. 😉

Speaking of, it looks like I may have discovered a definitive way to prevent the problem from happening. There are a few specific things I've done that appear to have resulted in a complete remission of my blurry icon disease.

Before I potentially mislead anyone however, I'm going to give it some more time to make sure I'm not wrong... or encouraging something that causes instability. That, and I'm not positive if it was one or the other, or a combination of the measures I took.

I'll be back.

Dolphbucs wrote: " But that is exactly what I have been saying."

Good, then we're on the same track.

MNMXML,
That sounds interesting: I know that everyone with this problem is wishing you success.


Footnote: I'm going to back off my earlier statement which (speculatively) pointed at the Finder as the possible root of this problem. (Write in haste, repent at leisure. - to paraphrase.) Just as speculative but more complete would be: Also, logically, the Core Graphics and the new OpenCL features in OS X may be involved with the problem of improper icon rendering.


Again, I'm not asserting anything: just trying to be complete in looking at all the factors. I bring up the new OpenCL feature because (1) it is a new feature in OS X and (2) because it directly interacts with graphics cards (whether or not it's actually called to bring in graphics card computing power under load).

Actually, I'm hoping that these are not the causes because it would mean that Mac users would have to wait for Apple to fix the problem(s) rather than come up with a fix or fixes themselves. (That is the purpose of these forums, according to my understanding.)

Good luck with your trials!