Access to network preference pane

HI,



Open System Preferences/Software Updates and select the Installed Software tab. If you don't see the;
*AirPort Client Update 2009-002 Version 1.0* installed, go here; http://support.apple.com/kb/DL973

Download and install the AirPort Client Update 2009-002 then restart your Mac.

Then repair disk permissions...

Quit any open applications/programs. Launch Disk Utility. (Applications/Utilities) Select MacintoshHD in the panel on the left, select the FirstAid tab. Click: Repair Disk Permissions. When it's finished from the Menu Bar, Quit Disk Utility and restart your Mac. If you see a long list of "messages" in the permissions window, it's ok. That can be ignored. As long as you see, "Permissions Repair Complete" when it's finished... you're done. Quit Disk Utility and restart your Mac.

If that doesn't help, go to */Library/Preferences/System Configuration* and move these files to the Trash.

com.apple.airport.preferences.plist

com.apple.nat.plist

com.apple.network.identification.plist

Restart your Mac.











Carolyn 🙂

shoshola:

Can you clear up a few things that are a bit confusing?

--Your profile says you are using an "iMac G5 Quad core i7." There is no such thing. G5's are PPC processors; only Intel Macs can run Snow Leopard. i7's are the latest Intel CPU's found only in some 2009 iMacs. Is this the iMac you now have, or is it another model?--

You said you used Migration Assistant with this new Mac. Are you sure you did not also do something else to transfer anything from the old one, especially anything to do with networking? I ask because the 'quit and reopen' message is typical when opening a preference pane associated with an old 32 bit OS component. This in itself is not a problem, but the new, Apple-supplied network preference pane has no such dependencies & should not generate this message.

Preference panes can be found in up to three different locations. The first is System/Library/PreferencePanes/ (in the root level System folder). This is where the normal Apple-supplied preference panes are installed. Navigate to /System/Library/PreferencePanes/ in the Finder & look for Network.prefPane. Select it & press command + i to bring up its Get Info window. What version does it show in the General section of that window? (It should be version 2.4.1 but I suspect it either is not or the pane is missing altogether from this folder.)

If you do not find Network.prefPane in this folder, look in /Library/PreferencePanes/ (in the root level Library folder). What if anything is in it? Do the same for your ~/Library/PreferencePanes/ (the Library folder in your home folder). What if anything is in that?

Message was edited by: R C-R

Just after posting my last message I noticed that you had already changed the details, so I edited my post to strike through that part. Thanks for doing that -- it really helps avoid confusion.

Moving on…

The pref pane just gives you access to the network settings which are stored elsewhere in your system; the obvious problem is without access you can't change them from whatever they are now. However, your symptoms indicate deeper problems that should be addressed since they may affect other things.

If you have not already done so, run Disk Utility's "Verify Disk" step. If it finds anything amiss you need to start up from your Snow Leopard installer disk, run Disk Utility from its "Utilities" menu, choosing the "Repair Disk" step. (You cannot repair the startup disk, which is why you must do this from some other startup disk like the DVD.)

Assuming there are no problems found or they are repaired, the next thing I suggest is to make sure your important data is backed up. My following suggestions should not affect them but it is always better to be safe than sorry!

Once this is done, I suggest reinstalling Snow Leopard -- just start up from the DVD & run the installer. This may not be necessary but it will insure that all the normal OS components are present, undamaged, & in their correct places. This will not affect your home folder or require the use of Migration Assistant again -- it just replaces the OS with a fresh version.

This may solve the problem outright, so check for that. If not, the underlying problem is probably something in your home folder, although it would be easier to tell if you let us know what (if anything) are in the following folders:

~/Library/PreferencePanes
/Library/PreferencePanes
/Library/StartupItems
/System/Library/StartupItems

(only the first is in your home folder)

Also let us know what if anything is in System Preferences > Accounts > Login items, aside from iTunesHelper.

If none of these items contains anything suspicious, your remaining problem(s) are probably in user preference files. There are several ways to deal with this, but let's see what the above reveals before we get into that.