System Freezes Randomly after 10.6.3 Update

batondor, I have the exact same GPU as you. There may be many different types of freezing issues in this thread, but I think you and I must be experiencing the same one. Thanks for the heads-up on all the information you supplied. If the 10.6.4 update doesn't resolve it, I'll try your kludge with the 10.6.2 driver.

Thought this link may be of interest as it has some photos
http://forums.mactalk.com.au/11/83289-10-6-3-freezes-crashes.html#post952398

For the first time, I am actually pretty narked with Apple's lack of response.

There are lots of well-intentioned posts about resetting the PRAM or trying the combo update and so on, but it does seem that if you have one of the affected machines, then this will make no difference - only a few minutes from booting and you'll be pressing and holding that power button again.

We have six machines here altogether, and three were affected: two mac minis and a macbook pro. Letting these get to 10.6.3 means that the crashing starts. Take them back to 10.6.2 and all is well. I'm only posting again now because one of the minis has been accidentally updated again, and is thus crashing. So I have to reinstall 10.6. So I came to see if an actual fix had emerged. But it hasn't.

Narked. Roll on 10.6.4, please.

It's been over 24 hours since I went back to 10.6 and began stepping up to 10.6.1 and 10.6.2. No freezes or video artifacts and TechTool reports VRAM is good. Yes, Jim, it is time for Apple to address this issue. Too many of us have gone back to 10.6.2 or earlier and had our problem go away for this to be anything other than a bug in 10.6.3.

See the main reason I told some users to jump back to 10.6.2 is that I feel it would be better to have an Apple user in a good stable working condition then someone who has completely lost all their productivity and workflow. Try 10.6.3. v.1.1 for some then if a no go .. drop back to 10.6.2 and use that as another option.

I have also rolled back to 10.6.2.

10.6.3 caused my iMac's screen to stay on during sleep, which forced me to power it off with the button. Also when browsing safari the screen would flicker and the machine would become unresponsive. I've been using 10.6.2 for over a week without any trouble.

I won't celebrate yet, but the following is what I have found.

Ever since I have used Snow Leopard (on and off) I have had problems with sore eyes and the display seemed to be a little blurred and maybe even flickered a little. It was like the monitor was not operating at the correct refresh rate.
Deleting the com.apple.windowserver.plist file at /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver.plist
and rebooting fixed these graphics issues.

Is this the cause of the lock ups and coloured screens? I don't know, however, I have just installed 10.6.3v1.1 Combo, and using Snow Leopard on my iMac the graphics have never looked this good before.

I have also uninstalled flash using the uninstaller and installed the latest version of flash.

Below is a HEX dump of the com.apple.windowserver.plist file

00000000 62 70 6c 69 73 74 30 30 d2 01 02 03 20 5b 44 69 |bplist00.... [Di|
00000010 73 70 6c 61 79 53 65 74 73 5f 10 18 43 47 53 49 |splaySets_..CGSI|
00000020 6e 74 65 72 6f 63 69 74 6f 72 53 65 6c 65 63 74 |nterocitorSelect|
00000030 4d 6f 64 65 a1 04 a1 05 df 10 19 06 07 08 09 0a |Mode............|
00000040 0b 0c 0d 0e 0f 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 1a |................|
00000050 1b 1c 1d 1e 1f 20 21 20 20 22 23 24 20 20 24 26 |..... ! "#$ $&|
00000060 20 27 20 20 28 29 2a 2b 22 20 2c 2d 20 55 44 65 | ' ()*+" ,- UDe|
00000070 70 74 68 58 4d 69 72 72 6f 72 65 64 5f 10 11 49 |pthXMirrored_..I|
00000080 4f 44 69 73 70 6c 61 79 4c 6f 63 61 74 69 6f 6e |ODisplayLocation|
00000090 5f 10 13 44 69 73 70 6c 61 79 53 65 72 69 61 6c |_..DisplaySerial|
000000a0 4e 75 6d 62 65 72 5f 10 11 55 6e 6d 69 72 72 6f |Number_..Unmirro|
000000b0 72 65 64 4f 72 69 67 69 6e 59 5e 55 6e 6d 69 72 |redOriginY^Unmir|
000000c0 72 6f 72 65 64 4d 6f 64 65 5f 10 0f 55 6e 6d 69 |roredMode_..Unmi|
000000d0 72 72 6f 72 65 64 57 69 64 74 68 5f 10 12 53 74 |rroredWidth_..St|
000000e0 65 72 65 6f 42 6c 75 65 4c 69 6e 65 53 79 6e 63 |ereoBlueLineSync|
000000f0 5f 10 11 55 6e 6d 69 72 72 6f 72 65 64 4f 72 69 |_..UnmirroredOri|
00000100 67 69 6e 58 57 4f 72 69 67 69 6e 58 58 49 73 53 |ginXWOriginXXIsS|
00000110 74 65 72 65 6f 57 49 4f 46 6c 61 67 73 57 4f 72 |tereoWIOFlagsWOr|
00000120 69 67 69 6e 59 56 48 65 69 67 68 74 58 52 6f 74 |iginYVHeightXRot|
00000130 61 74 69 6f 6e 54 55 6e 69 74 55 57 69 64 74 68 |ationTUnitUWidth|
00000140 59 44 69 73 70 6c 61 79 49 44 5f 10 10 44 69 73 |YDisplayID_..Dis|
00000150 70 6c 61 79 50 72 6f 64 75 63 74 49 44 5f 10 0f |playProductID_..|
00000160 44 69 73 70 6c 61 79 56 65 6e 64 6f 72 49 44 54 |DisplayVendorIDT|
00000170 4d 6f 64 65 58 4d 69 72 72 6f 72 49 44 56 41 63 |ModeXMirrorIDVAc|
00000180 74 69 76 65 5f 10 10 55 6e 6d 69 72 72 6f 72 65 |tive_..Unmirrore|
00000190 64 48 65 69 67 68 74 5f 10 10 52 65 66 72 65 73 |dHeight_..Refres|
000001a0 68 52 61 74 65 31 36 2e 31 36 10 04 10 00 5f 10 |hRate16.16...._.|
000001b0 8f 49 4f 53 65 72 76 69 63 65 3a 2f 41 70 70 6c |.IOService:/Appl|
000001c0 65 41 43 50 49 50 6c 61 74 66 6f 72 6d 45 78 70 |eACPIPlatformExp|
000001d0 65 72 74 2f 50 43 49 30 2f 41 70 70 6c 65 41 43 |ert/PCI0/AppleAC|
000001e0 50 49 50 43 49 2f 50 45 47 50 40 31 2f 49 4f 50 |PIPCI/PEGP@1/IOP|
000001f0 43 49 32 50 43 49 42 72 69 64 67 65 2f 47 46 58 |CI2PCIBridge/GFX|
00000200 30 40 30 2f 41 54 59 2c 48 79 70 6f 70 72 69 6f |0@0/ATY,Hypoprio|
00000210 6e 40 30 2f 41 54 59 5f 48 79 70 6f 70 72 69 6f |n@0/ATY_Hypoprio|
00000220 6e 2f 64 69 73 70 6c 61 79 30 2f 41 70 70 6c 65 |n/display0/Apple|
00000230 42 61 63 6b 6c 69 67 68 74 44 69 73 70 6c 61 79 |BacklightDisplay|
00000240 10 02 11 07 80 08 08 10 07 11 04 b0 11 07 80 12 |................|
00000250 04 27 23 80 11 9c 8e 11 06 10 10 01 11 04 b0 00 |.'#.............|
00000260 08 00 0d 00 19 00 34 00 36 00 38 00 6d 00 73 00 |......4.6.8.m.s.|
00000270 7c 00 90 00 a6 00 ba 00 c9 00 db 00 f0 01 04 01 ||...............|
00000280 0c 01 15 01 1d 01 25 01 2c 01 35 01 3a 01 40 01 |......%.,.5.:.@.|
00000290 4a 01 5d 01 6f 01 74 01 7d 01 84 01 97 01 aa 01 |J.].o.t.}.......|
000002a0 ac 01 ae 02 40 02 42 02 45 02 46 02 47 02 49 02 |....@.B.E.F.G.I.|
000002b0 4c 02 4f 02 54 02 57 02 5a 02 5c 00 00 00 00 00 |L.O.T.W.Z.\.....|
000002c0 00 02 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 2e 00 00 00 00 00 |................|
000002d0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 5f |.........._|
000002db

I'm not exactly sure why you included a hex dump of the preference file but FWIW, they use a standardized XML format & can be read with the *Property List Editor* app that is a part of the Apple developer tools package or with the donationware app Pref Setter.

Deleting the com.apple.windowserver.plist file at /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver.plist
and rebooting fixed these graphics issues.

^ So this will stop the graphics issues in 10.6.3?

Interesting I have checked it out using activity monitor and it did show my WindowServer to be the only Delta running in all my processes. Every process you launch using the GUI is handled by it but the mach_init I believe is somehow hidden and might be its parent.

I would test it here but my system is fine so I can't recreate your issue.

Well first I need to know the exact year and model of you computer? early 08 iMac ! etc.

June 2009 iMac

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac9,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 3.06 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: IM91.008D.B08
SMC Version (system): 1.45f0

FWIW, the parent process of WindowServer is launchd (process ID #1) & its parent is kernel_task (process ID #0), the parent of everything. kernel_task & launchd(1) are root user processes; WindowServer is run by user _windowserver, another of the non-human users running on the system.

The launchd process that launches regular user account processes is a different one from launchd(1), has a higher number process ID number, & belongs to the user account.

You can see all these relationships in Activity Monitor by selecting the "All Processes, Hierarchically" view.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by WindowServer being "the only Delta running in all my processes." The "Show Delta" option just shows the change between successive Activity Monitor samples for the various columns of info. kernel_task at least should be showing changing delta values, as should any other process that for instance uses a varying amount of CPU usage.

Do you mean something else by "Delta"?

Graphic drivers for Nvidia and ATI are important and creating an update to make them all perform smoothly without testing every model after the iMac G5 (20 inch iSight) came out is a very plausible idea. There are from what I found 11 different possible GPU's since that model.

xtech wrote:
Well first I need to know the exact year and model of you computer? early 08 iMac ! etc.

batondor's profile shows it has a model ID of "7,1" -- The "7,1" indicates it is an "iMac (Mid 2007)" model in Apple's nomenclature.

FWIW, one handy way to translate between model ID's & Apple's clumsy model names is with the Mactracker database application. It has lots of info for essentially all Macs & most other Apple products, a search function, & more.