24" iMac Screen Freezes since 10.6.3 update - pls help!

I'm still confused as to why the freezing screen occurs with other graphics cards as well as the Radeons. I have a NVIDIA GeForce Gt130 card, which was replaced a l

ittle over a year ago. The freezing increased with every update. By the time I got to Lion 10.7.2 the lock ups were at a frequency of several times an hour. It would consistently freeze waking up from sleep mode. I noticed how incredibly hot my computer was one day and downloaded 'FANCONTROL' for Mac for free. I increased fan speed marginally. My now cooler CPU NEVER freezes. Even when I tax it to the max. I have done nothing else to my Kext files. I have spoken with a number of Apple service technicians and all seem unaware of the issues we are discussing. None have read these feeds.

As the Radeon related freezes discussed here are

• independent of the sleep mode,
• independent of CPU/GPU temperature,
• independent of playing video, flash, whatever,
• but dependent one the kext versions,

I would say that the GeForce issue really is a different one. I understand that one doesn't want to suffer all alone, but why don't you just open a new thread for the GeForce issue? Please don't understand me wrong, but for the Radeon people (which are beyond e.g. cooling their CPU/GPU) this is just extra noise to be filtered out …

The increased noise is negligable. Honest. Still far less noise than a PC. But as the Kext fixes have only worked for some, I thought perhaps there was another underlying issue. Why would the NVIDIA cards have the same freezing issues. As well, I checked into Kext file fixes for NVIDIA cards and was unable to obtain info from any online source. Anyway I'll stay out of the way and let you Radeon people have at it.

I have the same machine as you Simon Baker. I did the kext fix under 10.6.7 and have been afraid to update because my machine has been running flawlessly. There's a lot of mixed problems on this discussion that don't seem to specifically apply to the random freeze. Anyway, with iCloud here, Lion is in my future.

I recently changed to 64-bit.

Can I download Lion and not worry? Do I download Lion and then use the kext fix again?

There is mixed info on the discussion.

Thanks.

I can only say what I have found with my machine, obviously! Had random freezes since 10.6.2, sometimes with a GPU debug dump under console, sometimes with machine still accessible over my nextwork - just a frozen screen - and mouse and keyboard, I think (difficult to check!). 10.6.2 kext has worked under Snow Leopard and Lion 10.7.1. (fans also improved matters prior to the kext fix). Fully expected the same under 10.7.2 but no freeze for 10 days now using only the software update - no kext fix applied. Normally after a software update it would freeze after 2 days, but with Lion 10.7 it was a lot sooner (couple of hours?) and the console has changed and I couldn't sopt the normal chatter or a GPU dump, but that just might be me not loooking properly.

Off on a break tomorrow so will shut down and reboot in a weeks time, so fingers crossed.

Hardware or software? Who knows? 2 days before a crash sounded a bit like a memory leak? And there seems to be firmware updates for most iMac models to fix screen freeze issues?

I also logged onto the developers site and registered a bug, attaching a couple of Console GPU dumps (for 10.6.3+, not 10.7) and had a reply to do a diagnostic check - my machine just reports a Harddrive overspeed fan,should be 1200rpm but it settles at about 1350 after 20 minutes or so. I can live with that.

In sum, my machine worked fine with the 10.6.2 kext fixes up to 10.7.1. Not needed to apply (yet…) for 10.7.2.

Best of luck.

Simon

Thanks a ton for the info. When I first installed 10.6.7, I didn't get a freeze for almost 2 weeks – then it went freeze nuts and I did the kext fix.

Please let me/us know if you have continued success with your machine.

Spokes

Simon, as I said I don't have the freeze problem anymore since some releases of Snow and Lion.

I had to revert (succesfully) to the 10.6.2 kexts but they were upgraded by new revisions of SL and Lion and it didn't occured anymore. I'm certain that it was the same problem as the one described here : totally random, and I was able to compare with some picture taken by other users.

Am I the only one who had his problem (mysteriously) solved ?

My specs hereunder. Do I have the same EFI version ? Same SMC firmware ?

Informations matériel :

Nom ** modèle: iMac

Identifiant ** modèle: iMac8,1

Nom ** processeur: Intel Core 2 Duo

Vitesse ** processeur: 2,8 GHz

Nombre de processeurs: 1

Nombre total de cœurs: 2

Cache de niveau 2: 6 Mo

Mémoire: 4 Go

Vitesse ** bus: 1,07 GHz

Version de la ROM de démarrage: IM81.00C1.B00

Version SMC (système): 1.30f1

Numéro de série (système): N/C

UUID ** matériel: N/C

Vue d’ensemble ** logiciel système :

Version ** système: Mac OS X 10.7.2 (11C74)

Version ** noyau: Darwin 11.2.0

Volume de démarrage: Lion

Mode de démarrage: Normal

Mémoire virtuelle sécurisée: activée

Noyau et extensions 64 bits: Oui

ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro :

Jeu de composants: ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro

Type: Processeur graphique (GPU)

Bus: PCIe

Longueur de la voie PCIe: x16

VRAM (totale): 256 Mo

Fournisseur: ATI (0x1002)

Identifiant ** périphérique: 0x9583

Identifiant de révision: 0x0000

Révision de la ROM: 113-B2250L-259

Version ** gestionnaire EFI: 01.00.259

Moniteurs:

ATI2600Controller :

Version: 7.12.9

Dernière modification: 24/06/11 08:22

Chaîne des informations: ATI2600Controller 7.12.9 10224

Type: Intel

Architectures: i386, x86_64

64 bits (Intel): Oui

Emplacement: /System/Library/Extensions/ATI2600Controller.kext

Version de kext: 7.1.2

Adresse de chargement: 0xffffff7f81851000

Valide: Oui

Authentique: Oui

Dépendances: Satisfaites

ATIFramebuffer :

Version: 7.12.9

Dernière modification: 24/06/11 08:16

Chaîne des informations: ATIFramebuffer 7.12.9 10224

Type: Intel

Architectures: i386, x86_64

64 bits (Intel): Oui

Emplacement: /System/Library/Extensions/ATIFramebuffer.kext

Version de kext: 7.1.2

Adresse de chargement: 0xffffff7f8183a000

Valide: Oui

Authentique: Oui

Dépendances: Satisfaites

ATIRadeonX2000 :

Version: 7.12.9

Dernière modification: 24/06/11 08:14

Chaîne des informations: ATIRadeonX2000 7.12.9 10224

Type: Intel

Architectures: i386, x86_64

64 bits (Intel): Oui

Emplacement: /System/Library/Extensions/ATIRadeonX2000.kext

Version de kext: 7.1.2

Adresse de chargement: 0xffffff7f8154c000

Valide: Oui

Authentique: Oui

Dépendances: Satisfaites

ATISupport :

Version: 7.12.9

Dernière modification: 24/06/11 08:17

Chaîne des informations: ATISupport 7.12.9 10224

Type: Intel

Architectures: i386, x86_64

64 bits (Intel): Oui

Emplacement: /System/Library/Extensions/ATISupport.kext

Version de kext: 7.1.2

Adresse de chargement: 0xffffff7f813c2000

Valide: Oui

Authentique: Oui

Dépendances: Satisfaites

The best way to solve this issue is to update to OS X v10.6.8

That is absolutely NOT the best solution drmacintosh. The 7,1 iMac I support at work didn't start freezing until 10.6.8 was installed. The best solution (based on this thread) seems to be running the 10.6.2 drivers, or rolling back to 10.6.7.

Just reverted my 8.1 iMac back to the 10.6.2 drivers again...

I installed 10.6.8 yesterday and the system was running hot once again with slow response times to applications...

I'll probably try out 10.7.2 in another few weeks...

Thankfully we have this option with the kext fix to keep our Mac's running...no thanks to Apple though...

Hi swmaster, would you be willing to send me the 10.6.2 drivers for a 21" 2.0Ghz Core2Duo Intel iMac (7,1) using the ATI RadeonHD 2400 / 128MB. I see you posted that you have them. I would greatly appreciated it.

michaelsmull@mac.com

Hi Nekosaur - would you be willing to send me the 10.6.2 drivers for a 21" 2.0Ghz Core2Duo Intel iMac (7,1) using the ATI RadeonHD 2400 / 128MB Graphics card.

I think I might have just asked the wrong person for the. Sorry about that.

Just a little bit about what I'm experiencing....

imac 2 ghz intel core 2 duo here with the ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT 128 MB.

I was running snow leopard 10.6.2 with no problems whatsoever when I attempted to go to 10.6.3 it constantly froze. I gave up and went back to to 10.6.2. Not willing to deal with the headaches. Well, I got a new iphone 4s and upgraded both my laptop and my imac to Lion and the laptop is fine, but the freezes are back. I need to get this working and I'm hoping that the 10.6.2 Kext fix will do the trick. I really need the drivers because I wasn't smart enought to save them.

Thanks for you help.

I was able to grab the ATI Drivers from my Time Machine Backup. Didn't think about it, but I only upgraded to Lion 2 weeks ago so they were there and easy to grab.

So, now my question is how many of you out there have tried the Kext Fix with Lion 10.7.2 and have you had any problems?

I think I've seen two ways to do this but I want to know what works the best.

Thanks in advance.

Don't replace the Lion drivers on your model iMac.

You will get a kernel panic when booting if you do and you will have to reinstall the OS back to factory settings.

The 10.6.2 drivers for the 7,1 iMac are 32bit. Lion is 64bit native.

Sorry to say you are screwed. I'm in the same boat.

Either live with the freezes or buy a new iMac because Apple is not fixing this.

It's almost been 2 years since it first started and there has been no action to fix it. There isnt going to be.

I will be buying a new iMac next year and suffering until then.

Oh well. Not worth my energy anymore.

Two years of complaining and hoping is enough for me. On to better things!

Wow, that is a bummer. I can't understand why this would just be ignored by Apple. Seems like this is a very common problem.

I too am planning on upgrading to a new iMac early next year, but freezing 3 or 4 times a day when I'm in the middle of trying to get work done is a hard pill to swallow.

Very dissapointing, Apple. Very dissappointing.