DazzaG

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

I don't know if this is just coincidence or not, but since updating my iMac to 10.6.3 it keeps on crashing. On 3 separate occasions today, whilst using my Mac the screen has gone completely black with thin white lines down it.....see pic below:

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/6SYzhCgVYEU5TBKqRfOQ1Q?feat=directlink

The fans and hard disk are still running but it will not respond to any keyboard or mouse presses - I simply have to turn it off by holding the power button in.
It will then restart as usual.

Anyone got any ideas? Do you think that if I was to re-install Mac OS X from my original install disk it could solve the issue?

Thanks

Darren

24" intel imac 2.8Ghz, Mac OS X (10.6.3)

Posted on Mar 31, 2010 2:43 PM

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

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  • by Roelof2,

    Roelof2 Roelof2 Aug 24, 2012 2:23 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 24, 2012 2:23 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek

    Thanx for your quick reply.

     

    Found and downloaded the installer:

    http://support.apple.com/downloads/DL1571/en_US/OSXUpd10.8.1.dmg

     

    Making aan archive to roll back just in case.

  • by boy howdy,

    boy howdy boy howdy Aug 24, 2012 4:44 AM in response to aieronimo
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 24, 2012 4:44 AM in response to aieronimo

    Yes, and with that in mind the Kext helper never worked for me. I know there are plenty folks reporting how to check their card via terminal, and then report what it spits out. Thank you, and I'll be happy to do the same. But these messages are almost unreadable in plain formatting for a laymen.

     

    I'm kindly requesting a literal transcript with the required commands at a separate indent level or quoted for INSTALLING the kext. In my case the ATI1600, while assuming I know nothing about Terminal. I wouldn't even know what to look up to diagnose why the Kext Helper didn't work, only that I followed the instructions in numerous occasions, including the double-try suggestion, in rote.

     

    So yeah, 80 pages in, one confirmed solution, all of which I've read, and there is one write up on using the helper, and another hard-to-follow process via terminal. I was hoping we could try again and tidy that command-line approach with a lot more hand-holding. If anyone replies but others wish to clarify, reply to the first good attempt, and then I'll compile a most thorough and clear version.

     

    Very grateful for your reply.

  • by Zahori,

    Zahori Zahori Aug 24, 2012 4:57 AM in response to Gr8er
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 24, 2012 4:57 AM in response to Gr8er

    I would like to comment that this issue is not only affecting you people with ATI cards, but also many people with NVIDIA GT120 and GT130 cards. The only difference is that there are no kext patch apparently for those cases, and that's why "our" discussions seems to be less active than this one (there is no "patch" apart of rising RPM of ODD fan with SMCFanControl or similar SW to reduce the probability of having a crash).

     

    But just to let you know that this problem is bigger than what is shown in this discussion...and that's really disappointing.

  • by Tardigrada,

    Tardigrada Tardigrada Aug 24, 2012 6:10 AM in response to boy howdy
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 24, 2012 6:10 AM in response to boy howdy

    ATI1600 sounds like a 2006 Mac. I never read about the 10.6.2 kext helping on such a system. I thus guess it only helps on 2007 or 2008 Macs with ATI GPUs. Your machine may just have a (somewhat) different problem. Maybe this one? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nO-hrBKeTOc

  • by KrzysiuTurek,

    KrzysiuTurek KrzysiuTurek Sep 13, 2012 2:09 PM in response to DazzaG
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 13, 2012 2:09 PM in response to DazzaG

    Hi,

     

    Today I have a tip for all NVIDIA users. As you know I have an ATI card so I can't check anything for NVIDIA GPU, but couple of days ago I receive message from Claus Miller, who has a problem with his iMac. After a few days I discover that Apple adds another kext file to 10.7.2 named AppleGraphicsControl.kext. Because we could not get this file, I'm proposed to change only those files:

     

    GeForce7xxxGLDriver.bundle

    GeForce8xxxGLDriver.bundle

    NVDANV40Hal.kext

     

    here are some quotes from Claus messeges about downgading:

     

    Since I upgraded from Snow leopard to Mountain Lion the flickering/freezing became much more often. Sometimes every half hour (before it was once or twice a day):

    I did the upgrade 3 days ago.

    I don't know if it is a coincidence but since yesterday, when I downgraded the files:

    GeForce7xxxGLDriver.bundle

    GeForce8xxxGLDriver.bundle

    NVDANV40Hal.kext

    it seems like the freezing goes less often (like one each two hours...) temperature is also lower. Today I have a lot of graphic design work to do so I will know better. Though the most freezing is going on when I'm on webpages with flash or videos..

    Forgot to say that yesterday evening after having installed the GeForce7xxxGLDriver.bundle

    GeForce8xxxGLDriver.bundle

    NVDANV40Hal.kext

    files I did a permission repair (including the log file here) and one (maybe) important thing in the process was that:

    Permissions differ on “private/var/db/GPURestartReporter”; should be drwxr-xr-x ; they are drwxrwxr-x .

    So Disk Utility[319:707] Repaired “private/var/db/GPURestartReporter”

    and the iMac is working at a much lower temperature:

    -before installing the bundle and kext files 50°-70°

    - now 40°-60°

    I've been working 12 h today on my mac, and had only one freeze by opening Google earth and zooming on a landscape.

    Looks like that was too stressfull for the graphic card.

    That is all I know for this moment. You can download Nvidia Kext's from 10.6.2



    Mayby this can help somene

  • by iamvivid,

    iamvivid iamvivid Sep 15, 2012 6:18 AM in response to DazzaG
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 15, 2012 6:18 AM in response to DazzaG

    First I would like to thank KrzysiuTurek for his fix.  I thought ever since 10.6...something, that my out of warranty imac was going to eventually have to have hardware replaced.  As I have upgraded through the years the problem always persist.  Some days I would get screens with lines, some days it would be white screens, some days my mouse and keyboard would stop working.  It was something two or three times a day.  I did fresh installs.  I thought Mountain Lion would fix it.  It only got worse.

     

    Three days after applying his fix following his blog where I could download the kext's without having to go all the way back to 10.6.2, I have no issues.  I am at peace once again.  Its a pleasure not worry about "will my machine crash in the middle of this important job" or "how many times will I hard reboot today".

     

    If you have a 24" iMac with the ATI 2600 Pro and you have any of these problems and you are on Mountain Lion (or anything else for that matter), don't suffer the pain any longer.  Back it up and do what Apple has not been able to do or cared about doing since 10.6.3,

     

    Thanks again.  You can find Krysztof Turek's blog here where you can download the files and follow clean instructions with pictures.

  • by gymaroe,

    gymaroe gymaroe Sep 20, 2012 12:18 AM in response to DazzaG
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 20, 2012 12:18 AM in response to DazzaG

    So Apple release Mountain Lion 10.8.2 (And Lion 10.7.5).

     

    Did this bring the fix for the 24” iMac with ATI HD2600 pro? (Don’t think so)

    Do you have to reinstall the Kext after this update or does is leave the videodriver alone?

     

    Who tried it allready?

     

    (Thnx KrysiuTurek for the solution! ) You gave me back a fine usable iMac.

  • by richard.s.hall,

    richard.s.hall richard.s.hall Sep 20, 2012 7:05 AM in response to gymaroe
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 20, 2012 7:05 AM in response to gymaroe

    Take this with a grain of salt...

     

    I installed 10.8.2 yesterday on my 7,1 iMac. Normally, when I update the OS, it locks up almost immediately and I need to apply the kext fix. So far, no lock ups without the kext fix and it has been almost 24 hours.

     

    I'm keeping my fingers crossed. So far, so good.

     

    I'll post again when I get more experience.

  • by friedmania,

    friedmania friedmania Sep 20, 2012 7:51 AM in response to gymaroe
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 20, 2012 7:51 AM in response to gymaroe

    I upgraded to Mountain Lion and got a freeze pretty quick.  When I went to replace the kext files, I noticed the ones I expected were not there (different names).  So I just decided to revert back to the older OS (via time machine).  I do want to use Mountain Lion sometime, but not sure what the fix is now...

  • by gymaroe,

    gymaroe gymaroe Sep 20, 2012 8:11 AM in response to richard.s.hall
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 20, 2012 8:11 AM in response to richard.s.hall

    Thnx richard.s.hall

     

    @Friedmania

    The Fix

     

    It works perfect on my:

    iMac 8.1 24" C2D 2,8 GHz

    ATI Radeon HD 2600 pro 256mb

    Early 2008

     

    (I did a clean install of Mountain Lion of USB stick. 1 week de ML worked fine after this week freezes etc. applied the Kext a month agoo. No freezes at all!)

  • by richard.s.hall,

    richard.s.hall richard.s.hall Sep 20, 2012 8:22 AM in response to gymaroe
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 20, 2012 8:22 AM in response to gymaroe

    Well, I must have jinxed myself. My display just locked up. Had to hard reboot and reapply the kext fix.

     

    So, it likes like it is still needed for 10.8.2... :-(

  • by millit,

    millit millit Sep 21, 2012 10:15 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 21, 2012 10:15 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek

    Hi everyone:
    somene here has an original

    AppleGraphicsControl.kext file for iMac 24" 8,1 - graphic card model "NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS" 32-Bit

    ???

  • by theboxorocks,

    theboxorocks theboxorocks Sep 21, 2012 10:58 PM in response to DazzaG
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 21, 2012 10:58 PM in response to DazzaG

    For what it's worth. My 7.1 with ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT 128MB was freezing several times a day. OS reinstalls, permission repairs etc didn't help. smcFan control didn't help. Finally I installed OS X 10.8.2 and applied the kext fix using kext helper. That seems to have solved the freeze problem.

     

    So far it's been two weeks without problems. I'm not crazy about no longer having Rosetta but I've kept my buggy Snow Leopard OS on a partition so I can access PowerPC programs when I absolutely have to.

  • by navsaria,

    navsaria navsaria Sep 22, 2012 7:19 PM in response to DazzaG
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 22, 2012 7:19 PM in response to DazzaG

    For what it's worth, I was having the multiple freezing problem on my 2007 iMac (ATI2400) on 10.7 AND 10.8.  (Had to go to Lion when Mobile Me shut down, then Mountain Lion soon thereafter.)  The 10.6.2 kext solution from KrzysiuTurek worked and I had weeks of uptime through 10.8.0 and 10.8.1 without any problems.

     

    10.8.2 apparently over-wrote things, because I had a freeze within 5 minutes of rebooting after upgrading.  I just reapplied the same solution -- hopefully that works.

     

    I am surprised Apple isn't monitoring this thread and fixing this...

  • by millit,

    millit millit Sep 23, 2012 2:35 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 23, 2012 2:35 AM in response to KrzysiuTurek

    hi, I'm Claus.
    The funny thing is that the files which where in my extentions folder before upgrading to 10.8.2:

    AppleGraphicsControl.kext
    GeForce7xxxGLDriver.bundle

    GeForce8xxxGLDriver.bundle

    NVDANV40Hal.kext

    has all dissapeared from my system. And I still get freezes now and then.
    Incredible that Mac support center does not answer on this problem apparently so common for a lot of people.
    Should I take the risk and ri-install the abobe kext files before buying a new imac? Of course Mac support center would prefer me to buy a new one, right?

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