Finder won't quit

Question

Level 1

8 points

Finder won't quit

When I ask my mac to shut down, all goes as usual except the last stage. The finder toolbar disappears along with everything on the desktop but the finder won't quit. The shutdown process stalls out and I get the familiar "won't shut down because finder won't quit." I also cannot relaunch the finder.

If I mouse to the dock, I can select the finder and the computer works normally. The only recent change to my system is the addition of a USB 3G modem for wireless internet access. I've only had it a few days, and I HAVE successfully shut down the system after this was installed.

Any ideas? I tried a search but couldn't find a solution that would work for this problem.

air, Mac OS X (10.5.8), USB modem

Posted on Nov 22, 2010 7:59 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 22, 2010 10:18 AM in response to Birdo

Birdo wrote:
"won't shut down because finder won't quit."

Launch the Console utility and look for messages around the time of the shutdown failure to see if you see anything that explains the problem. If you see a suspicious message but don't understand what it says, post it here and someone should be able to help.

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Answer 2

macjack

Level 10

111,242 points

Nov 22, 2010 10:22 AM in response to Birdo

Hi Birdo,

Go to Applications/Utilities/Activity Monitor.app and launch it. Choose the process named Finder and you should be able to kill or force-quit.

But before you do that go to Users/yourname/Library/Preferences and trash these two files:
com.apple.finder.plist
com.apple.sidebarlists.plist

Then, kill or force quit the Finder and restart.
(You will have to reset a few finder prefs the way you like them.)

-mj

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Answer 3

Birdo Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 22, 2010 11:06 AM in response to macjack

Thank you for these two ideas. I tried macjack's instructions, selected "finder" from activity monitor and then choose quit and then force quit. Same result. Tried shutting down the machine several ways.

William, here's something that looked odd to me from the console.

11/22/10 9:41:03 PM [0x0-0xb40b4].com.google.Chrome[2252] Mon Nov 22 21:41:03 airbook.local Google Chrome Helper[2259] <Error>: The function `CGAccessSessionSkipBytes' is obsolete and will be removed in an upcoming update. Unfortunately, this application, or a library it uses, is using this obsolete function, and is thereby contributing to an overall degradation of system performance. Please use `CGAccessSessionSkipForward' instead.

I will appreciate any ideas. I am in Africa where the mac is virtually unknown so these discussion boards are my best bet.

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Answer 4

Nov 22, 2010 11:10 AM in response to Birdo

Birdo wrote:
The function `CGAccessSessionSkipBytes' is obsolete and will be removed in an upcoming update.

I wouldn't expect that to cause your problem.

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Answer 5

Birdo Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 22, 2010 11:19 AM in response to William-Boyd-Jr

News Flash: I just tried verify the hard drive with disk utility. The whole machine crashed. I waited a bit, pressed the start-up button and voila! Now I wonder if it'll shut down properly.

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Answer 6

Birdo Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 22, 2010 11:28 AM in response to Birdo

Machine has successfully shut down and restarted. Interestingly, the modem is now appearing as a disk in the finder whereas previously there was none. Perhaps the shut down problem had to do with my not ejecting the modem (which I couldn't do for obvious reasons.) Hopefully, this small mystery has ended.

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Answer 7

Nov 22, 2010 6:55 PM in response to Birdo

Birdo wrote:
I just tried verify the hard drive with disk utility. The whole machine crashed.

That's not a good sign, although in your case it didn't appear to be fatal.

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Answer 8

Nov 22, 2010 6:57 PM in response to Birdo

Birdo wrote:
the modem is now appearing as a disk in the finder

That sounds to me like the result of a miss-executed installation. If you do a Finder File -> Get Info on that "disk", what do you see for "Kind"? Is there an item in that window for "Disk Image"?

Perhaps the shut down problem had to do with my not ejecting the modem

That's a very strange modem if it can be "ejected".

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