Q: OSX Lion + 2011 iMac 27'' + Video = Freeze

I am not certain that the video is not a red herring - I have been running into the same bug on Lion on two different machines - right after a reboot, no keyboard, mouse moves, but no button clicking is possible. The clock is still updating and iTunes will start when attaching an iPhone.

The only solution I found was a hard reboot.

We've been having this same problem but now I can't even get it to turn on. It's a gray screen. It acts like it's booting up, the Apple turns pink and green then a solid gray screen. Anyone heard of this? We bought a MacBook Pro and an iMac and I'm thuroughly disgusted.

Just adding another one to the list.  I'm having the freezing problem as well.  (Mid-2011 27" iMac i5)

Mine has froze a few times with youtube videos, and it also froze once when I tried using Photo Booth.  And the fact that Photo Booth made it freeze makes me think this is no one's fault but Apple.

Has Apple released any sort of statement about this?  It would be nice if they would acknowledge this problem and tell us what they're doing to fix it, rather than let all of us hash it out on the forums.

We can't even USE ours! It's less than a month old. I would return it if Best Buy would refund my money. I can't find any statement on it. I'm calling Apple tomorrow. Good luck with that, right?!

If you have not already done so, report this to your favorite blogs... Find the "Tip Us" or "Share it" button on tech blogs until it gets more widespread attention.

I think Apple does not listen to their users until their is an absolute chorus of criticism.

Yes keep us posted especially if it starts to work.

I'm actually going a tad better than before I have a video in one window, five tabs in chrome open and a six page adobe pdf opened - don't know why previews not picking up my pdf's it did once here and there but has not the last day or two. Anyway my resources say between 7-9MB low and 12-17MB high and am not crashing the system where it had been doing for days.... a total of 1.97 used and it's still alive. WOW

Just an OUTSIDE thought - MAYBE the new OS has a different scheme for defragging the drive and it just takes a super long time on a heavily used system... I'd like to give Apple the benefit of the doubt, especially if there is a quick cure... but they should have warned the buyers what to expect --whatever theyr really knew.

I purchased an iMac last week and I upgraded it to Lion a few days after. Since the upgrade, my computer freezes when I try to watch embedded videos on any site. I haven't had any problems with other programs yet. Like other comments have already mentioned, I can move my mouse, but everything else is frozen. I tried waiting it out to see if it unfreezes, but a few minutes later, my computer screen just went black. Only a hard reboot fixed the problem.

I tried uninstalling and reinstalling Flash, but that didn't do anything. So, I decided to call Apple Care today for help.  The person was very nice in helping me and sugessted that I should download Microsoft Silverlight and do the ctrl+cmd+p+r thing when restarting my computer. So far, I think that has helped, but judging from the comments in this thread, it looks like the problem will return.

I really hope Apple fixes this problem soon because I'd hate to have to return my computer back. I'm going to call Apple Care again tomorrow and see what happens next.

No no... don't return to Best Buy... sidenote: always best to purchase from an Apple Store but anyway, Apple will take care of your iMac. I'm assuming your have Apple Care protection plan? Anyway, I will say for the last 2 weeks Apple's customer service has been fantastic as troubleshooting and taking care of things over the phone. You can always take your iMac into an Apple store and have the Genius counter look at it for you. Or simply downgrade back to Snow Leopard for the time being if that's still an option until Lion/or Internet sites get adjusted to new Mac OS system.. which probably can take a few weeks. I'm just guessing.

I will say one thing after keeping up with this thread for the last week or so:

When people are calling Apple Care and speaking to the Tech's.. it seems like every one of them is offering different troubleshooting advise. It would be nice that we can somehow get everyone on the same page in regards to this specific issue. Since there are multiple users with the same exact symptoms.. you would think that the Tech's would have the same list of troubleshooting ideas.. or perhaps be already familiar with the issue.

The Tech that I spoke to today sounded like he didn't know of such an issue. I will write down that keyboard shortcut for restarting the computer.

When I purchased my computer 2 weeks ago, I was running Snow Leopard with ZERO issues. For Mac users that are considering returning the Mac, I would downgrade first prior to taking the machine back.... it's the OS, not the computer, I will guarantee that much.

This sounds suspiciously like the problems 07 and 08 iMacs had with Snow Leopard, starting with 10.6.3.  (cursor moves, but not clicks, no actions, sound continue to play in background).  Someone was able to tracked it down to the video driver kext and by reverting back to 10.6.2, the problem goes away.  Here's a tread discussing those models:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2384136?start=675&tstart=0

Unfortunately I don't know what 2011 iMacs can revert back to, but most likely it's a video driver issue.

I haven't tried it myself, but you could try to remote login to your iMac once it freezes and should be able to see your screen.

Steve

Count me in!

Crashed today when opening iPhone-recorded mp4 with Quicklook. Mouse still moved for a minute or two and then the screen turned black, the drives unmounted but fan kept spinning. --> Hard reset.

Same thing happened earlier when looking at flash video on a news site.

One more here. I'm having the same problem with my brand new iMac 27'' i7 4GB 1TB HD (purchased less than a week ago), updated to Lion. Hoping for a quick solution!

An update: I've been working with an Apple support technician, trying out a number of things, and nothing resolves the problem. He's had me disconnect all my peripherals, delete a number of files, etc., but the freeze still occurs. However, it seems clear that this _only_ occurs after I have put my Mac to sleep and awakened it at least once. I can't reproduce it right after boot.

Do others see this problem occuring without putting the Mac to sleep?

I've posted an article on my blog, and anyone who wants to comment about their problem is welcome to do so:

http://www.mcelhearn.com/2011/07/25/new-imac-lion-video-freeze/

I ran into the same problem.

Trying to read in quicklook a MP4 video made my iMac 27' core i7 (2 month old) to freeze.

Only the mouse pointer can move. I had to hard reset the computer.

+1

Brand new iMac 2011 21.5 i7, 12GB RAM, 2TB HD, updated to Lion a couple of days after I've got it. The RAM upgrade mad me suspicious, but all tests on that were ok. Don't think it's that - reading about so many others having the same problem.

Sad story - coming from a more stable PC. Hope this is just a Lion issue, and not a Hardware problem.

gduc.

I also purchased an iMac 27 last week and I'm also having the issue with freezing after upgrading to Lion. It's happened several times with safari but most recently with a H264 video I was previewing with Quicklook. I can't do anything apart from switching off the iMac and rebooting.