System and Finder Preferences not saving

This is a joke. My system is ruined. I've spent days trying to get to a working system again. Re-install os - no way!!! That's why I bought a mac, but LION IS A MESS APPLE!!!

I'll have to wait for the patch to be released to sort out all the BUGS and in the meantime implement all the workarounds that the net is full of because of people trying to deal with this os.

Actually I might try that download... I'll get back to you on it....

Batchmod fixed the problem - thanks Joe. Looks like we need to be unix admins with mac os nowadays.

I'm also considering reinstalling with snow leopard and having a clean system, but this might be difficult with iphoto, itunes etc..

bigrich18, thanks. Trashing Finder preferences worked for me. In addition to com.apple.sidebarlists.plist, I also trashed com.apple.finder.plist. Rebooted and now it remembers the default folder I'd chosen as well as the other finder preference settings.

Here's a slightly more detailed step-by-step process I found:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/finder.html

Hi all,

Just posting my solution to the problem - our biggest concern was that all our applications kept opening on start-up and they seemed to be stuck from the day that we upgraded to Lion (the iTunes user agreement would keep appearing, iPhoto would keep telling us to upgrade, Firefox was showing the "Well this is embarrassing" page, etc)

The problem was that the system preferences weren't saving so we couldn't keep the "Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps" unchecked. Tried all the solutions here, nothing worked, including trashing the com.apple.systempreferences.plist. However, it WAS working on a different account on the computer, so we were almost resigned to moving everything across to a new account and starting again.

Finally I decided just to trash the com.apple.iPhoto.plist & restarted the computer to see if that would fix it for iPhoto specfically and for some reason that completely fixed the problem. No more issues with System Prefs not saving and all applications are staying closed on start up. Currently having celebratory drinks as it has been a major problem for us ever since upgrading!

Hope this solution can be used for anyone who is still having problems with this. My guess would be, try trashing the plist file for any application that is continuing to open on startup.

- Monica & Aaron

Hi bigrich18,

this seems to work for me too. In my case iMail and Safari and keychain did not save there values.

I stop the programs, deleted the com.apple.xxx.plist and .lockfile then logged out and in again (important as it did not work, only deleting the files)

Now email, safari and keychain work again.

I hope I don't have to do that with all programms!!!

Regards

Alex

No need to do a clean install or other complicated stuff. This worked for me:

1. Open up Terminal (/Programs/Utilities/Terminal.app)

2. Enter "chmod -RN ~/Library/Preferences" (without the quotation marks)

3. Hit return.

Repairing permissions doesn't seem to work for home folders...

HTH

Thanks, finally Batchmod solves the problem om my Mac!

I did what Mark23 suggested and the problem solved!

Thanks Mark23!

This is the absolute solution!

RECOMMENDED!!

thanks Mark23!

I was going crazy with this problem! Mark23 solution worked. Thanks 🙂

Thanks Joe! This solved my preferences issues today after hours of failed attempts! Rob

Thanks so much Mark23, no more frustrations and worries about my iMac 🙂

BatChmod didn't work for me ... system preferences still don't save :-(

This was it, thank you Mark23. It is a well needed solution.

FYI,

I am a photographer and my workflow on my MBP was stopped because none of my files could be deleted or renamed. So I used BATCHmod App (http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/6440/batchmod) and changed the ownership for my user to R W X and for Staff to R W X, then checked the following at the bottom, Change Owenership and Privilidges, Unlock, Clear ACLs, and Apply to enclosed folders and files. This resolved my issue with changing file names etc.

But then on reboot my system preferences were not changing. so I followed Mark23's instructions and did this...

1. Open up Terminal (/Programs/Utilities/Terminal.app)

2. Enter "chmod -RN ~/Library/Preferences" (without the quotation marks)

3. Hit return.

Thanks Mark

Mark23,

Thank you this worked for me as well.

None of my preferances were saving.

When I ran "chmod -RN ~/Library/Preferences" (without the quotation marks) my Dock preferences where saved. But noticed my Adobe Bridge Preferences where not saving so I decided to run this on the whole Library and now everything works like a charm. **** what a hasstle this has been. And all the documentation out there by idiots with various solutions that didnt work!! lol

"chmod -RN ~/Library" (without the quotation marks) Worked!!