Can not type in the body of email program & reply button does not work.

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Can not type in the body of email program & reply button does not work.

I installed 10.4 (Family Pack) on my G4 400 and after a few days the email program does not work as it originally did. The reply button no longer works. (It did for a few days.) Additionally on a new mail or mail forward. I can not type in the body of the email after the first word. It just beebs at me. (It did work as normal for a few days.) I can still receive and can send mail. I have also installed this Family pack on my iMac flat panel G4 and have no mail problems. That mac is about 200 mile from this location. Before I installed 10.4 I was using 10.3.9 and mail was ok. I use high speed internet with the iMac and use dialup with the G4.

G4 400, Mac OS X (10.4), I have 2 internal hard drives and it's happened on both.

Posted on Apr 11, 2006 11:52 AM

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Answer 1

Apr 11, 2006 8:59 PM in response to Laksidemac

Are your really using Mac OS X 10.4, as in 10.4.0? If that's the case, you should seriously consider updating your system to Mac OS X 10.4.6 before attempting to fix your Mail problems.

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Answer 2

Apr 11, 2006 9:50 PM in response to Laksidemac

You can also try "Repair Disk Permissions" from Disk Utility.
Please update your system to 10.4.6 🙂

Mihalis.

Dual G5 @ 2GHz Mac OS X (10.4.6)

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Answer 3

Laksidemac Author

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Apr 12, 2006 5:04 AM in response to David Gimeno Gost

It's impossible to dowload 10.4.6 on my dial up connection at this location. Yes I have repaired permissions before & after. This same email problem has happend twice to me on the same computer but witth different healthy internal hard drives. (One is 20 GB & other is 75 GB.) In both cases the mail problem appears to have happened after I downloaded and installed DVD Player 4.6 and DVD Player Update 4.6.1. I have now done an erase and clean install on the smaller hard drive & installed 10.4.0 and all is fine with mail on it at this time. This is my 3rd install on this computer. I do not plan on doing any further updates at this location from the internet for now.

I plan to download the required updates (it's a long list) at my other location (200 miles away) and bring them up on a CD or my 20 GB Portable firewire hard drive. My iMac location has high speed internet service and that will be very little problem to get them. The iMac is running 10.4.6 and is just fine. I also have another Mac at that location (Wife's Cube) to update from 10.3.9 to Tiger. That will be my 3rd computer and that's why I purchased the Family Pack. The bright side of all of this at 74 it does keep my mind active.

Thanks for your help. It will be about 3 weeks before I will be able to complete this cycle and see what's the solution.

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Answer 4

Laksidemac Author

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Apr 12, 2006 5:12 AM in response to Mihalis Tsoukalos

I thank you for you help. Please read my complex reply to David Gimno Cost. I'm please to have received yours & David's reply to my mail problem.

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Answer 5

Apr 12, 2006 5:48 AM in response to Laksidemac

OK, let's try deleting the cache then. I know of at least two users with the exact same problem as yours that fixed it deleting some caches. Unfortunately, deleting certain caches can have undesirable side effects, and I don't know what cache exactly was the cause of their problem, so try this first:

1. Quit Mail.

2. In the Finder, go to HOME/Library/Caches/.

3. Locate the Mail folder there and move it to the Desktop (to be deleted after fixing the problem). Be sure to do this with the Mail folder located in HOME/Library/Caches/ and not with the Mail folder located in HOME/Library/, which contains all your mail database.

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Answer 6

Laksidemac Author

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Apr 13, 2006 1:23 AM in response to David Gimeno Gost

I tried it and it did not solve the problem. No change with mail on that hard drive (75 GB). But the other hard drive (20 GB) that I did the erase & clean install of 10.4.0 on now has the same email problem. So my guess is that it is a length of time item or number of launch times for mail & has little or nothing to do with my additional downloads that I mentioned before. I have now had the same mail problem on 3 of 3 installs of 10.4.0 on this computer.

My out for email at this location is I'm now using web email via Safari for sending emails and I'm using Mail to receive them. A little difficult but doable.

Again I thank you for your time and effort on my problem.

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Answer 7

Apr 13, 2006 9:56 AM in response to Laksidemac

I've lost track of what computer you have where, and I don't understand why you keep installing buggy OS X 10.4.0 on systems that worked fine under OS X 10.3.9, without being able to update to install system updates afterwards.

That said, you may want to look at this web site for general Mac OS X troubleshooting tips:

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

In particular, since I know of other people with the same problem as you that fixed it deleting caches, you may want lo look these two pages:

Resolving Disk, Permission, and Cache Corruption

Side effects of System cache cleaning

In addition to some utilities mentioned there for cache cleaning, you may also consider OnyX, if for no other reason, because it's free:

http://www.titanium.free.fr/

Although utilities such as OnyX allow you to clean many caches with just a click of the mouse, I'd recommend to be as selective as possible and clean them up one at a time, to try to identify which exactly is causing your problems, if any. This information, in turn, could be useful for other users. I'm pretty sure some Mail problems are related to cache issues, but I don't yet know which cache exactly is the culprit here (since it was not the Mail cache, I would say that the fonts cache should be next in the list).

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Answer 8

rewaniw

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Apr 13, 2006 12:22 PM in response to Laksidemac

Hi Laksidemac, I cannot quite tell from the thread whether you got your problem straightened out or not, but I have the identical problem and cannot solve it:
Ever since I installed X tools on my mac (running 10.4.6), my mail program has two significant bugs. It does not send mail, and the cursor disappears after I type a few letters and then hit space. Does anyone have a solution to this?

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Answer 9

Apr 13, 2006 12:28 PM in response to rewaniw

Have you tried any of the steps I've described above?

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Answer 10

rewaniw

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Apr 13, 2006 12:42 PM in response to David Gimeno Gost

thanks for the quick reply. i did try deleting the mail cache, and i also repaired the disk permissions. these did not solve the problem. i did not yet try deleting other caches or using onyX. i guess that is the next step.

my first thought was that if the user did resolve the problem, naybe the same solution would work for me. meantime, i will try other caches. i guess i'll try fonts first as you sugegsted that, though i have to locate it first (it is not in my "user/libraries/cache" folder.)

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Answer 11

Laksidemac Author

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Apr 13, 2006 2:21 PM in response to rewaniw

No my email problem has not been solved at this point. I have tried every solution suggested, except downloading and updating to 10.4.6 (As with my dial up at this location it would require about 24 hours.) so far and no luck with this computer. I'll bring the update with me the next time I come to this location but I have no confidence that that will solve the problem.

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Answer 12

Laksidemac Author

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Apr 13, 2006 2:29 PM in response to David Gimeno Gost

I keep installing 10.4.0 as that is what Apple made and sold. If I had know it was buggy, as you say, I would not have purchased it to start with. As far as what I've done it's all in the thread that you have been using. I have no confidence that when, and I will, upgrade to 10.4.6 that it will solve the problem.

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Answer 13

Apr 13, 2006 2:51 PM in response to Laksidemac

I keep installing 10.4.0 as that is what Apple made
and sold.

Apple sells it on the assumption that you will install any necessary system updates as they are released.

If I had know it was buggy, as you say, I
would not have purchased it to start with.

That's not a reason to not purchase it. That's a reason to not install it until you can install any necessary system updates as well.

I have no confidence that when, and I will,
upgrade to 10.4.6 that it will solve the problem.

And you're right, it might not. But until you do, there is little point in trying other troubleshooting approaches apart from those mentioned in the links I provided above. The fact that your problem has appeared in all the machines you've installed Tiger on, is a clear indication that there is a bug in Mac OS X 10.4.0 that wasn't present in Mac OS X 10.3.9.

Regards.

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Answer 14

Apr 13, 2006 2:57 PM in response to rewaniw

i did not yet try deleting other caches or using onyX.

The reason to use OnyX, or any other of the utilities mentioned in the links I provided above is precisely to easily clean up the caches that might be causing the problem. They are not different things to try, they are the same.

You should really read the articles I linked to above before proceeding, in particular the two related to cache cleaning.

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Answer 15

rewaniw

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Apr 13, 2006 3:16 PM in response to Laksidemac

Many thanks for the tips. The problem is fixed. I downloaded "Tiger Cache Cleaner" and ran the minimal cache cleaning ("light cleaning") on the local and system disks, then rebooted. Mail now works fine and as far as I can tell there is no loss of data.

Thanks again.

Jon

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