Under System Information I click on extensions and it gives me the error "There was an error while gathering this information." Any ideas?
Mac Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9.2), Early 2008
Try Disk Utility ( Repair Permissions ) This is one case where it might prove helpful.
Thanks, I repaired permissions and am still getting the error.
Restart the computer in safe mode. This will cause certain caches maintained by the system to be rebuilt.
Safe mode is much slower to start up than normal.
When the login screen appears, restart as usual (not in safe mode) and test. There's no need to log in while in safe mode.
Note: If FileVault is enabled, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a Fusion Drive or a software RAID, you can’t start in safe mode. In that case, ask for instructions.
Thanks for the information on restarting in safe mode.
I restarted my computer in safe mode and then restarted as usual. Went to System Information app and clicked on extensions and received the same error message. All other information loads correctly.
My computer is running fine, as far as I know. I just upgraded to 10.9.2 from 10.6.8 a few days ago and was checking out the new features and trying all my previously installed apps to be sure they all worked. Thankfully, they all do!
I'm just concerned that there may be a problem lurking behind the scene.
Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the icon grid.
Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left. If you don't see that menu, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar.
Click the Clear Display icon in the toolbar. Then try the action that you're having trouble with again. Select any messages that appear in the Console window. Copy them to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.
When posting a log extract, be selective. In most cases, a few dozen lines are more than enough.
Please do not indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Important: Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.
20/04/14 4:04:54.385 PM System Information[4752]: Failed to parse plist output from '/usr/sbin/system_profiler -nospawn -xml SPExtensionsDataType -detailLevel full', error: (null)
If you don't already have a current backup, back up all data, then reinstall the OS.* You don't need to erase the startup volume, and you won't need the backup unless something goes wrong. If the system was upgraded from an older version of OS X, you may need the Apple ID and password you used.
If you use FileVault 2, then before running the Installer you must launch Disk Utility and select the icon of the FileVault startup volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name.) It will be nested below another icon with the same name. Click the Unlock button in the toolbar and enter your login password when prompted. Then quit Disk Utility to be returned to the main screen.
There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.
If you installed the Java runtime distributed by Apple and still need it, you'll have to reinstall it. The same goes for Xcode.
*The linked support article refers to OS X 10.9 ("Mavericks"), but the procedure is the same for OS X 10.7 ("Lion") and later.
System Information Application
