Level 1

47 points

crashed: too many corpses being created

After installing a Yosemite update on my laptop, when it boots, it seems to all be fine until about the loading bar is maybe 2/3 done, then slows to a crawl and takes another 20 minutes or so to reach full - where it stays. I have no cursor or anything else during this time, but my caps lock button light will go on an off when I press it.

I've tried:
-Resetting PRAM/NVRAM
-Booting into recovery mode and repairing the drive/partition. This seemed to be done successfully.
-Booting hardware diagnostics and doing a check. It says everything is fine.
-Safe boot. Takes the same length of time and hangs at the same place, so honestly not sure if I'm even doing it right.
-Verbose mode says every single process has crashed, with 'too many corpses being created.'. (picture - note that it's not actually blurry, just scrolling pretty fast so a photo wasn't the best)

It's a Mid-2011 15" Macbook pro, 2.2GHz with a 750GB hard drive and 16GB of RAM. I'm still doing a few other checks (currently re-installing 10.10 using a thumb drive to see if that fixes it), but has anyone got any ideas or had a similar problem?

MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011), OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on Jun 27, 2015 2:24 PM

Top-ranking reply

aka_dapper

Level 1

21 points

Posted on Oct 1, 2017 4:49 AM

The following didn't work for me, but creating/fixing the file rc.server has worked for many others with a similar problem. To do this, boot up your Mac in Single User mode (hold Cmd+S immediately as you hear the Apple chime).

Once the initial verbose script has finished loading, enter the following two lines:

mount -uw /

/usr/bin/nano /etc/rc.server

The first line allows your Mac's system files to be written to. The second line opens/creates rc.server as a file, using the nano process. Once the file opens, delete any script that already exists (don't worry if it's empty) and then enter the following two lines:

#!/bin/sh

/usr/sbin/BootCacheControl jettison

Once finished, save your changes with Ctrl+O and then exit nano with Ctrl+X. Your Mac may then automatically reboot, but if it returns you to Single User mode, enter the following line:

reboot

Credit to Chris Hotte (a.k.a NightFlight) for originally discovering this fix

Hope this works for you!

Note: if you're using a UK-type keyboard like myself, you might have a hard time creating the # hash symbol required for the rc.server script. UK input requires Alt+3 to create #, but Alt seems to have no effect within Single User mode. To get around this, I used Recovery Mode (boot up and hold Cmd+R) and changed my input to a US keyboard, then rebooted. US input uses Shift+3 to get #, which works fine in Single User mode

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76 replies

daDrop

Level 1

4 points

Feb 10, 2018 4:30 PM in response to Zcomuto

I was able to solve this problem in about 35 minutes without a backup, without erasing, and without having to re-set up much of anything.

http://capitoladesign.com/2018/02/10/osx-too-many-corpses-the-30-minute-fix-no-d ata-loss/

frankv.

Level 1

9 points

Apr 13, 2018 8:19 AM in response to Zcomuto

So, here is the latest solution from Apple:

Restart your Mac and hold down Command-R tostart up from macOS Recovery.
If the startup drive has FileVault turned on, open Disk Utility and proceed with the next step. If FileVault is off, skip to step 5.
Select the startup drive and click Mount in the Disk Utility toolbar. When prompted, select a login name and enter the password. Then click Unlock to mount the startup drive.
Quit Disk Utility.
Choose Utilities > Terminal from the menu bar.
Type this command in Terminal:cd /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/var/db/caches/opendirectory/
Modify the command to reflect the name of the startup volume if it's not Macintosh HD. Remember to use an escape character \ before each white space in the command path.
Press Return.
Type this command in Terminal:mv ./mbr_cache ./mbr_cache-old
The mv Terminal command is safer than the rm command. Errant white space in an rm command can destroy the user's data.
Press Return.
Quit Terminal.
Choose Apple () menu > Restart.

The first startup after running these commands takes longer than usual as the cache is recreated. Subsequent startups will take the normal amount of time.

Hope this will help you 🙂

Frank

Apr 23, 2018 2:14 AM in response to frankv.

Hi Frank,

yes, you are right concerning "Recovery HD". My reply was to jorgelcampos' solution where an external drive was suggested to be used.

Using "Recovery HD" is faster, more direct and the only way if you cannot use or don't want to use an external drive – "creating" an external boot drive when you don't have any working Mac might be impossible. (Haven't try the "createinstallmedia"-thing in this context, wonder if it would still work with High Sierra. It is not recommended since El Capitan, I think - though it might still work.)

Regards,

Olaf

yannaï

Level 1

4 points

Apr 29, 2018 1:37 PM in response to frankv.

Hi !

Just wanted to say thank you ! After having tried everything but erasing my hard drive completely, I followed your solution Frank, and it worked !

I hope everyone experiencing the same problem will be aware of this solution soon.

Thank you so much ! 😀

May 15, 2018 6:00 AM in response to frankv.

This works! this is the one that worked in my system. My macbook pro (late 2011) crashed after SMC reset. I tried many options like reinstalling mac OS, disk repair etc., and nothing worked. Thanks Frankv for this suggestion!

PPF1

Level 1

4 points

May 19, 2018 3:53 AM in response to frankv.

Franv.

Thanks for this. MBP late 2011, issue after updating to latest High Sierra OS, when logging loading bar progressed all the way to the end and stayed that way. I tried every single option posted here and other forums and only this one seems to finally worked for me. Not sure if the solution was just the above option or a combination of all or several of other options but after following the above my MBP is now up. Would be good to know if other than to do a new TM if I should perform some sort of check before a future shut down.

Thanks

May 27, 2018 2:55 AM in response to frankv.

Thanks for Sharing this solution @frankv. It worked like a charm ✅ & I was finally able to get my 3 years data back 🙂

I have tried all the other solution before like Resetting PRAM, reinstalling High Sierra, but none worked.

Thanks again !!!!

Jun 7, 2018 1:44 PM in response to Zcomuto

I have experienced this the second time in a few months today, first time I resorted to a Time Machine reinstall.

Solution posted above fixed it for me second time without a reinstall. See https://mrsystems.co.uk/blogs/news/too-many-corpses-being-created

Oct 2, 2017 6:13 PM in response to epikos

Hi epikos, it’s very strange that nano wouldn’t let you exit. If you run it again, can you take a photo of your screen when running nano to edit rc.server ?

AlexGzz

Level 1

4 points

Oct 3, 2017 9:04 PM in response to aka_dapper

Hi. I have the same problem. I'm not allowed to overwrite the file

-----edit

Tried a second time and it allowed me to save the file but the system is still stuck at the Apple logo

Nov 21, 2017 3:28 AM in response to epikos

hi epikos, i'm stuck at the same point, how did you go on? thank you for your help!

leale

Level 1

4 points

Nov 26, 2017 6:47 AM in response to AudreyE14

I don't understand all those codes. have the same problem. somebody can help explaining more what is the process or another simple way? thanks

Nov 28, 2017 3:14 AM in response to aka_dapper

Does the "etc" in your second line of code mean we need include a specific drive or directory location in place of the "etc", or do we type this exaclty?

Nov 28, 2017 7:35 PM in response to TungstenWarri0r

Type that exactly

Dec 4, 2017 10:52 AM in response to Claudio P.

Hi Claudio,

I'm happy for you. unfortunately I did not have a time machine backup, so I could not try this way to solve the problem. I learned the lesson for tne next time..

bye

Federica

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crashed: too many corpses being created