System Clock loosing minutes *fix*

This appears to be a very common problem. Over the course of several days, the system clock will loose minutes until after about a month, it's around 5 minutes slow. This of course makes no sense because the "Set Date and Time automatically" check box is checked.

Here's the problem (and the fix):

The /etc/ntp.conf file is written to when you check the box to "set date and time automatically". There is a bug in the process that causes the system to add a period at the end of specified time server. If you vi /etc/ntp.conf, you'll find an extra period at the end of your time server entry.

It should only say: time.apple.com

This causes the system to be unable to find the server, so your clock will continue to lag (apparently the system clock can't keep time very well, so it needs to be able to auto-update all the time).

To fix the problem, you will need to enable the root user account, and then modify the /etc/ntp.conf file to remove the period at the end of the time server entry. (if you have to ask how to do this task, you should not attempt this. Get someone who knows Unix or Linux)