Tracing down short pauses

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Level 2

163 points

Tracing down short pauses

Every couple of days my computer locks up for about a minute. It doesn't happen all at once, my mouse and keyboard lock up, except for swapping between windows, and then what I'm playing on my iTunes stops. And then everything starts again, queuing up my commands. I open up my Console and look for something interesting at the time, but don't know what to look for.

Since I can't repeat the problem, I'd like a clue about what to look for, so I can cut and paste it to show an Apple Genius or someone else.

I don't see any sign of permanent problems, and have had Malwarebytes do full scans on my computer. All of my software is kept current. (macOS 10.13.3).

iMac, macOS High Sierra (10.13)

Posted on Mar 14, 2018 6:04 PM

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Answer 1

John Galt

Level 10

141,210 points

Mar 17, 2018 7:06 AM in response to Howard Brazee

You need to "catch it in the act" to advance troubleshooting.

Why not simply post a screenshot of AM. Even when everything is working properly it might point to one of a number of bad actors (non-Apple "anti-virus" / "cleaning" scams etc). Read below.

Determine if you can correlate the poor performance with the presence of other processes that may be affecting its operation. To do that use Activity Monitor:Use Activity Monitor on your Mac - Apple Support. Please select View > Active Processes (not My Processes as shown in that document) and sort by %CPU.

Take a screenshot of the entire Activity Monitor window, and post it in a reply: How to take a screenshot on your Mac - Apple Support.

For example:

Please omit or obscure any information you might consider personal before posting the screenshot.

To learn how to edit and post a screenshot refer to Screenshots (Mac) under the Appendix in Writing an effective Apple Support Communities question.

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Answer 2

Howard Brazee Author

Level 2

163 points

Mar 15, 2018 2:25 PM in response to John Galt

Computer locked up at 3:05.
I could see from the copy of my activity monitor on the dock that something was using up resources, but by the time I could look at it, things were back to normal.
I tried console log but had to force kill it twice before I rebooted and got the following:

Log (minus my computer’s name)

Mar 15 15:04:51 --- last message repeated 11 times ---

Mar 15 15:04:52 xxxx-Computer com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.imfoundation.IMRemoteURLConnectionAgent): Unknown key for integer: _DirtyJetsamMemoryLimit

Mar 15 15:04:56 xxxx-Computer com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.apple.imfoundation.IMRemoteURLConnectionAgent): Unknown key for integer: _DirtyJetsamMemoryLimit

Mar 15 15:05:31 --- last message repeated 10 times ---

Mar 15 15:06:37 xxxx-Computer com.apple.xpc.launchd[1]

Nothing there at 15:05!!!!

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Answer 3

John Galt

Level 10

141,210 points

Mar 15, 2018 6:44 PM in response to Howard Brazee

You are not likely to find anything in the log stream itself, for the simple reason is that your Mac is unable to do anything while it's "locked up". Look for a spin report in Console's System Reports. It will end in .spin.

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Answer 4

Howard Brazee Author

Level 2

163 points

Mar 17, 2018 6:37 AM in response to John Galt

My computer locked up at 7:12 this morning (March 17) for a minute. The activity monitor showed a blue (user) spike in the doc icon, but I have no idea what process it was (By the time I could look at the window, it was over).

I looked in the console system report and did not see .spin (nothing made sense to me there). In the top of the bottom window was this:

Date/Time: 2018-03-17 05:25:22.648066 -0600

OS Version: Mac OS X 10.13.3 (Build 17D102)

Architecture: x86_64

Report Version: 19

So I did a search for 7: (because of the time) and .spin without a match.

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Answer 5

John Galt

Level 10

141,210 points

Mar 17, 2018 7:25 AM in response to Howard Brazee

Whatever “RTProtectionDaemon” is, disable or uninstall it or the application responsible for it, and evaluate your Mac’s performance. It may or may not be responsible for the unresponsiveness but it’s an obvious CPU burden.

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Answer 6

Howard Brazee Author

Level 2

163 points

Mar 19, 2018 8:49 PM in response to John Galt

Well, that wasn't the problem. I had it happen today at 9:26pm. I did see something odd - I haven't had a Kodak printer for months now, but this was in my system log for that minute:

Mar 19 21:26:01 (not the name of my computer) com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.kodak.KODAK AiO Firmware Updater[6471]): Could not find and/or execute program specified by service: 2: No such file or directory: /Library/Printers/Kodak/AiO_Printers/AiOFirmwareUpdater.app/Contents/MacOS/AiOF irmwareUpdater

Mar 19 21:26:01 (not the name of my computer) com.apple.xpc.launchd[1] (com.kodak.KODAK AiO Firmware Updater[6471]): Service setup event to handle failure and will not launch until it fires.

Mar 19 21:26:10 (not the name of my computer) iTunes[402]: Entered:_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:29

Mar 19 21:26:10 (not the name of my computer) iTunes[402]: Entered:__thr_AMMuxedDeviceDisconnected, mux-device:29

Mar 19 21:26:10 (not the name of my computer) iTunes[402]: tid:28003 - Mux ID not found in mapping dictionary

Mar 19 21:26:10 (not the name of my computer) iTunes[402]: tid:28003 - Can't handle disconnect with invalid ecid

Mar 19 21:26:26 (not the name of my computer) syslogd[66]: ASL Sender Statistics

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Answer 7

John Galt

Level 10

141,210 points

Mar 20, 2018 4:54 AM in response to Howard Brazee

If as you suspect it's related to the Kodak firmware updater, look in any or all of the following locations for it:

~/Library/LaunchAgents

/Library/LaunchAgents/

/Library/LaunchDaemons/

/Library/Application Support/

To navigate to them, copy and paste each one of the above lines into the Finder's Go menu > Go to Folder... field.

If you are not certain about an item to delete, ask. Each of those folders probably contain sufficiently few items so that a screenshot can capture all of them, but you can provide a list if you prefer. A screenshot is probably easier.

The updater was called by launchd. It's a likely candidate because that time coincided with the "freeze" event.

I'd seek to remove or disable it even if you still had that printer. I don't like things that serve for the sole purpose of updating software or firmware automatically for this reason and others. It's presumptuous and impolite. You can check for updates on your own, so that you can correlate possible unexpected behavior to it. Google's automatic update service (which you also have) is a textbook example.

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Answer 8

Howard Brazee Author

Level 2

163 points

Mar 20, 2018 5:38 AM in response to John Galt

I found a firmware & software updater Kodak .plist along with a StatisticCollection .plist in ~/Library/LaunchAgents that I deleted.

I also found a Kodak folder in /Library/Application Support/ which I deleted.

I don't know whether these cause my system's minute long lock-ups, but I certainly don't want them on my computer.

Thanks

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Answer 9

John Galt

Level 10

141,210 points

Mar 20, 2018 3:16 PM in response to Howard Brazee

Howard Brazee wrote:

Chrome? (That's my main browser)

No, I mean Google.

You cannot install Chrome without also installing Google's system-altering, information-harvesting and automatically-updating components, making Chrome impossible to use as "just another browser". Its plethora of "helpers" and related processes complicate troubleshooting.

Investigate any other Google products you may have installed. Its "Backup & Sync" product, for example, is known to cause the very problem you describe.

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Answer 10

Howard Brazee Author

Level 2

163 points

Mar 20, 2018 4:07 PM in response to John Galt

Did you see something that indicated I had Google?

Hmm, I see under System Preferences/Security & Privacy/Firewall, that I have allowed "Google Software Update" to control my computer. I am guessing that's what you are talking about, I unchecked it now - how do I uninstall it (or is that necessary - does it just update Chrome?) I also see "installd" & dropbox can control my computer can control my computer.

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