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I am running Snow Leopard. It is up to date. Every few days, I get the "Spinning Wheel of Death."
- I can't do anything except hold down the power button to shut off my MacBook Pro.
- I've even tried a
kill -9 -1
from a root shell that was already opened. It just hangs. - The Spin Control app just says "Sampling" on a few of the apps but is unresponsive.
Do I have any other options to shut down my laptop? I don't like to just power it off.
Update: I have no idea which app is doing this. At the moment it appears random. My fan does not spin up. Maybe it's a networking thing?
Update: Dead again. This time I had X11 running and no matter what app I switched to, I got that app's menu bar and the X11 screen. I ping and the Internet doesn't respond. My Apple router is working because I'm streaming Pandora over WiFi. I turn off the wifi and I'm still screwed. I try to power off and it won't shutdowm because X11 is running. If course, I can't kill it. Press and hold... boom. This is not how an OS is supposed to work!
3every few days? ouch! Is there any specific application that causes it? Which OS are you running? Is it up to date? – JT.WK – 2010-02-09T00:12:04.247
4Thats "Spinning, Technocolor Pizza of Death", please. – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten – 2010-02-09T00:36:40.097
2@dmckee Also known affectionally as the beachball. – waiwai933 – 2010-02-09T00:58:12.693
2Can you identify what app is running when it happens, or is it random? Is it accompanied by an increase in fan speed, additional heat, etc.? – None – 2010-02-09T13:15:07.293
1
obligatory Family Guy reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqKM3SCEmAw
– Jeff Atwood – 2010-02-12T10:02:19.310You ARE making backups of all your crucial data... right? – Scottie – 2010-02-12T10:09:33.367
How much RAM do you have installed? – Chealion – 2010-02-12T15:49:49.847
If this was Linux, you could do Alt-SysReq-R,E,I,S,U,B. =/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_SysRq_key
– badp – 2010-02-12T21:40:16.983@Jeff Atwood thanks for the reference. All of my research servers are named after Family Guy characters, I use a mac daily, but I have never seen that episode/clip. Thanks! – gavaletz – 2010-02-14T06:23:14.623
This happens to me with microsoft office applications...Powerpoint & excel lately. I am able to "quit" the application then re-open; but I generally lose work since the last save... I save frequently, but this just happened and I lost a couple slides I had developed. Not much of a contribution, but it avoids completely hard-booting the Mac. – None – 2012-06-24T16:07:32.100