Applications hanging all the time

[maleercan]

Hi
I am a recent Mac convert but have run into a problem- on Saturday morning I tried importing photos from my camera into IPhoto and it wouldn't start up.. sort of. I also noticed Safari wouldn't start. Since then I have found a few other problems. I'll describe the whole issue:
I am on a Mac Powerbook G4 17" running 10.3.7 (I inherited it from a colleague but with no Restore discs). There is 18GB free on the harddrive.

When I click on IPhoto or Safari to launch it, it bounces in my dock then settles with the little arrow under it (i.e. suggesting it has launched) however no window appears and no menus appear at the top.

Other symptoms are:
Installer can't load any info (it seems Onyx is a good app to have, but I cannot run it) if I launch an install a blank window appears with blank buttons.
Disk Utility launches but when I select my hard-drive it just hangs (the spinning 'busy' cursor makes me a bit nauseas after a while too).
Yesterday on IChat, the app would launch but I couldn't launch any text chat windows.

I have tried starting in single-user mode and doing an 'sbin/fsck' thing.

Does anyone know of any similar problems and solutions?

Thanks
Nathan

[Tetano]

Do you have the macosx install disk? you can try running disk utility booting from the disk (holding c at the startup) then click on the apple and select disk utility, then run repair permissions on your volume...

[pds]

Repairing permissions seems like a good place to start. In Panther you can do it from disk utility application the utilities folder (no need to use the install disk).

BTW welcome to the forum. I just re-read your post. Running fsck as single user should be just as good as running disk utility repair permissions.

So next step will be to create a new user and see if that clears up the problem. If things work well in the new user, it is probably a plist or some other preference in the original user, so move your data and you can delete the broken user.

[Tetano]

i wrote that because he's having problems launching disk utility from his utility folder....

[Arden]

Originally Posted by pds

Running fsck as single user should be just as good as running disk utility repair permissions.

No... fsck is what Disk Utility does when you click "Repair drive." It has nothing to do with permissions.

[maleercan]

Hi.
Cheers for posting replies.
I have discovered that it seems to be linked to ILife/ IWork/ Mac programs.
The following is a list of apps that aren't working: Safari, Iphoto, Imovie, Keynote, Ichat, Ical, Iblog, Mac Help and Installer (and other Utitlies).
I can only use certain operations in System Prefs too, like I cannot access User Accounts, which means I cannot create a new user!
Preview and Finder work OK though.
I guess they would integrate some browsing feature of Mac OS which must have become messed up.

I now have a theory that may give a clue to what's wrong. I was doing some video editing on Friday night in IMovie, and it didn't recognise a Codec in a couple of the Quicktime compressed movies and it shut down (no viruses in the the files).

Unfortunately I don't possess the sytem restore discs (the colleague I inherited this from is making noises like they ain't around anymore!). I guess I'll have to get a copy of OS10.3.7... and perhaps ILife and IWork...

Any last suggestions?

Thanks again.

[Randman]

Sounds like you need to do a clean install. Though I would have suggested not buying something unless you got everything included, especially the installation disks.

How much ram do you have? That might one other thing causing hangups.

[maleercan]

Thanks Randman.
Don't fret though my buying habits are in tact - they can't be out of tact because I didn't by this! This is a business machine that I 'inherited' off a colleague in the US (I'm in the UK) - he probably has the discs lying around, but being a registered charity we can get pretty good prices on.

Thanks all.

I am gonna put this thread to bed now.

Seeya again sometime.