Hi Carlo,
on 13/1/11 11:31 AM, cm at cm200...@gmail.com wrote: > Hi Neil, > > It does sound like a software problem. Perhaps the screen brightness is being > set to zero. Have you tried fiddling with the brightness buttons as a > work-around. Yes, at the time I tried increasing brightness no effect. > Another potential work-around is to enable screen sharing on your iMac and > then log-in from your laptop. You could then either try to revive the iMac or > do an orderly shutdown. I was thinking about that (though I¹ve never actually tried screensharing yet) - however, now that I¹ve found that it seems to be a sleep failure and that I can then sleep and rewake using the power button (without actually shutting the machine down) I do have an orderly ³fix² to recover the situation it¹s just that I¹d rather not have the situation in the first place ;o) > I personally would do the upgrade to 10.6.6. If it is a problem known to > Apple, they may have put a fix in the upgrade. Failing that, if sufficiently > many other users are having the problem a fix will eventually be released. I will, no doubt, upgrade to 10.6.6 before too long however the problem(s) relating to SL sleep have been reported/discussed through several SL upgrades though, as I said, the forum seems to describe several similar but different sleep issues. In the meantime, after some reading prompted by Ronni¹s post, I am trying unchecking the "Allow Bluetooth devices to wake this computer" option we will see how we go! Thanks for the thoughts/suggestions. Cheers Neil -- Neil R. Houghton Albany, Western Australia Tel: +61 8 9841 6063 Email: n...@possumology.com > > Good luck, > Carlo > > On 2011-01-13, at 11:00, Neil Houghton wrote: > >> >> Hi all, >> >> A strange problem this.. >> >> A few days ago, my iMac wouldn't wake from sleep properly - in actual fact, >> the screen didn't wake-up (though I didn't realise that at the time) - I >> could hear the disc going and, since I have the Mac set to require password >> on wake from either sleep or screen saver, I should get a login window - but >> the screen remained black, with no mouse cursor. >> >> I tried a few random key strokes (to try and "wake" it) and got the "beep" >> that tells you that is not appropriate (ie I needed to login first). >> >> At the time, I was worried my screen had died (and me just a month out of >> warranty!) and decided a forced shut-down and re-boot should be tried. >> However, as I was pressing the power button, the log-in window appeared >> (together with a message about incorrect password - obviously referring to >> my random keystrokes when the screen was black). >> >> I then logged in without problem and everything was OK - I have since >> surmised that when I went to force the shut-down I actually pressed the >> power button twice - which put the computer to sleep and then re-awakened it >> (together with the screen, this time). >> >> At the time, I just put it down to some random gremlin - was relieved my >> screen was not dead - and forgot about it! >> >> >> Until this morning... >> >> Go to wake up the computer, can hear activity but the screen stays blank - >> this time I try just blindly entering my password and hitting return - the >> login obviously works and I can hear entourage (left running when the mac >> goes to sleep) retrieving emails from various accounts - but the screen >> stays black. >> >> I fired up the laptop and the iMac can be seen on the network. I try Google >> (from the laptop) and find a 5 page MacRumours forum on "27"iMac won't wake >> from sleep" stretching from to November 2009 (the vintage of my iMac) >> through to December 2010 (ie, basically, now): >> <http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=825871> >> >> This showed LOTS of people having sleep problems - though the problems and >> circumstances are far from identical - several of the posts seemed similar >> to my problem and the consensus seemed to be that the screen was not waking >> up and that perhaps the computer had failed to go completely to sleep. >> >> This reminded my of my power button pressing previously - so (more >> observantly this time) I pressed the power button once and did, in fact, >> hear the computer go to sleep - I then pressed the button again and the >> computer awoke correctly and presented me with the login window. >> >> Unfortunately, though there are MANY theories on the forum - there appears >> to be no clear cause/solution: >> >> Some people have blamed USB hubs and wireless keyboards - not applicable in >> my case. >> >> Some people point to hardware and have had Apple replacing power supplies, >> logic boards (sometimes multiple replacements) and even new computers - this >> may fix it for some people - but others have the problem re-occur - even >> over new computers. >> >> Others point to this as indicating a software problem and advocate complete >> re-installations of the operating system - again this has worked for some >> (or appeared to work for a while) but not for others - and the problem seems >> to span several versions of Snow Leopard. >> >> For myself - I had the computer for over a year before the problem appeared >> - but it then re-appeared within days. >> >> I haven't recently changed any hardware (& don't have a usb hub connected). >> >> I haven't had any major software changes (haven't yet gone to 10.6.6) - >> though I may have installed a few small programs/utilities? >> >> I tend to feel that the problem MAY be down to the sleep process hanging >> (after the screen has been put to sleep but before the computer has been >> fully put to sleep) as one strange thing I have noticed is some entourage >> error messages reporting failure to connect to server - at times when the >> computer should have been asleep - but these are isolated and not recurring >> on the 20 minute schedule that entourage checks for mail. >> >> >> Anybody else experienced or experiencing similar problems? >> >> >> Any ideas? >> >> >> At present it is not too big a problem since (unlike some posters) I don't >> have to force shutdown to get out of the problem - and it's only happened >> twice - but if it starts to get more frequent it could get very annoying! >> >> Cheers >> >> >> >> Neil -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Unsubscribe - <mailto:wamug-unsubscr...@wamug.org.au>
