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-   -   usb problems, i think!!! (http://hintsforums.macworld.com/showthread.php?t=12700)

bustthis 06-16-2003 11:23 AM

usb problems, i think!!!
 
hi,

i have a mdd dual 1ghz/1.75 ram/4 internal 120 gb ata/audiophile 2496

i have a iogear 4 port mini hub with soundsticks, epson c60 printer, lightwave dongle, and epson 2400 perfection scanner.

I noticed this weekend that while listening to itunes, that halfway through a song the sound source would switch from the soundsticks to the built in speaker constantly. when i switch back to the soundsticks, i would hear cracks and pops in the song until it would stop and switch back to the built-in speaker. after a while of switching back and forth between sources there would be no sound at all... my scanner would also start acting up after a couple of hours of use, by giving me a message that the scanner can not be found.

i plugged the soundsticks into my cinema display and it seems to working fine...

i rebooted into system 9.2.2 and could not recreate the problem, so i guess it isn't a hardware problem, but a usb problem with 10.2.6. do i need a new hub or is there something can do to fix this?

if not, can anyone recommend a good small 4 port usb hub that will work with all of my usb devices?

thanks for your help,

charles

tlarkin 06-17-2003 12:10 PM

Does this happen with a new user account? Have you tried not plugging your usb audio through the usb hub? Is the hub a powered hub? Also what happens if you take the lightwave dongle off? I have seen dongles cause problems when being hooked up through a hub. You may want to check with newtech to see if there are any LW updates for the usb dongles.

bustthis 06-17-2003 12:29 PM

i haven't treid this with a new user account, but i will now... the soundsticks are now plugged into the hub on my 22 inch cimena display and have not experienced any problems with the sound.

the iogear 4 port mini-hub does not come with a ac adapter, but after i was having problems, i used the plug from my zip drive and now it is self-powered and i am only experiencing problems with the epson 2400 perfection scanner that is plugged into the iogear hub.

i can use the scanner for a couple of hours, than i get a message (the scanner failed to respond, please ensure that it is switched on, ready to scan and that the cables are attached correctly.) i even get this message over night, when i am not using the scanner at all. the message appears in the finder, but i can not get rid of it, not even force quitting the finder. i have to restart to get rid of the message.

i will also try to unplug the lightwave dongle, but i haven't had any problems using lightwave at all.


do you think it's the hub?

thanks for your help,

charles

tlarkin 06-17-2003 12:50 PM

Hmm kinda sounds like the hub, when you ran the updates for OS X did you do them all individually? From what I have read it is better to run the combo updates. You may want to redownload the combo updates and run them. USB was real flaky in os 10.2.5, and was supposed to be fixed in 10.2.6. The problem with the hardware protection dongles I have seen usually does not affect the application itself, but it affects the operating system, or conflicts with other devices. I had a high end PC once in my shop running dual procs, octane card, and maya, 3dsmax, and other higher end 3d design/animation apps. Well the hardware dongle for one of the apps was conflicting with the cd drives, everytime you plugged one of those dongles in and cdrom drive would pop open. It was weird, and it was fixed by updates. So I am just saying it could be a possiblity.

Try using your scanner while directly being connected to your G4 and see what happens. Also check your system log when it errors out. Right after you get that error message go into the terminal and type:
Code:

tail -30 /var/log/system.log | more
This will show the last 30 lines of the system log, which should have that error message in it somewhere if you do this right after it happens. If you can copy/paste it to these forums.

bustthis 06-17-2003 01:06 PM

hi,

every single time there is a system update, i have software update download them to my desktop and i install them manually, so yes, i have installed the 10.2.6 combo update without software update. i will unplug the dongle and put it on my keyboard and check for updates, but i am running lightwave 6.5 and i'm not sure if there will be any updates for older version on the newtek site, but i will look.

i am also going to see if i can return this hub, since it has a 3 year warranty, but something tells me it's software related, since it works fine in 9.2.2.

i have had the hub for 6 months now and only started having problems recently ( this week)

do you think it's possible that all of the devices that were hooked up to it demanded too much power and messed up the hub? i only made it self powered yesterday.

i have been checking the console logs everyday and never see anything related to what is going on, but i will try the terminal command now. i only seem to get WindowServer range exhausted messages, but i guess thats for another forum, lol!

i will also try to use my scanner with the g4 usb.

thanks again,

charles

bustthis 06-17-2003 01:09 PM

oh yeah, it seems when i get the message about the scanner, if i unplug the scanner from the hub and plug it back in, it will work. the message still appears in the finder, but it will scan. the message has a ok button, but won't go away until a reboot.

bustthis 06-18-2003 11:39 AM

much bigger problem
 
it seems that it isn't the hub after all! itunes continues to make my soundsticks cut out and i hear pop and crackles in my songs until i stop and replay.

when playing through my bang and olufsen stereo system that is hooked up to my computer with a m-audio 2496 card, the sound gets garbeled from time to time.

do you think this is a problem with my computer or itunes 4.0.1?

i have had nothing but problems with this mdd dual 1 ghz, and apple is not helping me at all.

i appreciate any help anyone can give me.


thanks,

charles

tlarkin 06-18-2003 11:53 AM

sound sticks are usb audio right? I don't really think usb is that good. just my opinion. your m-audio card (midiman.com right?) should have updated drivers. I had to configure a delta 1010 card for this guy, for his emagic recording studio a while back ago. I can remember there being a driver update for 10.2. I can also remember him calling me not too long ago to complain about a similar problem with the crackling and cutting out of sound. I can't remember exactly how, but he ended up fixing it himself. I shoot him an email to see if he can tell me how he fixed it. Meanwhile, what audio files are you playing? MP3? CDA? AIFF?

yellow 06-18-2003 12:14 PM

FWIW, I have had sound sticks since they first came out and the sound quality on them is very good (to my ear). I've never had a problem with them. However, I cannot plug them into the hub I have, they just won't work from there. I keep them plugged into the CPU.

bustthis 06-18-2003 12:27 PM

yes, the soundsticks are usb and now are hooked up to my cinema display.

the card i have is a m-audio delta 2496 audiophile card, purchased from the apple store a couple of months back. the driver i have is the most current and the only for 10.2 , which is version 1.1(from 9-5-02).

i only hear the cracks and pops on my soundsticks until the sound just cuts out. i don't use the delta card that much, but when i do it is hooked up to my bang & olufson stereo system and the sound gets really weird. it gets garbeled and i have to stop itunes and start it again when this happens to get rid of the annoying sounds.


i use itunes 4.0.1 and have mostly mp3 and aac formats. i did recently record my vinyl with audio x to aiff format. when playing the aiff's through audio x using my soundsticks, i got the same cracks and pops.

i haven't really installed anything lately, besides diskwarrior. i have had this setup for almost a year and never had these problems, not even with older versions of itunes. yesterday, i created a new user and deleted my sound prefs, m-audio prefs and apple midi prefs, but this ddin't help.

thanks,

charles

tlarkin 06-18-2003 01:07 PM

Okay I sent out an email, it could be a day or two before he gets back to me. The guy I did work for had a bunch of m-audio and motu stuff. I know a bit from working with him (he's a sound engineer) but not a whole bunch since I do not have tons of hands on experience with high end audio equipment. However, I am very sure we can figure this out.

Did you find anything in your system log? Right after itunes messes up and you get the "garbled" sound check your system log to see if itunes is erroring out. Also, play an audio cd, does it still happen? Maybe your HD needs to be optimized, maybe its fragmented (or at least the audio files are).

bustthis 06-18-2003 01:45 PM

these forums are far better than macfixit!

you are so helpful, i appreciate it!

i looked in the system log with ( tail -30 /var/log/system.log | more) and didn't notice anything going on with itunes after it would happen. i will look againwhen i get home and post the results.

i just rebuilt all of volumes directories with disk warrior 3.0 last week and i run cocktail weekly, but i will try this again when i get home.

i did a clean install of 10.2.6 last week and before i installed any third party applications, i ran itunes and i had the same cracks and pops through the soundsticks using the iogear hub. so instead of going on reinstalling everything i decided to revert to a clone that i had of my previous system.


thanks again,

charles

tlarkin 06-18-2003 01:50 PM

Just for grins try an audio cd. This would tell us if the problem is with the actual data (music files) on your machine. If your files are somehow corrupted in some way they can do that. This would also tell us maybe your HD is not optimized, and some of your audio files (or perhaps itunes) are fragmented.

Also try another media player. I think winamp made macamp??? or maybe it was just a mac skin I saw, hehehe I can't remember. That would also rule out itunes. Just keep us posted.

yellow 06-18-2003 01:52 PM

There was a MacAmp once upon a time.. try Audion from Panic Software, that still exists.

http://www.panic.com

bustthis 06-18-2003 01:58 PM

i will try when i get home from work... thanks

bustthis 06-23-2003 11:19 AM

hi,

i have defragged my hard drives and listened to a audio cd in my cd drive and the problem is still there!
i get little pops and cut-outs in tracks from time to time. i noticed that it is not happening as often as it was 1 week ago.

i have trashed my apple audio midi setup prefs and think this helped, i read somewhere else that this might help.

this is what my system log looks like right after the sound goes out:
[localhost:~] charlesm% tail -30 /var/log/system.log | more
Jun 18 23:30:16 localhost WindowServer[181]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbefc000 to 0xbc301000 goes out of bounds)
Jun 18 23:30:19 localhost WindowServer[181]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbefc000 to 0xbc402000 goes out of bounds)
Jun 18 23:30:55 localhost mach_kernel: USBF: 6238.629 [0x3ce2600] (Reset) USB Generic Hub @ 6 (0x1112000)
Jun 18 23:31:06 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Image Capture/Devices/TWAINBridge.app/Contents/MacOS/TWAINBri
dge could not be launched prebound.
Jun 18 23:31:15 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Image Capture/Devices/TWAINBridge.app/Contents/MacOS/TWAINBri
dge appears to have no prebinding problems.
Jun 18 23:31:15 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: 2003-06-18 23:31:15 -0400: prebinding for TWAINBridge done.
Jun 18 23:32:00 localhost WindowServer[181]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbefc000 to 0xbc521000 goes out of bounds)
Jun 18 23:32:30 localhost mach_kernel: USBF: 6333.658 AppleUSBOHCI[0x3c34800] Watchdog detected dead controller (hcca #: 3
3810, hc #: 34224)
Jun 18 23:32:33 localhost mach_kernel: USBF: 6336.127 [0x3ce2600] (Reset) USB Generic Hub @ 6 (0x1112000)
Jun 18 23:32:36 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Image Capture/Devices/TWAINBridge.app/Contents/MacOS/TWAINBri
dge could not be launched prebound.
Jun 18 23:32:47 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Image Capture/Devices/TWAINBridge.app/Contents/MacOS/TWAINBri
dge appears to have no prebinding problems.
Jun 18 23:32:47 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: 2003-06-18 23:32:47 -0400: prebinding for TWAINBridge done.
Jun 18 23:32:47 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Frameworks/Carbon.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/ImageCaptur
e.framework/Versions/A/Image Capture Extension.app/Contents/MacOS/Image Capture Extension could not be launched prebound.
Jun 18 23:32:55 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: /System/Library/Frameworks/Carbon.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/ImageCaptur
e.framework/Versions/A/Image Capture Extension.app/Contents/MacOS/Image Capture Extension appears to have no prebinding problems.
Jun 18 23:32:55 localhost /usr/libexec/fix_prebinding: 2003-06-18 23:32:55 -0400: prebinding for Image Capture Extension done.
Jun 18 23:32:57 localhost WindowServer[181]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbefc000 to 0xbc01d000 goes out of bounds)
Jun 18 23:33:03 localhost WindowServer[181]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbefc000 to 0xbc349000 goes out of bounds)

tlarkin 06-23-2003 12:10 PM

looks like your windowserver is having some problems. Try booting into single user mode (hold down cmd+s at start up) and run fsck
Code:

/sbin/fsck -y
Run that command, and reboot and repeat the process until fsck runs all the way through with out finding a single error.

bustthis 06-23-2003 12:23 PM

okay, will do... but what about the line that says:
Jun 18 23:32:30 localhost mach_kernel: USBF: 6333.658 AppleUSBOHCI[0x3c34800] Watchdog detected dead controller (hcca #: 3
3810, hc #: 34224)
Jun 18 23:32:33 localhost mach_kernel: USBF: 6336.127 [0x3ce2600] (Reset) USB Generic Hub @ 6 (0x1112000)


doesn't sound too good! dead controller? will fsck fix that?

thanks for your help...

tlarkin 06-23-2003 12:53 PM

If the problem is related to the software of the machine (ie OS, drivers, applications) then fsck will have a good chance of fixing it. Do you have an extra HD, or partition you could wipe out? If you were to install OS X clean on a disk, then you could easily compare and determine if its OS related or not. If you still get the same results after running all these diagnostics on it, I would contact your nearest apple service center and see about possibly getting a MLB replacement.

bustthis 06-23-2003 10:43 PM

i ran fsck a couple of times and it found no problems
at all... i then rebooted and got the garbeled music playing through my receiver. i also still get tons of the same window server messages!

Jun 23 22:29:23 localhost WindowServer[179]: Reserved range exhausted. (0xbbbbc000 to

i have 4 internal ata 120 gb discs in my g4 and will do a clean install onto one to troubleshoot. if i am satisfied with the new system, is it okay to use carbon copy cloner to move the clean install over to the disk i am using now? stupid question, but i'm not sure...

what do you mean by mlb replacement?


thanks again,

charles

yellow 06-23-2003 11:18 PM

Before you go and reinstall because of the "reserve range exhausted", read throught this thread:

http://forums.macosxhints.com/showth...threadid=12357

tlarkin 06-25-2003 11:05 AM

Well, if its not software related like the OS, applications, or data, then its probably going to be the main logic board, except you have added a pci sound card correct?

bustthis 06-25-2003 11:26 AM

i have a m-audio delta 2496 sound card, firewire card and the ati 9000 pro agp card in the pci slots. i have 1.75 gb ram and 4 internal 120 gb ata drives and a lacie d2 120 gb external firewire drive. the firewire card is from a umax scanner i used to have, but i think it is for pc's, but it worked in my g4, so i kept it in. do you think that could cause problems?

the computer is 6 months old without applecare and it has been nothing but problems. sometimes i get home from work and it is shut down. i replaced the power supply and fan with the apple program to make it quieter, but the first power supply died in one day. i forgot to mention that this is the second dual 1ghz from apple, the first was doa.

i always have such a bad experience when i call apple and i thought i might find some help here. i guess i will call, but if i tell them that i am having problems with sound, i am sure they will blame it on the third party device.

what makes you think it might be the logic board?

tlarkin 06-25-2003 12:18 PM

Well, typically the sound controller is on the logic board. Since you have an m-audio card, I doubt this is the case. Do you have any 3rd party utilities like disk warrior? If you do try running those, a lot of times diskwarrior can fix tons of software problems.

bustthis 06-25-2003 12:31 PM

i have diskwarrior 3.0 and have rebuilt the directories numerous times since i have been having these problems.

as it is now, i am having two major sound problems.
the garbeled distortion when playing through the m-audio card to my receiver, but this only happens once in a while and is easily fixed by stoping itunes and starting it again. i am more concerned with the pops and poor sound i get coming from my soundsticks, this happens constantly and it gets really annoying! i tested the soundsticks with a powerbook g4 and they seem to be working perfectly.

i suspect it having something to do with the sound controller and i will call apple to assist me.

i appreciate all of your help and if you hear back form the guy about the m-audio card let me know.

thanks again,

charles

tlarkin 06-25-2003 01:47 PM

Yeah I just checked my email. He said that by messing with the sound cards buffer settings he was able to fix his distorted sound/latency problems. He said set the buffer on the card to a lower setting and see if that helps at all. This may not be the case with your situation, but anything is worth a shot at this point it looks like. He also mentioned m-audio's phone support is really good. Its free, but long distance charges may apply depending on where you live. That is how he fixed the problem. He ended up calling m-audio and a tech on their end helped him figure it out. Apple may not be able to help much since there are some third party devices involved. It would be 1000 times easier if I could sit in front of your computer and look at it heh. Well, try that buffer setting thing and if that does not work, maybe try calling m-audio. Hope this helps out a bit.

bustthis 07-03-2003 01:05 PM

so i have another clue of why this might be happening when playing through my soundsticks using itunes 4.0.1.

i am working on a clean install of 10.2.6.

last night, my girlfriend was connected to my g4 over my airport network. (she has a 400mhz powerbook g4) she was working on a large photoshop file off of one of my internal ata drives in my g4 and the sound coming from itunes started getting really muffled and i heard loud pops and the sound would just cut out, really bad, until itunes just quit.

i reinstalled itunes, trashed the prefs, and rebooted, nothing fixed the problem. later last night, my friend was downloading a 400 mb file from my pure-ftpd server on my g4, same itunes problems.

it seems as if itunes cannot play when the computer is being used by another background task??? it's funny that i have dual 1ghz g4.

i know something isn't right.

tlarkin 07-03-2003 01:17 PM

Interesting, you may want to monitor your resources when playing itunes. Launch itunes, and use your computer as normal. But this time open up the terminal and type this:

Code:


top  -u -s5 20

For more info on the top command type:
Code:

man top
This will show you what each process is taking up what resources. Monitor it as you go. To quit out of the top command in the terminal hit ctrl+C on your keyboard. Maybe something is taxing your HD, or RAM, or processor at certain times and causing the poor performance. Also copy/paste your results on the forum so we can get a better idea. Typically on my G4 (its a 500Mhz) itunes will take from 8 and sometimes up to 20% of the system resources. It all depends on what I am running on it. Hope this may help you figure out your problems.

bustthis 07-05-2003 03:11 PM

this is what i got when copying a 11.9 mb file across my airport network to my ti 400 mhz powerbook. i was listening to itunes and got the muffled sound and very loud pops, it also cut out a lot. i am able to re-create this everytime and seems to happen from time to time during other background processes.

i have 1.75 gb ram, 4 120 gb drives, sound card, firewire card, old airport card. i just reinstalled 10.2.6 and the system seems to run better, except sometimes it just chooses to shut itself down.



Processes: 65 total, 2 running, 1 stuck, 62 sleeping... 195 threads 15:00:38
Load Avg: 0.50, 0.54, 0.56 CPU usage: 10.7% user, 19.8% sys, 69.6% idle
SharedLibs: num = 102, resident = 24.9M code, 2.92M data, 10.4M LinkEdit
MemRegions: num = 7302, resident = 111M + 19.1M private, 198M shared
PhysMem: 96.7M wired, 114M active, 763M inactive, 974M used, 818M free
VM: 5.54G + 64.3M 10726(1) pageins, 0(0) pageouts

PID COMMAND %CPU TIME #TH #PRTS #MREGS RPRVT RSHRD RSIZE VSIZE
0 kernel_tas 25.1% 0:33.93 32 0 - - - 82.0M 663M
178 Window Man 7.5% 0:30.94 4 277 698 5.30M- 53.1M 58.4M- 220M-
584 Internet E 6.9% 0:31.98 12 118 230 5.87M 13.3M 24.6M 209M
523 iTunes 6.7% 0:22.52 10 213 552 13.2M 15.8M 30.8M 222M
588 Adobe Illu 3.8% 0:14.67 4 91 429 19.4M 46.2M 56.6M 264M
632 top 3.0% 0:01.53 1 14 18 328K 348K 624K 13.6M
475 Finder 1.9% 0:18.74 6 113 231 5.45M 16.2M+ 30.5M+ 204M
174 ATSServer 1.3% 0:05.73 2 46 151 716K 4.80M 3.45M 64.9M
585 Adobe Phot 1.1% 0:09.99 5 92 637 26.1M 36.7M 52.9M 271M
553 Terminal 1.1% 0:06.34 4 98 213 1.72M 9.42M 18.3M 190M
591 Synergy 0.5% 0:03.29 2 73 189 2.57M+ 9.55M 19.6M+ 206M
495 X-Assist 0.1% 0:01.84 2 67 194 4.23M+ 9.25M 16.9M+ 191M+
476 fix_prebin 0.0% 0:35.77 1 17 564 936K 35.6M 2.22M 335M
583 Safari 0.0% 0:03.63 6 125 225 5.09M 9.49M 21.8M 195M
466 pbs 0.0% 0:03.48 2 44 31 1.12M 852K 1.94M 15.1M
474 SystemUISe 0.0% 0:02.02 4 201 255 1.98M 7.15M 19.5M 189M
576 System Pre 0.0% 0:02.28 2 91 192 3.69M 9.57M 19.4M 192M
51 kextd 0.0% 0:02.22 2 18 20 788K 676K 556K 14.9M
581 Mailsmith 0.0% 0:02.93 12 152 264 13.5M 16.7M 35.5M 221M
582 iChat 0.0% 0:01.68 2 99 165 2.02M 6.41M 16.6M 186M

mervTormel 07-05-2003 03:52 PM

one sample from top isn't very useful, overall, for pasting in here, but this one captured something disturbing...
Code:

Processes:  65 total, 2 running, 1 stuck, 62 sleeping... 195 threads  15:00:38
Load Avg:  0.50, 0.54, 0.56    CPU usage:  10.7% user, 19.8% sys, 69.6% idle
 SharedLibs: num =  102, resident = 24.9M code, 2.92M data, 10.4M LinkEdit
 MemRegions: num = 7302, resident =  111M + 19.1M private,  198M shared
 PhysMem:  96.7M wired,  114M active,  763M inactive,  974M used,  818M free
 VM: 5.54G + 64.3M  10726(1) pageins, 0(0) pageouts   
 
  PID COMMAND      %CPU  TIME  #TH #PRTS #MREGS RPRVT  RSHRD  RSIZE  VSIZE
    0 kernel_tas  25.1%  0:33.93  32    0    -      -      -  82.0M  663M
  178 Window Man  7.5%  0:30.94  4  277  698  5.30M- 53.1M  58.4M-  220M-
  584 Internet E  6.9%  0:31.98  12  118  230  5.87M  13.3M  24.6M  209M
  523 iTunes      6.7%  0:22.52  10  213  552  13.2M  15.8M  30.8M  222M
  588 Adobe Illu  3.8%  0:14.67  4    91  429  19.4M  46.2M  56.6M  264M
  632 top          3.0%  0:01.53  1    14    18  328K  348K  624K  13.6M
  475 Finder      1.9%  0:18.74  6  113  231  5.45M  16.2M+ 30.5M+  204M
  174 ATSServer    1.3%  0:05.73  2    46  151  716K  4.80M  3.45M  64.9M
  585 Adobe Phot  1.1%  0:09.99  5    92  637  26.1M  36.7M  52.9M  271M
  553 Terminal    1.1%  0:06.34  4    98  213  1.72M  9.42M  18.3M  190M
  591 Synergy      0.5%  0:03.29  2    73  189  2.57M+ 9.55M  19.6M+  206M
  495 X-Assist    0.1%  0:01.84  2    67  194  4.23M+ 9.25M  16.9M+  191M+
  476 fix_prebin  0.0%  0:35.77  1    17  564  936K  35.6M  2.22M  335M
...

kernel_task at 25% is never very good for prolonged periods of time. and fix_prebinding is in there (momentarily idle), too.

you should learn to observe the top report and draw conclusions about the profile of your rig (which is alive) at that particular moment.

then, examine the logs to determine what fix_prebinding is doing. i always suspect that sucker in exams, tho the load avg values don't reflect it, so i can't ascertain the veracity of this report's connection to your issues.

consider staging a test of the problem, create an account for one to remote ssh in and examine the rig while the test runs?

bustthis 07-05-2003 06:00 PM

that a little over my head, can you tell me what a fix_prebinding and kernel_task is?

why is this happening? is it a hardware problem?

mervTormel 07-05-2003 06:23 PM

you can search here for prebinding threads.

the kernel is the OS traffic cop, the master scheduler, mother of all processes, PID 0.

don't know why it's happening, or if it's hw related. that's what we're digging about.

even on a fairly saturated rig, kernel_task usage shouldn't be that high.

like i said, you happened to "catch" something interesting in your one top capture. whether it's endemic to your reported issues remains to be seen.

repeat: consider staging a reproducible test of the problem, create an account for one to remote ssh in and examine the rig while the test runs?

[edit: the top you reported was from a fresh boot, eh? prebinding runs for several moments after boot, and that is prolly the reason for the odd top report. so, disregard this stuff and capture good data during a test of your problem]

tlarkin 07-07-2003 11:23 AM

Hmmm but would it still do that even after a clean install of 10.2.6 Merv? That is what kinda confuses me. I did some searching on why that the kernel_tas maybe hogging up resources and the only related article I could find was one about a video card driver problem that caused it. However, I do not think this problem is the same. If you reinstalled 10.2.6 clean and the problem is reproducible in a new user account, I would start testing hardware. You could also try resetting the firmware I guess as another troubleshooting step. At boot up hold down these keys cmd+opt+O+F and then type:
Code:

reset-nvram
reset-all

The system should then reboot, and all your firmware should be reset to factory default. Also did you mess with the buffer and latency settings with your m-audio card? That guy I know said thats how he fixed his problem, he lowered the buffer and his audio sounds fine now.

bustthis 07-07-2003 11:46 AM

i have reset the nvram and reset-all a couple of times over the last weeks. i ran fsck and zapped the pram. i run disk warrior once a week on all of my drives.

i have lowered the buffer settings in the m-audio control panel and have contacted m-audio support. they may take the card back, but this is the least of my worries at this point. i use my soundsticks 90% of the time and can reproduce the problem when coping large files with afp and ftp. it also happens from time to time when i am just using adobe illustrator.

i found that disk warrior will repair my startup disk, then when i reboot i find a couple hundred files out of wack again in the graph, is this normal?

i am running top from work in a newly created user account.
i think my girlfriend is working in photoshop on my machine now, but this is what i'm getting:

Processes: 62 total, 3 running, 59 sleeping... 176 threads 11:44:51
Load Avg: 0.33, 0.52, 0.55 CPU usage: 11.9% user, 4.4% sys, 83.7% idle
SharedLibs: num = 110, resident = 26.8M code, 3.07M data, 10.7M LinkEdit
MemRegions: num = 9627, resident = 288M + 17.5M private, 197M shared
PhysMem: 115M wired, 135M active, 716M inactive, 966M used, 826M free
VM: 5.43G + 66.2M 13067(0) pageins, 1(0) pageouts

PID COMMAND %CPU TIME #TH #PRTS #MREGS RPRVT RSHRD RSIZE VSIZE
506 iTunes 8.7% 7:56.76 11 218 606 18.8M 17.8M 37.1M 227M
527 Adobe Phot 8.1% 20:19.61 12 154 2958 184M 73.6M 230M 520M
178 Window Man 5.4% 15:23.55 4 284 874 8.52M+ 67.5M 75.1M+ 240M+
528 Adobe Illu 4.0% 18:35.46 4 91 427 19.1M 46.9M 46.7M 264M
727 top 2.7% 1:37.34 1 15 18 344K 348K 432K 13.6M
522 Internet E 0.7% 3:22.52 8 104 239 9.74M 16.1M 22.4M 214M
0 kernel_tas 0.5% 6:39.29 32 0 - - - 99.4M 689M
456 SystemUISe 0.3% 0:14.57 4 208 248 2.20M 7.84M 14.6M 189M
540 Synergy 0.1% 1:42.30 2 76 232 9.62M 11.8M 23.5M 214M
688 EPSON Prin 0.1% 1:10.84 3 101 529 3.53M 16.1M 21.6M 208M
174 ATSServer 0.1% 0:50.09 2 45 185 680K 6.86M 2.89M 107M
457 Finder 0.1% 0:43.35 3 110 186 4.55M 29.8M 35.7M 214M
515 System Pre 0.1% 0:16.47 2 96 215 4.00M 13.0M 18.2M 195M
80 update 0.1% 0:04.74 1 7 13 52K 316K 104K 1.26M
454 Dock 0.0% 0:38.69 3 125 167 1.34M 16.7M 17.9M 195M
544 httpd 0.0% 0:22.76 1 8 79 184K 2.76M 696K 19.5M
477 X-Assist 0.0% 0:11.15 2 69 274 10.0M 9.69M 18.5M 196M
535 SpamSieve 0.0% 0:10.52 2 90 189 4.07M 7.37M 12.3M 188M
476 Default Fo 0.0% 0:07.11 2 127 154 1.75M 10.2M 8.68M 197M
368 coreservic 0.0% 0:07.64 3 102 101 2.50M 19.0M 20.4M 37.0M


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