Hayne linked to several excellent Troubleshooting pages above. I would suggest that you go through those.

One of the items detailed on some of those pages is that if you are not confident that your current OS might not have some corruption, you can try downloading and installing the combo update of the same OS point version that you are already running. So, for example, if you are running Tiger 10.4.3, download the 10.4.3 combo updater from Apple, and run that overtop of your existing install.

That's just one possible fix for your glitches--check out the links that Hayne gave you above.

Trevor

I think that the scenario you describe (Automatic Login ON but you are still asked to give username and password) is possible when you have Automatic Login switched on in System Preferences > Accounts, but in System Preferences > Security, you have the setting "Disable automatic login" checked.

But I've never actually verified that.

Trevor

I've been looking at Hayne's links to the troubleshooting pages.
I just ran "repair disk permissions" and login time is 58 seconds.

Right now I am downloading combo update for 10.3.9 and will do as you suggested. See what that does.

I just installed the 10.3.9 combo update. Login time 1'26".

Just an update - I created a new user account. Things work LOT faster now. For example, in Photoshop using eraser tool in brush mode was very slow in my original account (got the watch icon, so I could never tell how precise I am at the moment), in the new user's acc. this is not an issue. However, some things in the new one don't work well at all. I think it should be a different thread so I will do that.
The question is - is this a good fix? Just work in the new account and not worry about why the first one isn't working right? Or could it be something that will "creep" into the new one?
Thanks for all your time and help!!!!
-alimaj

That's not really the fix I would advise. Since you've created a new account and the problem went away, we now know that the (remaining) problem is in your main account. I.e. it is probably somewhere in your /Library folder somewhere.

You can start with quitting Photoshop, then dragging any PS-related prefs files out of /Users/yourusername/Library/Preferences to the Desktop, relaunching PS and checking if the problem goes away.

Trevor

Trevor, thanks. I did as you said and the eraser-brush mode now works perfectly :-)
I tested the login time again as the main user. If I log out and then log in again, the login time 8 seconds! But if I restart, then the login time is 1'25". Is that normal?

It isn't clear whether you are distinguishing "startup time" (the time the system takes until it shows you the login window) from "login time" (the time from when you type in your password until you can use Finder etc.
If you have auto-login set, it is more difficult to see the boundary between these two. If you are doing timings, it is best to disable auto-login.

Hayne, automatic login is OFF and I do measure the login time - from the time I type in name and password and hit the login button. So in my post #47 I truly meant login time, not startup time.

Then that is a bit strange. I would expect the login time to be a bit longer when you restart (as opposed to just logging out and in again) because the various files used are cached in RAM so less disk access would be needed. Restarting clears all the caches.
But that shouldn't have such a large effect.

Do you have a large number of files on your Desktop? (that would slow down the launch of Finder)

Otherwise, watch carefully so you can describe to us exactly what is happening when you log in. What things appear first? What appears after 8 seconds? What doesn't appear until after a minute?

When I log out and then login, first I see background picture, after about 7-8 seconds the menu bar comes on, and very quickly the dock and all desktop. BUT - this was true for all but one such login, which took over 30 secs. Before that one I didn't manually quit applications before logging out. Does that matter?

After restart, first the desktop pic, ball is spinning and then, after more than a minute (from logging in) the upper right corner of the menu bar comes on - the menu bar is transparent and I get the time, the american flag and so on continuing to the left until it's all there, then the dock and icons.

It doesn't really matter. All the apps will be quit automatically when you log out.

Hmm - it sounds like something in that right-side of the menubar is slowing things down.
Are you using Airport?
What things are up there in the right side of the menubar?
Do you have any 3rd-party menubar items? (If so, try removing them)

You should also look for messages in the log files.
Launch the "Console" application (under /Applications/Utilities) and look for relevant error messages. Note that messages are labeled with the date & time so you can use that to locate the part of the log to look at. Copy & paste the relevant messages back here so we can see them.

console log after restarting
 

Here are parts of the log from restarting: I put the first and last lines in so that you can see the time and then I cut out everything that didn't say anything about error. Not sure if I should include anything else:


Nov 19 17:10:47 localhost syslogd: restart

Nov 19 17:10:50 localhost kernel: AppleRS232Serial: 0 0 AppleRS232Serial::start - returning false early, Connector or machine incorrect
Nov 19 17:10:50 localhost kernel: IOPlatformControl::registerDriver Control Driver AppleSlewClock did not supply target-value, using default


Nov 19 17:10:59 localhost SystemStarter: The "HasShadow" window property is obsolete. Use CGSSetWindowShadowAndRimParameters(cid, wid, 0.0,0.0, 0,0, CGSNoShadowStyle) to turn off the window shadow instead. Set a break-point on CGSLogMessage to find out where this property is set.

Nov 19 17:10:59 localhost ConsoleMessage: Checking disks
Nov 19 17:10:59 localhost syslogd: /dev/console: Input/output error

Nov 19 17:11:14 localhost DirectoryService[219]: DS (SLP) couldn't register Jamila Hla Shwe’s Computer (afp) due to an error: 57!

Nov 19 17:11:16 localhost SystemStarter: Startup complete.
Nov 19 17:11:24 localhost DirectoryService[219]: DS (SLP) couldn't register awws://192.168.1.102:3703?name=Jamila-Hla-Shwes-Computer.local&version=2.0&guid=6374401f-b60a-10ed-bf97-8863394ac238 (awws) due to an error: 57!
Nov 19 17:11:37 localhost diskarbitrationd[91]: disk1s6 hfs 9FC951FA-D10F-3488-BDB1-F85CE9E25628 LaCie /Volumes/LaCie
Nov 19 17:12:43 localhost kernel: resize: max chain len 37, new table size 8192

console log of login after logout
 

And here is the entire log from logging in after logout:


Nov 19 17:28:55 localhost loginwindow[197]: sendQuitEventToApp (Xcode): AESendWithMach returned error -609
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[306]: logout notification received.
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[306]: requesting logout processing.
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[311]: logout notification received.
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[311]: requesting logout processing.
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[306]: handle_deferred_requests: user logged out.
Nov 19 17:28:57 localhost automount[311]: handle_deferred_requests: user logged out.
Nov 19 17:28:58 localhost /Library/StartupItems/Tablet/TabletDriverRelauncher: switch bootstrap from 2403 to 2603
Nov 19 17:28:59 localhost /System/Library/CoreServices/ARD Agent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARD Agent: ********Launched Agent********
Nov 19 17:29:10 localhost diskarbitrationd[91]: disk1s6 hfs 9FC951FA-D10F-3488-BDB1-F85CE9E25628 LaCie /Volumes/LaCie

removed items from menu bar
 

So I removed third-party items from the right side of menu bar, now I have (from the right): date&time, american flag, modem, PPoe status,volume, airport (it's turned off and it has been for a year) and display.

After I removed everything else I restarted and login time was 1:36". Longer than before.

these are parts of this consol log:

Nov 19 17:46:22 localhost kernel: AppleRS232Serial: 0 0 AppleRS232Serial::start - returning false early, Connector or machine incorrect

Nov 19 17:46:31 localhost SystemStarter: The "HasShadow" window property is obsolete. Use CGSSetWindowShadowAndRimParameters(cid, wid, 0.0,0.0, 0,0, CGSNoShadowStyle) to turn off the window shadow instead. Set a break-point on CGSLogMessage to find out where this property is set.
Nov 19 17:46:31 localhost syslogd: /dev/console: Input/output error

Nov 19 17:47:06 localhost DirectoryService[216]: DS (SLP) couldn't register awws://192.168.1.102:3703?name=Jamila-Hla-Shwes-Computer.local&version=2.0&guid=6374401f-b60a-10ed-bf97-8863394ac238 (awws) due to an error: 57!


Anything in particular in the log I should be looking for?

Also, I guess I do have bunch of stuff on a desktop (how much is too much?) but would that matter at restart as opposed to logout-login?

Exactly what third party hacks were you running (both on the right side of the menu bar and anywhere)?

What exactly did you do to remove the hacks? Some hacks leave problematic files around even after you've removed the obvious stuff, and that may be slowing things down.

Note that one of the items in the Troubleshooting pages that Hayne gave you links for was to remove any system hacks as a troubleshooting step.

Trevor

I am not sure I know what "hack" is but what I had there was Version Cue, Now -up-to-date contacts, now-up-todate date book and I think that was it.
I just went to preferences of those and unchecked the "show status in menu bar" or something like that.

So if those items are slowing down your computer, they will still be slowing down your computer.

As a troubleshooting step, you need to see if completely removing them from your computer fixes the problem you are seeing. If it doesn't fix the problem, then of course you can reinstall.

A system hack is a program that runs all the time that your computer is running, is not a part of the operating system, and (usually) changes the behavior of your system in some way.

Candybar http://www.panic.com/candybar/ is one example of a system hack. So are the products of Unsanity http://www.unsanity.com/products/ .

If you have any system hacks running, try removing them completely from your system and see if the login time is reduced to a normal period.

Trevor

I don't think I have any of that kind of stuff running. Where should I look to find out?

various things
 

From startup:
This problem might be slowing down the startup. Did you configure something using Directory Services? If you don't know, you probably didn't. Is your computer on a corporate network?


From logout:
Why are you running Xcode?

This "Tablet" StartupItem is something that you must have installed. (By default there is nothing under /Library/StartupItems)
Do you have a tablet of some sort attached to your Mac?
You should disconnect all peripherals while troubleshooting.

I guess this is an external disk drive. You should unmount it and physically disconnect it while troubleshooting.