Intermittent problem putting my 24" iMac to sleep.

About every tenth time I attempt to put my iMac to sleep it will do the following: The screen dims a bit, the cursor disappears and the clock stops. The machine then becomes totally unresponsive and all I can do is do a forced shutdown.
I thought it might have been the 'safe sleep' function so I disabled it. No change. I cleaned out all the caches, repaired permissions, checked the drive directory, reset the machine (pulling the cord, waiting and then putting back in and starting it up). Then I reset everything there is to reset! No change.
Has anyone had this happen? If so, have you found a solution?
Griff

Just to report a resolution to the problem putting my 24" iMac to sleep...
As I said, I put in two fresh 1G DIMMs (Shika brand). The two Kingston DIMMs were found to be defective. The sleep problem seems to be resolved. Also I found that a second problem (Applications suddenly and unexpectedly quitting) seems to have been resolved as well.
Something else I found as well is that the machine runs much faster. Right off the bat, when I ran the Apple Hardware Test, it was completed in 53 seconds. With my previous RAM it took over two minutes to complete.
Conclusion: Even if Utilities such as the Hardware Test and TechTool Pro 4 report no problem with RAM, some of the problems that people are experiencing that appear to be software based may be caused by bad RAM. It might be an idea to download and run Memtest or Rember over a period of a few hours to see if there is a problem. Or if you have access to a supply of RAM, you could swap in new ones and see if the problems go away.
Griff

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Have you ever experienced this?
Put you iMac to Sleep and it powers down - not a shut down, but the power goes off - no blinking light, no whirring of the hard drive, no sign of life!
I have read and performed many of the tips regarding NVRAM, SMU, PMU, etc. resets. None have worked.
Situation 1-
Use the 'sleep' command - moments after the machine powers off.
Situation 2 -
iMac screen saver will run for a short time, then screen goes blank, the power light illuminates, the fan spins full speed, and the machine is totally unresponsive to mice clicks or movements, or keyboard entries.
Situation 3 -
Sometimes upon power up, the iMac doesn't start, but you can hear a faint buzz sound from the back of the machine. Similar to audio hum.
These problems occur whether or not other devices are connected to the iMac.
Connections-
Standard USB devices - mice, card reader,
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Ehternet
Power Settings-
Screen saver 5 minutes
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Various other settings tried with no change in problem.
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Any solution to this?
Put you iMac to Sleep and it powers down - not a shut
down, but the power goes off - no blinking light, no
whirring of the hard drive, no sign of life!
I have read and performed many of the tips regarding
NVRAM, SMU, PMU, etc. resets. None have worked.
Situation 1-
Use the 'sleep' command - moments after the machine
powers off.
I began experiencing the same thing this week (two days ago). I also tried repairing permissions, resetting SMU, and removing the iTunes receipts (Library/Receipts) since this is what caused an earlier failure to sleep. The difference is then the computer would not sleep, now it shuts off instead of sleeping.
Situation 2 -
iMac screen saver will run for a short time, then
screen goes blank, the power light illuminates, the
fan spins full speed, and the machine is totally
unresponsive to mice clicks or movements, or keyboard
entries.
Have not yet encountered Situation 2.
Situation 3 -
Sometimes upon power up, the iMac doesn't start, but
you can hear a faint buzz sound from the back of the
machine. Similar to audio hum.
I have experienced this (Sit 3) as well with my LaCie firewire drive connected, sometimes. I have found that powering off the LaCie resolves this, as does unplugging it.
These problems occur whether or not other devices are
connected to the iMac.
Connections-
Standard USB devices - mice, card reader,
Bluetooth keyboard
Ehternet
Power Settings-
Screen saver 5 minutes
Energy Saver - to sleep when inactive - 15 minutes,
display to sleep - 15 minutes.
Various other settings tried with no change in
problem.
I suspect the power supply. What's your
opinion?
iMac g5 1.8Ghz,
1gig mem Mac OS X (10.4.9)
Another difference, I am running OS X - 10.3.9, otherwise the same
Any ideas?
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ibroker wrote:
This just started happening tonight with no new programs or hardware added anytime recently. I tried putting my imac to sleep & it goes through it's motion just to pop back up again. I tried it several times & it keeps doing it! What's going on?
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My year and a half old 27 inch iMac has developed an intermittent problem. In the middle of my using it, the screen will suddenly go black.
This happens regardless of the sleep settings and the computer is not really asleep when it happens. Any sound that the Mac is playing continues to play and if I put my ear up against the machine, I can hear the hard drive and/or internal fans spinning. But the screen remains black no matter how much I click around.
The only way I can get the picture back is to press the power button to put the computer to sleep, wait a few seconds, and then wake it back up again. Sometimes the problem will go away for a while and sometimes it will happen repeatedly, making it very difficult to get any work done.
I took the Mac into the nearest authorized service center (not an Apple Store) and they kept it for 24 hours, during which time they ran diagnostics software on it and tried to see if they can reproduce the problem, but they couldn't.
When I came in to pick up the computer, they told me if I brought it in again and they weren't able to reproduce the problem, they would have to charge me $50, because Apple doesn't compensate them for work that is not performed. They said that, although this policy is sometimes waived, that this is true even at an Apple Store.
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It's not true for an Apple Store, no, not if the system is under warranty or under an AppleCare extended service contract. At least I've never heard of an Apple Store charging such a fee. To the best of my knowledge authorized service centers are indeed compensated by Apple only for fixing problems, not for diagnostics that turn up no fault, so a service center may charge a diagnostic fee for situations where they can't find a problem.
Make an appointment at your local Apple Store and talk to them about the issue.
Regards.

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Hello,
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George

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Regrettably, I can't offer a solution to the problem stated in the title. Instead, I experience the same problem.
Wireless Mighty Mouse circa 2007
Wireless Apple Keyboard circa 2007
Bluetooth dongle (a bluetooth thingy connected to a USB port)
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HI,
First, try Resetting the PRAM
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Intermittent problem putting my 24" iMac to sleep.

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