Lose System Alert Sound after Fast User Switching

After switching between accounts a few times I lose all alert sounds from all applications, including the Finder. I can still play music, hear audio from movies, etc., but any alert sound is now silenced. Anyone else know a fix for this?

I don't have a solution, but I thought I'd mention
I'm having the same problem where the alert sounds
(Finder, Mail, etc.) can no longer be heard so that
the "powers that be" can see that it's a growing
problem and perhaps find a resolution.
I didn't notice this problem until I recently
upgraded to 10.4.4, but I may have simply not noticed
with 10.4.3 since I've always got my iTunes cranked
up.
G4/933Mhz
Quicksilver Mac OS X (10.4.4)
I had no problem until 10.4.4 and I do not switch users. But having some knowledge of Unix, I went digging, and I tried a Force Quit on the system process "coreaudiod". Can be found in Activity Monitor - select all processes. iChat started sounding again on its own, and a restart of Mail got it going again. This worked for me (tired of re-booting to fix).
I hope this helps others
Dave
Dual G5 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

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Apps do not launch after fast user switch; requires restart

I have 3 users accounts on a mid-2010 with 12 GB RAM; two with parental controls - the kids.
The kids like to play games (particuarally Minecraft), so will log in a play for a while. Typcially when one is done playing they will use the fast user switch menu to go back to the "Login Window..." They are pretty good about shutting down the apps afterwards due to previous performance issues.
When the second user logs in, the only application that seems to work is Finder. Clicking on an app in the dock results in the "Denied"sound. Tyring to launch from Finder or from the dock using "Open" results in nothing happening. It just seems to ignore it - not even the spinny wheel.
It is almost like everything is locked for the second user and the restart clears it. Generally it is responsive for the upper menu items so it does not seem to be a memory or CPU issue. Activity montor does not show anything out of the ordinary.
This does not occur on my accout which I am currently running as an admin. (I shouldn't but am). I can login and run all the applications but if I switch to the second user nothing launches.
I have re-installed Mavericks, and ran both the file and permissions repair on disk. I cleared all of the old cahce. The only thing that seems to work reliably is to restart the system.
It also seems that if the first user logs out then when the second user tries to log in the system just seems to hang after trying to log into the second account. It swtiches to the user screen but gets stuck with the spinny wheel; this requires the one finger force reboot.

Generally yes, they will keep running. You can confirm this by running the "Activity Monitor" app to see their CPU usage.

Screen has a bluish tint after fast user switching and then warning tone

Hi all I'm having a bit of a problem that I hope someone can help me with. First the details, I have a MBP bought in late '07 and running Tiger. I was doing full backups using "Backup" and I also had Safari, iTunes, and Word open. I briefly switched to my other account using fast user switching and when I returned to the original account the whole screen had a blue tint to it. Like the color profile was off. This has happened before and a restart usually cures it, I haven't restarted yet but I am fairly certain it will correct the problem this time too. But is there anyway to prevent this? My second question is the one I'm more worried about. It also has happened before but usually when using more CPU intensive applications. When I went to System Preferences and opened up the display preferences in an attempt to correct the previous problem I heard a very loud tone. Like some type of warning tone, it was loud enough that it startled me. I had iTunes playing and after the tone the music got very quiet but relaunching it brought it back to normal. I'm just wondering is this some type of warning tone? Is it something I should be concerned about? Besides the music everything else seemed unaffected, although the previous times that this has happened usually when using handbrake there was noticeable problems after the tone (like applications crashing). All of these problems are gone after the computer is restarted though. Does anyone have any insight on these issues? Thank you.
-James

OK I ran TechTool and everything passed except for the volume scan. Then I checked this with Disk Utility and the HD failed for a few minor reasons, like invalid block count. I repaired it using the fsck -fy command in single user mode. The computer seems a little faster now. I don't know if this error is related to the beep in any way, I may try talking to an Apple genius to see if they know. Since it seems like pretty minor errors I'm not too worried about it but it does seem to be happening often. The last time I had this error was when I posted a question here about it which I just checked was on March 1st. So this error happened again after a little more than 2 weeks which seems excessive to me. Any thoughts?

Colour Shift after fast user switching

An old issue has returned...
When I use fast user switching to log into another user and then log that user out to go back to the log in window - I get a dramatic colour shift once logged into my normal admin / owners account.
System Prefs bleep each time I select the Display Pref panel too.
My account is still logged in when switching users.
Only a log out and log back in will bring everything back to normal.
Both users using the same colour profile.
Any ideas as to the fix ?

See: http://www.tuaw.com/2006/03/29/fixscreen-applescript-to-fix-fast-user-switching- color-bug/

Time machine effect with fast user switching

I already calculated it will take 11 hours to do my initial back up of 420 gb. but my Gf wants to login. I am certain this will at least slow to process down if not pause or cancel. does any one know for sure?

Audio output is squelched when fast user switching. Under Panther, audio playing in one user account would continue to play after fast user switching to another account. Under Tiger, the actual process continues, but the sound is muted.
Same thing goes for audio input. I learned this the hard way by setting up an app to record a two hour radio program through the built-in audio input jack. During the recording I switched to another account for an hour. When I later went to listen to the recording, there was an hour of silence corresponding to the time I was in the other account.
I really wish Apple would fix this.

Scanners usable with Fast User Switching

Which mid-range scanner operates with multiple logged users?
Manufacturers seem poorly equipped to answer this, since they test their products with only one user logged in—their support people come up empty-handed. I work in a small but busy office where fast user switching is considered a basic part of the Mac OS, and I feel that if a product doesn't work with multiple users logged the maker shouldn't be allowed to state, without caveat, that it works with OS X.
We recently tried two scanners and found them lacking: first, the HP Color LaserJet 2840 all-in-one. After six months of support calls that often involved switching users, HP happened to mention that user switching with any of their scanners is unsupported. (Good-bye, HP.) Next, the Epson 4490. Ditto—zero support.
My intent was to use the 4490 as a replacement for the color laserjet's function as a copier. We don't want to mess with another multi-function machine, as the makers don't seem to have their act together when it comes to drivers for those. We miss our color laser, but we can get by with an inkjet. In the meantime, everyone in the office needs access to a copier, and I see no reason a printer plus a scanner (with its scan-to-printer button) can't be that copier.
Do you know of a scanner that's fully functional, buttons and all, under OS X—that is, ALL of OS X, including fast user switching?
G4 and G5 iMacs Mac OS X (10.4.6) FileMaker, Toon Boom Studio

Audio output is squelched when fast user switching. Under Panther, audio playing in one user account would continue to play after fast user switching to another account. Under Tiger, the actual process continues, but the sound is muted.
Same thing goes for audio input. I learned this the hard way by setting up an app to record a two hour radio program through the built-in audio input jack. During the recording I switched to another account for an hour. When I later went to listen to the recording, there was an hour of silence corresponding to the time I was in the other account.
I really wish Apple would fix this.

User activity with fast user switching

what actually continues with one user when another user logs on with fast user switching?
Does any activity continue, such as downloading, calculating, getting mail, or playing movies? Or does everything go into limbo until that user logs back on?

Audio output is squelched when fast user switching. Under Panther, audio playing in one user account would continue to play after fast user switching to another account. Under Tiger, the actual process continues, but the sound is muted.
Same thing goes for audio input. I learned this the hard way by setting up an app to record a two hour radio program through the built-in audio input jack. During the recording I switched to another account for an hour. When I later went to listen to the recording, there was an hour of silence corresponding to the time I was in the other account.
I really wish Apple would fix this.

Repeating system alert sound, without user action 10.6.1

After installing 10.6.1 on my Macbook Pro unibody 17", i get a repeating system alert sound every 2 seconds. I have restarted,logged out,changed my sound settings, and eventually just had to turn the system alert volume all the way down.
Anyone else having this problem after the 10.6.1 update? Any resolutions besides muting system alerts?
Thanks,
c

I think I found my issue - It seems to have been with Peer Guardian. I uninstalled Growl a little while back because of a bug causing Firefox to launch in the background instead of in the foreground (help from Apple's forums helped with finding that fix), and I think PG heavily utilizes Growl for user notifications.
One this you might try is creating a dummy user and logging into that account to see if the problem still exists. If it doesn't, then you know one of your startup items (System Preferences --> Accounts --> (user) --> Login Items) is causing the sounds you're hearing.

Safari misbehaving with fast user switching after Mavericks upgrade

Anybody else have this problem with fast user switching?
Since upgrading to the worst OS upgrade in history, not only have I lost TB's of data from my external drives, but Safari is behaving like a spoilt brat when fast user switching is used.
If I leave safari windows open and switch users, then switch back, the Safari windows are collapsed to about a tenth of their normal height and stuck in the top left of my screen. When I say stuck, I mean that if I attempt to move them, they snap back.
The best part is, it's not consistent, so I can't reproduce it at will.

I have a 2014 BTO 27 inch iMac and I have the same problem with open windows being locked to the top left/right of the screen and just a fraction of their previous size after switching to other users and then switching back. In addition if an open window is not bugged into either of the top corners it may still get re-sized
Due to screen backlight issues, I went through being shipped (and returning) 3 BTO iMacs before settling with this current one and each of those iMacs had the same fast user switching bug. This leads me to think that a re-install will not neccessarily solve this issue as I am assuming that the BTO iMacs they shipped to me from China were brand spanking new. We see this behaviour with Safari, Chrome, Mail, iCal, and iTunes since these are the apps that we commonly leave open. We do not have these as full screen apps either, just open windows.
It is very easy to replicate this bug. Open a few of the above mentioned apps, and then switch to another user; I'm guessing even the guest user will do if you have no other users on your system. Switch back to the first user and more than likely one or more of the windows will be anchored at the top left or right of the screen, depending on where the window was initially. As stated by a few other users above, this doesn't always happen but switch users a couple of times and it is bound to happen before long.
Curiosly when my windows are anchored on the left after switching users, the upper edge of the window is hidden BEHIND the menu bar. If I pull the window down it appears that the red button is off screen to the left and only that portion of the window to the RIGHT of the amber button is visible.
When the windows are anchored to the right they are BELOW the menu bar, and only the red and amber buttons are visible and only that part of the window to the LEFT of the amber button is visible.
In both cases it seems the amber minimise button is the window cut-off point.
You wonder how they could have broken this feature since ML and much worse, still not have it fixed 3 months later.

Crashing with Skitch, Snapz Pro, Fast User Switching - graphics card issue?

Noticed this issue when I switched back to a G5 from a Mac Pro.
Clean install of the OS and apps but Skitch locked the machine when accessing prefs etc. in the app. Then discovered Snapz Pro locked the machine when attempting to screen grab. Now, after creating a new user account and activating Fast User Switching the machine locks when switching to the new user.
Could this be an Open GL or Quartz Extreme issue? Ran Xbench and everything went fine. Normal day to day use of the machine is sound.
System Profiler tells me this about the graphics card:
*ATI Radeon X800 XT:*
Chipset Model: ATY,R420
Type: Display
Bus: AGP
Slot: SLOT-1
VRAM (Total): 256 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x4a48
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-A35801-109
I just flashed the ROM to 109 (from 108) today, but still have the issue.
Thoughts?

Malcom,
If I turn it off, then I lose the ability to jump between users without having to kill everything I'm doing. Yes, that does solve the problem, but only because it removes the cause of the problem. I'm trying to find a solution to the issue.
-Steve

Fast User Switching with Mounted Network Drive?

I have a headless G4 Cube running 10.5.8 with a 2TB firewire drive plugged in for storage accessable to any of my macs here at home. I can access it fine with my 2 desktops over ethernet and wirelessly. Recently we decided to consolidate our 2 desktops into one using the muliple users feature. Seems to work fine, and both accounts can access the shared drive. They are logging in with the cube's admin credentials, and the shared drive is set to ignore permissions. I have the drive set to mount on login with a startup item in the system login items prefs. As long as I logout before switching users, everything is good.
The problem arises with Fast User Switching which we'd love to be able to use. I can't figure out how to connect to the drive in one account without the 2nd account then seeing it as a volume without proper permissions, then that account creates a new volume mount for it (which doesn't work with iTunes properly and seems to cause other wierd issues).
Example: So say 'user1' logs in, mounts the drive 'Jukebox'. everything seems OK so far. 'Jukebox' is on the desktop and iTunes finds the music. Now I fast user switch to 'user2' and there is a 'Jukebox' on the desktop with the red minus icon indicating I don't have permissions to access it. If I then browse the network and mount the drive, I end up with ANOTHER 'Jukebox' on the desktop. BUT iTunes doesn't see it properly. If I look in the /Volumes/ folder with the Terminal, I see a mountpoint for 'Jukebox' (with the owner of 'user1' group 'staff') and now a new mountpoint called 'Jukebox-1' (with the owner of 'user2' group 'staff').
It seems when you mount a AFP drive, it creates the Volume with the current user and staff group, but switching to another user then can't access that when it sees it in the /Volumes folder. You try to mount again and it creates a NEW mountpoint, names it with a '-1' at the end and you can use that (but iTunes cant).
So... how does one use a shared drive that you want on BOTH users desktops with Fast User Switching turned on? Is there a way to have the drive mounted BEFORE either user logs in, such that it will be seen as any other local drive (which doesn't have the issue)??
Or is there some other way I can attach to the network volume in each account on login so both have access to music and videos with full permissions?
I'm really stumped here after 2 hrs of googling, searching here and trying things.
TIA

I've not had any luck with the suggestions in the link either.
Here's two other approaches I've tried and failed with:
1. Creating a new share point on the cube itself so that one user can mount it as a different volume. Then the issue is that I still don't have a volume named "Jukebox" available to each user when switching. I DO have access now to the data from both accounts, but under 2 different mount points (volume names) and the xml file for iTunes is hard coded with the path for each mp3 including the "Jukebox" volume name... so no go.
2. Tried figuring out a way I could script a mounting of the share with the terminal thinking I could then run that shell script at startup. Can't seem to get the sytax right. If I create a directory in /Volumes and mount and afp share to it, it takes on the ownership of root/wheel which I can't access in the finder and can't seem to change.
BUT I'll keep playing with both these ideas a bit... the first one might be overcome with a bit of logic and the 2nd if I can get the syntax right to mount the share with afp_mount and give it the correct ownership/permissions such that when a user logs in she/he sees the volume on the desktop and has full r/w access to it.
thanks again. if you offhand know the syntax for that, let me know

Network Drive problems with Fast User Switching

I have a USB drive connected to my Time Capsule and shared to the network. On one of my computers (Mac Pro) I have 2 user accounts which access the data (music, photos). The first one to access the drive after a power on has no problems, and everything works perfectly. However, if I Fast User Switch to the other account, it can see the drive but cannot access it (permission problem apparently). I then have to click the disconnect button in finder, and reconnect, and then can use it again fine. Then when I switch back to the first account its the same deal, having to disconnect and reconnect. It is really annoying, since it marks all my itunes songs as missing and whatnot. Does anyone know how to fix it?
Thanks!

Yes, under Sharing in System Preferences both users have been added to full access of the drive. I had to do that for the non-admin account to be able to access it at all.

OS 10.4.6. has broken dialup connectivity when using fast user switching

I installed OS 10.4.6. It seems to have broken dialup connectivity when using fast user switching when switching from one user to the next.
For dialup, it is extreamly annoying that I can not resume downloading a file from were it got cut off, but now, if another user wants to check their email, my download always gets broken and has to be restarted. Dialup is slow enough with out having to start from scratch even more frequently, now.
Also, in earlier versions of 10.2 or 10.3 (I don't remember which), I was able to switch users and maintain listening to a single users' iTunes.
I would like to be able to switch users and not lose either my dialup network connection or the primary users currently playing iTunes songs.
Perhaps for iTunes, one should be able to chose to mute another users' instance of iTunes, if it is currently playing.
Mini-Mac 1.42GHz 80GB BT/AE Mac OS X (10.4.6)

I have not tried replicating this but might be able to provide some additional information.
We use network login accounts on our desktop computers. Fast User switching deliberately will not work for multiple network login accounts. (Remember network login accounts normally also have an associated network home directory mounted via AFP.)
Now a bit of background about volumes and mount points under Mac OS X. Under Mac OS X, any additional drive (or more accurately 'volume') is listed under the 'Volumes' folder, remember also that Mac OS X is a Unix operating system. So just as normal for Unix, the boot drive is '/' or the root level and Volumes is a folder in it. The underlying Mac OS X software automatically 'attaches' and additional volumes as sub-folders in the 'Volumes' folder (in Unix speak these are called 'Mount Points'), if you have an external hard-disc called 'Fred' then this would be represented by the following path
/Volumes/Fred
If you happen to have two volumes with the same name connected at the same time then while in the Finder they may show up with the same name, in Unix they would have different names automatically assigned to keep them separate like so
/Volumes/Fred
/Volumes/Fred 1
Now getting back to the Fast User switching problem and AFP volumes, when you login to a File Server volume it also is automatically added to the Volumes folder, so if we have a File Server volume called 'Shared' it would look like
/Volumes/Shared
With Fast User switching potentially both user accounts could be accessing the same /Volumes/Shared which means both user accounts would be talking to the server via the same File Server login, hence the possibility for one of the Fast User accounts to be using the 'wrong' permissions.

Disable Fast User Switching for RDP (NOT HIDE ENTRY POINTS!)

Windows 7 Pro.
I do virtually all my administration of 150 workstations (various domains and workgroups) remotely via RDP, and with Windows 7, I am finding more and more complications with Fast User Switching. Anything running under another user account may well
interfere with what I need to do: it may slow me down by consuming system resources, or it may, in fact, lock files that I need to remove or update.
When I log on remotely via RDP, I am notified that another user is logged on, but I have no option to log the other user off. If I then attempt to update a program that the other user has open, it may not update correctly because the other user has files
in use. I have been told I can use WMI to force another user logoff. I could probably run shutdown -i and force the user off (but, of course, that might log me off as well). However, this is not a good approach; when I run updates, I typically connect to anywhere
from five to 30 workstations simultaneously, and by the time I get logged onto all of them, I have no idea which had other users logged on and which did not. I would have to repeat on each of 30 workstations just to find out. I need a way to force-logoff the
other user during my logon process.
In the middle of running software installation, I may disconnect (NOT LOGOFF) from a workstation, take it to another site, then reconnect to the station to finish the installation. I may even just walk away from my computer for 15 minutes while updates are
running. If a non-administrative user attempts to logon, it asks me for permission, but allows the user to logon if I do not manually deny it. All non-administrators must be automatically denied logon when I am logged on.
It seems that disabling Fast User Switching would do this, but every time I have posted anywhere on the issue, I get another set of instructions on how to hide the entry points for Fast User Switching. That may work well for managing local logons
but fails miserably to protect my administrative environment.

Hi Brian,
Base on the KB article 279765
How To Use the Fast User Switching Feature in Windows XP, when not using Fast User Switching (FUS) and a non-administrator is logged on, a member of the Administrators
group can establish a remote desktop connection and has the ability to logon to the machine locally and gets a prompt to logoff previous logged on user. When an administrator is logged, any member of the Administrators group may establish a remote desktop
connection. If a non-administrator attempts to connect, you may receive the following error message:
“The user <Domain or Computer Name>\<username> is currently logged on to this computer. Only the current user or an administrator can
log on to this computer.”
In Windows 7, if the Fast User Switching is turned off, the Administrator cannot attempt to login locally. Administrator can do a Remote Desktop Session
to the Windows 7 machine and put his credentials. Once he attempts to login, he gets a prompt that looks like below.
“Once Administrator clicks on Yes, the User1’s session is disconnected.”
After logging in, Administrator can launch the Task Manager, click on “Users” tab and logoff User1. The prerequisite for the Administrator
to be able to do a Remote desktop session to the Windows 7 machine is to enable Remote Desktop services on the Windows7 machine.
In the interim, when the Administrator is logged in and has not attempted to logoff User1 yet, if User2 tries to login, the Administrator will get a
prompt that looks like below.
“If the Administrator clicks OK, User2 will be allowed to login and the Administrator’s session will be disconnected.”
This is a known issue.
Regards,
Sabrina
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Why is the "show fast user switching" option grey?

My MacBook has only ever had one account on it until now. I noticed that the Fast User Switching option wasn't showing up in my menu bar, so I went to System Preferences > Accounts > Login Options to enable it. However, the option to "Show fast user switching menu" is grey and I cannot select the checkbox next to it. Yes, I am using an admin account and yes, I have clicked the lock to make changes in the Accounts preferences pane.

I have the same problem- I have three accounts on this machine.
The option is greyed out. I tried zapping PRAM, and restarts but no joy.
It coincided with a forced shut-down after an HP update installation hung all day on one of the accounts. "turning off may harm your computer"...
Any clues to a fix would be welcome.
Thanks.

Lose System Alert Sound after Fast User Switching

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