MacBook Pro won't sleep or stay shut down?

Product: MacBook Pro 13" "mid 2009," 8GB RAM (3rd party RAM upgrade), 2.26GHz, Mountain Lion 10.8.2
This happens ~75% of the time:
1) When I put it to sleep, the fans keep running, hard drive keeps spinning, and the outside front pulsing light goes through unusual on/off pulsing cycles. When I open the lid, it's at the login window. So it knows I put it to sleep, but it doesn't stay asleep. And I can't just put it to sleep and throw it in a bag -- it would overheat.
2) When I shut down, it goes through the process, and as soon as it's off, the front pulsing light turns on, and the computer starts up again. I can't stop that from happening. So to shut down fully (for travel, unplugging power, etc), I need to force shut down (hold power button for several seconds), and that can't be good to do so many times.
I've read through so many posts online (not a totally unique issue here, Apple!), and I have done all of this:
- archive and install
- clear all faulty fonts
- reset SMC
- reset PRAM
- removed all strange startup items (with Genius Bar guy)
- delete /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.PowerManagement.plist and /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.AutoWake.plist to re-create them
- remove all sharing (file, printers, iTunes library)
- turned off Bluetooth
I even did a clean install, then pulled in my stuff backed up on external HD. Unfortunately I didn't test enough if I could replicate these issues before restoring all my files and settings.
Apple Genius Bar told me that it's not a hardware issue -- that's all been checked.
Anything else to do? other than doing another clean install and copying files, applications, etc. one by one? (which might not fix anything)
Thanks so much for any help.

I don't have any good solutions as it seem you have tried all the advised repairs and resets. If it were me I would wipe the HDD clean and install 10.5 or 10.6 depending on the installation disks you possess. If the problem is resolved then upgrade to 10.7 or 10.8 and see what happens.
I have a MacBook Pro that would not work correctly with an interim OS update no matter how I approached it. The consensus on this forum was that I was doing something wrong. I reinstalled to the pre update state and waited till the next upgrade was released. When I applied this everything was fine and has remained so. Perhaps OS X 10.8.3 will offer you some relief.

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Macbook Pro won't sleep when lid shuts or hit sleep

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So after the latest update my Macbook pro no longer immediately sleeps after shutting the lid. It also won't sleep when 'sleep' is hit in the apple menu. It's actually really annoying as I need it for security.
Does anyone know how to fix this problem?

Try Reset SMC. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
Choose the method for:
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This doesn't fit exactly under the definition for using an SMC Reset: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964 but I'd give it a try.

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Every so often my MacBook Pro won't sleep or shut down. I can't find any rhyme or reason to it.
I notice the problem when I close lid, and it doesn't go to sleep. I then hit apple menu:sleep, and it does nothing. I hit shutdown, and OS shuts down, but gets stuck at blue screen with spinning circle indefinitely. Have to hold power button for 5 seconds to finally shut down. Startup is then slow, but doesn't give me an error message indicating improper shutdown or failure.
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After 10.7.4 update macbook pro won't sleep

after 10.7.4 update, macbook pro won't sleep.

Test after each of the following steps that you haven’t already tried:
Step 1
 ▹ System Preferences ▹ Energy Saver ▹ Power Adapter ▹ Wake for network access: uncheck. You may need to unlock the preference pane by clicking the lock icon in the lower left corner and entering your administrator password.
Step 2
 ▹ System Preferences ▹ Energy Saver ▹ Schedule… ▹ Start up or wake: uncheck
Step 3
 ▹ System Preferences ▹ Print & Scan ▹ Open Print Queue...
Check all printers for unfinished jobs. Deal with any you find.
Step 4
Disconnect all wired peripherals except keyboard, mouse or trackball, and monitor, if applicable.
Step 5
Launch the Activity Monitor application in any of the following ways:
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Be sure your Mac is shut down.
Press the power button.
Immediately after you hear the startup tone, hold the Shift key. The Shift key should be held as soon as possible after the startup tone, but not before the tone.
Release the Shift key when you see the gray Apple icon and the progress indicator (looks like a spinning gear).
The login screen appears even if you usually log in automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.
Note: If FileVault is enabled under Mac OS X 10.7 or later, you can’t boot in safe mode.
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Step 7
Still in safe mode, launch the usual set of applications that are running when you have the problem, including your login items, one at a time, testing after each one. Some applications may not work; skip them. You might be able to identify the cause of the problem this way.
Step 8
If sleep is still working after you’ve launched all the usual applications, reboot as usual (not in safe mode) and test again. If sleep still works, you’re done, at least for the moment.
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My MacBook Pro won't go to sleep or shut down.
Sleep
The behaviour is the same whether I press the power button and choose 'Sleep' or whether I choose 'Sleep' from the Apple menu. The computer stays awake, but it loses the ability to respond to Keyboard Shortcuts, such as those used for Expose, and can get stuck in some Apps. If I close the lid the computer stays awake but the screen blacks out. Re-openning the lid does not re-illuminate the screen so I have to force shut down and re-boot.
*Shut Down*
The behaviour is erratic. Sometimes the computer simply ignores me (although it does close the 'Are you sure you want to Shut Down now?' window), and sometimes it goes to the blue screen with the progress circle and hangs.
*What I've tried already*
- Resetting the SMC
- Checked the Firmware versions are the latest

Sorry for the repost. New to this forum and I hadn't seen the answers to the last time I brought up this topic here:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=5050821

MacBook Pro won't sleep, even in safe boot

Hey gang,
I can't figure out what to do with this problem. I recently did an archive & install of 10.5 on my 2.33 GHz MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo, and then used software update to get to 10.5.2.
Ever since doing that, my MacBook Pro will not sleep on its own anymore. It will sleep the display, but it won't sleep the system. (I can close the lid and it will sleep. I can also choose "Sleep" from the Apple Menu, and it will sleep. It just won't sleep on its own.)
At first I thought it might be Time Machine that was preventing it from sleeping, but I turned off Time Machine and the problem persisted. I tried creating a new user, and the problem persisted. In fact, I EVEN BOOTED IN SAFE MODE AND THE PROBLEM PERSISTED!
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Thanks!
Scott

I see you've done your homework. I have this no auto-sleep problem on my Mac pro and none of those things worked for me either but I thought you should give them a shot.
I made a little sleep program of my own. You are welcome to try it. It's a very simple shell script that checks system idle time and if it's bigger than the sleep timer you set in system preferences it puts your computer to sleep. It will work so long as you can manually put your computer to sleep from the apple menu.
You'll also need to create a launch daemon to periodically run the script.
here are the steps to do it.
1. copy and paste the following into TextEdit.
#!/bin/bash
idl=$"`ioreg -c IOHIDSystem | awk '/HIDIdleTime/ {print int($NF/1000000000); exit}'`"
sleeptimer=$"`defaults read /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.PowerManagement "Custom Profile" | grep "System Sleep Timer" | awk '{print $5}' | sed -e 's/;//g'`"
st=`expr $sleeptimer \* 60 `
if \[ $idl -gt $st \]; then
shutdown -s now
fi
2. Format it as *plain text* (shiftcommandT in TextEdit) and save it as sleep.sh (don't use the .txt extension) at the top level of your hard drive.
3. make it unix executable by entering the following command in terminal.
*chmod 755 /sleep.sh*
4. Download and install [Lingon|http://lingon.sourceforge.net>.
5. Open Lingon and create a new *Users Daemon*
Call it,say, com.sleep.launchd (the name is not important)
On line 2. enter /sleep.sh
and in section 3 set it to run every 30 seconds.
Click save (you'll have to enter your admin password).
6. Restart.
That's it. Once this is done you can forget about it. The sleep settings are still controlled from system preferences. The sleep agent will work with every user and even over the login window.
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1/31/13 9:44:10 PM PST
Assertion status system-wide:
   PreventUserIdleDisplaySleep             0
   CPUBoundAssertion                       0
   DisableInflow                           0
   ChargeInhibit                           0
   PreventSystemSleep                      0
   PreventUserIdleSystemSleep              0
   ExternalMedia                           0
   DisableLowPowerBatteryWarnings          0
   EnableIdleSleep                         1
   NoRealPowerSources_debug                0
   UserIsActive                            0
   ApplePushServiceTask                    0
Kernel Assertions: None

MacBook Pro won't sleep or stay shut down?

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