Spinning ball and Syslogd Maxing CPU

Question

For about 2 months I have had periodic problems where once a week or so I get a runaway Syslogd process that consumes near 100% of CPU. I have available memory and disk space. To fix the problem I need to force kill Syslogd then reboot.
Following is from system.log:
Apr 12 12:01:23 Macintosh Safari[2861]: Cannot find function pointer NoteBookCMPlugInFactory for factory E10A17EE-6ED1-11D7-B4CE-000393A34A42 in CFBundle/CFPlugIn 0x105a2ef0 </Users/bob-ostiguy/Library/Contextual Menu Items/NoteBookCMPlugIn.plugin> (bundle, not loaded)
Apr 12 12:35:56 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: syslogd(12,0xa03b0720) malloc: * mmap(size=2097152) failed (error code=12)
Apr 12 12:35:56 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: * error: can't allocate region
Apr 12 12:35:56 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: * set a breakpoint in mallocerrorbreak to debug
Apr 12 12:35:56 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: syslogd(12,0xa03b0720) malloc: * mmap(size=2097152) failed (error code=12)
Apr 12 12:52:03 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: syslogd(12,0xb0185000) malloc: * mmap(size=2097152) failed (error code=12)
Apr 12 12:52:03 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: * error: can't allocate region
Apr 12 12:52:03 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: * set a breakpoint in mallocerrorbreak to debug
Apr 12 12:52:03 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: syslogd(12,0xb0185000) malloc: * mmap(size=2097152) failed (error code=12)
Apr 12 12:52:03 Macintosh com.apple.syslogd[12]: * error: can't allocate region
Continues on for pages.
I am running OS 10.5.6 on iMac. Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Have you tried removing NoteBookCMPlugIn.plugin from your /Home/Library/ContextualMenuItems/ folder? Seems to be causing the problem based on the posted log entry. You could also have a corrupted cache problem. You could try this:
Boot into single-user mode. After startup is completed you will be in command line mode and should see a prompt with a cursor positioned after it. At the prompt enter the following then press RETURN after each commandline:
/sbin/fsck -fy
If you receive a message that says "*** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED ***" then re-run the command until you receive a message that says "** The volume (nameofvolume) appears to be OK." If you re-run the command more than seven times and do not get the OK message, then the drive cannot be repaired this way.
If you were successful then enter:
/sbin/mount -uw /
rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/*
rm -rf /System/Library/Extensions.mkext
rm -rf /Library/Caches/*
reboot
I suggest you print out the above to be sure you do not make any errors when entering the commands. When in single-uwer mode you have 'root' access, so it's important that you not make any mistakes.