My G5 tower has begun to do strange things. From time to time some application will hang, with the spinning wheel showing up if the cursor is over the app window. Usually this will happen when I try to open the app. It's happened with everything from Grab to Software Update and from Graphic Converter to Word. It's odd that so many apps are hanging, but what happens next is really the problem. When I do a Force Quit on the app, the dialogue window asking whether I'm sure I want to do that comes up--and then that hangs, so I can't click either the Cancel or the OK button. When the cursor is over that window, I get the spinning wheel of death. In order to get rid of that problem, then, I have to restart or just shut the computer down.

I've run Permissions Repair and I've run DiskWarrior, but neither one has fixed the problem. I'm wondering if this is a hardware issue. Any thoughts?

Have you ran defragmenting regularly, or at least semi-regularly? And how full is the HD? These might come into play as well, along with perhaps memory or mainboard or with Macs, it could be the ROM, too.

But my first suspection would be stuffed out and/or defragmented hard drive as that can cause similar things on just about any system.

The HD is about half empty, so I don't think that's it. I haven't defragmented, for years, but I guess I can try that and see what happens.

I've always got something to say. Sometimes it's even useful.

Can you clone to something else and boot off of that HD to see if it's a HD failing, slowing up maybe.

Any clues from Console, All Messages?

Maybe it's time for the dreaded Archive and Install?

I defragged last night (overnight). I'll see if that did the trick. Next step will be to create a new account and see if working from that the problem stops. I haven't read the Console docs yet, but will at some point--not that I can decipher those hieroglyphics, but I'll post something that looks suspicious (if I can tell what that might be ). Last step is the ol' archive and install.

Incidentally, I ran all of the hardware tests on TTPro last night and everything was OK according to that.

Look for something in All Messages that's repeating for example while it's hanging. Or the most recent message(s) when it hangs. If it says anything about disk arbitration it may be a HD speed or controller problem.

You obviously defragged okay, but how long did it take, you said overnight. How much is on the drive?

I'm thinking the HD is heading south, too (or the controller) causing read/write delays. I hope you have a back up made.

Yeah, shouldn't take that long (overnight) with any sized drive that's only half full/empty.

I honestly don't know how long it took. I started the defragging at around 1 a. m., and went to sleep. It was done when I got up at 6:30, but i don't know when it finished. I'm thinking it might be the HD. TTP said the controller is OK, for what that's worth. Everything is backed up via TimeMachine as well as to another external drive, so that's ok. So far the defragging seems to have worked, but I know that's no proof that fragmentation was the cause of the problem. I'll keep plugging away until I'm sure the hanging has stopped or until the drive kicks the bucket.

Does About This Mac show the full amount of RAM you are supposed to have installed? Extremely low memory can cause lots of beachballs.