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Let’s face it, stuff breaks. This applies to Macs just as well as Windows PC’s (Only difference is that you have an 80% chance of starting windows and receiving an error, the odds are much more favorable with a Mac :)).

For those of you who run into some problems with your Mac running OS X Leopard, try these quick troubleshooting steps to help resolve you issue.

1. Restart your Mac

A simple restart of your computer might resolve your issue forever. If that is the case, you are officially done troubleshooting.

2. Check to see if you are running out of space 

Another fairly common and easy to fix problem. You always want to have a minimum of 3GB available on your hard drive. More is ideal and recommended if you burn cd’s/dvd’s or use resource intensive applications. Remember that swapfiles (generated from applications launched on startup) on launch will take up 2GB of space immediately!

To fix your space problem: Delete some files! Consider getting an external hard drive and upgrade your RAM if you like running a bunch of applications simultaneously as this will reduce swapfiles.

 3. Repair Permissions

Open Disk Utility (Applications/Utilities Folder). Select your boot drive (Probably “Macintosh HD”). Proceed to click on the First Aid Tab and then click on Repair Permissions.

4. Create a new User Account

Go to your System Preferences >>> Accounts and create a new user account. Log out of your current account and log in to your new one. If this fixes your problem you know that the cause is your user account. At this point, some serious troubleshooting is in order. Consider taking your Mac in for repairs or if you are up to it, backup your data from your previous account to your new user account until you pinpoint what file is causing your problem.

 5. Deep Clean all Caches

Try using a third party tool like Leopard Cache Cleaner  to deep clean all of your caches. Reboot your system and see if that corrected the issue.

6. Startup in SafeBoot Mode

You can do this by holding your shift key during initial boot. If you do not run into your problem while in SafeBoot, you can be sure that the problem lies with Extensions or StartupItems. You can find most of these at /Library/Extensions/ and /Library/StartUpItem/. Try moving some to your desktop, starting with third party extensions, and try to pinpoint the problem. There is a possibility that the problem might be from an extension installed in /System/Library/Extension/. You probably do not want to mess with those if you do not know what you are doing since you could screw up your whole system. If you cant isolate your issue moving the /Library/Extensions/ and /Library/StartupItem/ it is probably best to take your Mac in for repair.

7. Reset your Firmware

Resetting your firmware to factory default is pretty simple. Simply hold down cmd+opt+O+F during boot up and you will be presented with open firmware. Once inside type this:

reset-nvram (hit return)

reset-all (hit return again, the system will reboot) 

8. Unplug all USB and Firewire Devices

Reboot your computer with everything unplugged except for your Apple mouse. If this fixes the problem, you have a bad external drive or a bad port on your computer. Try to isolate the problem.

I hope that these tips above are useful to some people. If you need some help with any of these feel free to comment and I will try to help you out. If these do not fix your problem, post a comment describing your issue and I might just write a guide to help troubleshoot that issue. Either way, subscribe to our feed to make sure you get the latest troubleshooting guides and up to the minute product news and reviews. Thanks for reading!