This weekend I took the plunge and decided it was time to reinstall the system on my Powerbook. I had been suffering from Kernal panics for a while but hoping magically and pathetically it would go away with some system cleansing. I was wrong. Every few days or even sooner I’d be greeted by a hard freeze.
Archive and Re-install turned out to be an amazing option! My system retained ALL my personal settings and I only had to resinstall Stuffit Deluxe and The Missing Sync – both which had saved and installed themselves at the system level. I did have to re-download all the updates from Apple since 10.3 had been released, but that was pretty easy. I am happy to report no issues since and my computer is actually running beautifully again!
The only clue I have as to what caused my issue is uControl — a really nice way to utilize the trackpad as a scrolling device. When I tried to re-install it I was told it was not supported by my system. Would have been nice of course if it had deactivated itself previously instead of (possibly) causing my issue. I am using Sidetrack as a replacement but still getting used to it.
I’ve never heard of uControl messing up a system. I use it and Sidetrack together on my Powerbook, and they’ve never caused problems. Do you use any antivirus software? Many people who have reported problems such as yours have found products like Virex or Norton Anti-Virus to be the culprits. If you’re using programs like this, I’d try dumping them (they’re useless for now anyway, there are no viruses for OS X).
I do have Virex (from a .Mac account) and had not considered that to be my problem at all. Have to see what happens moving forward….