Two issues with MP 5,1: shutdown hangs and undeletable files

[Mister Speaker]

I'm having two rather bothersome issues with my Mac Pro that I've been unable to resolve.

The first is that the machine hangs on shutdown - and often on startup as well. On shutdown it hangs on the wallpaper screens - no cursor, no dock or toolbar. I have to force a shutdown with the power button on the tower. On startup, it will occasionally hang on blank grey screens - no Apple logo or loading bar shows up. Starting up in Recovery Mode allows the computer to boot fully.

The second issue is that I'm unable to trash a particular folder. I'm getting error code -8072 when I try to drop it in the Trash. Disabling csrutility in Terminal did not work, sudo rm -rf/filepath did not work.

Machine is a Mac Pro 5,1 (Mid 2010). 2x 3.46GHz Intel Xeon chips, 64GB 1333MHz DDR3 ECC RAM. Radeon HD7950 GPU. Two SSDs on PCI cards, one of them runs the OS. Two HDDs in the drive bays.

 

[bsbeamer]

HFS+ or APFS formatted system drive?
FileVault enabled or disabled?
SIP enabled or disabled?

 

[Mister Speaker]

All drives are formatted in HFS+, FileVault is off, I disabled SIP by booting in Recovery Mode but still no joy on trashing the files.

Sorry, forgot to mention, the filesystem stuff - and my OS, durr. OSX 10.11.6

 

[handheldgames]

Sounds like hardware. Tear down and clean your Mac with a couple cans of dust off. It’s probably coughing because the video card cooling fins, power supply, etc is caked with dust.

After your Mac is stable repair the drive with disk utility.

 

[h9826790]

All drives are formatted in HFS+, FileVault is off, I disabled SIP by booting in Recovery Mode but still no joy on trashing the files.

Sorry, forgot to mention, the filesystem stuff - and my OS, durr. OSX 10.11.6

For slow shutdown. It can be software issue. In fact, this bug exist since Mavericks and Apple didn't fix that until Sierra (or may be even High Sierra).

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/slow-shutdown-in-mavericks-10-9.1690134/page-2#post-20211216

However, the hang during boot more points to hardware failure. The biggest suspect is the HDD. Did you try remove all drives except the boot drive? The Mac still hang?

 

[Mister Speaker]

I don't think it's hardware, least not dust... I'll check the power supply later but I cleaned off most everything else last week. Will pull the other HDDs later tonight as well.

 

[lclev]

I had shutdown issues with my 2010 cMP until I upgraded to Sierra and now running High Sierra. I would have to press the power button to get it to shut down.

Your startup issues could be hardware. I would try the suggestions in post #5 - remove all drives and any peripherals so that all it has is the SSD startup drive. If that solves the problem then start adding back in the other drives until the problem reappears.

If that does not help you figure out a potential hardware issue I suggest booting into safe mode, create a new user account and see how it acts booting to a new fresh account. You could have a user account issue.

Lisa

 

[Mister Speaker]

OK, I've removed all drives except the boot SSD. It did not start up correctly, but here's something weird: it did when I switched the SSD to another PCI bus (it was immediately above the video card, I moved it to the topmost port).

It does still take a bit of time to boot - about 15-20 seconds to chime and grey screen, another 15 before the Apple logo and loading bar appear. The bar makes it to about 60% before the logo disappears and I have a grey screen again for a sec then login screens. First Aid on my boot volume takes about 45 seconds.

And still I get the same hanging shutdown with just the boot SSD connected.

Update: I've plugged in the second SSD (into the second PCI port from the top) and now I'm getting the same startup hang again - grey screens, but I can see the mouse cursor now?

 

[crjackson2134]

Install a rotational drive and put a clean copy of macOS on there. Remove all the SSD drives and boot from the conventional HD. See what happens then.

You may have a failing or corrupted SSD drive. Presumably your boot drive, but not necessarily.

 

[Mister Speaker]

I've booted into Safe Mode and it crawls to the login screen, but for some reason my trackball does not work... tabbing to my account and the guest user selects them, but when I hit return the screen flashes; I can't type my password or log into guest user.

 

[crjackson2134]

My understand is that Safe Mode doesn't load you hardware drivers so I'm not really surprised. Try what I listed above and see what happens.

 

[Mister Speaker]

I might not have a spare HDD handy; can my empty machine be booted instead from a USB boot drive of El Cap I have laying around?

 

[h9826790]

It's really time to get another boot drive.

Not necessary failing hardware, but if the SSD is corrupted. It can cause this kind of issue as well. The best way to test is indeed use another drive.

If you install a PCIe SSD in slot 3 or 4, it is expected to take longer to boot. The mechanism behind slot 2 and 3 (or 4) is different.

 

[crjackson2134]

I might not have a spare HDD handy; can my empty machine be booted instead from a USB boot drive of El Cap I have laying around?

It can be if you have a full install, but that’s not really a good testbed. It’s on a very SLOW BUSS (USB2) and will be difficult to use fully for diagnosis.

Since you are getting file errors and have an inability to delete files, I suspect drive or corruption issues. Free up an actual HD, put it Bay 1, and drive it around for a day or two (unless the same problem manifests quickly).

We can guess all day long and it means nothing. Time to roll up your sleeves and test. You will find the problem by process of elimination. Start Eliminating.

 

[Tooldog]

I'm having two rather bothersome issues with my Mac Pro that I've been unable to resolve...

I wonder if booting into Single User Mode (https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201573) might not get you into a state for you to remove said file. Be mindful that you will be root and every legal command will be followed, possibly without a conformation prompt.

If you aren't in a hurry, order a couple of used/refurbished spindles from newegg or somewhere and test a clean install on the cheap. Last ones I bought were 160G SATA3 for $8 each.

...interested to know how things get resolved.

-T

 

[Mister Speaker]

OK, I removed the SSDs and booted from a Time Machine backup on one of my internal HDDs. Naturally, startup was reeeeally slow, but the shutdown problem was resolved. So it looks like I may have a bad boot SSD... I'm pretty pissed off as I just bought this drive from OWC (it's a 240GB Mercury Extreme Pro 6G, if that matters). Is there a utility I can download to confirm, without a doubt, that the drive is corrupted?

Curiously though, before I removed the SSD I tried to shutdown from the login screen (as in, before logging into my account) and it worked. So is it possible this is still a user account problem and not a bum drive? Wouldn't I be seeing more problems than just these two if the drive was failing? Shutdown and undeletable files aside, the machine runs flawlessly, near as I can tell.

Booting into Single User Mode and trying sudo rm -rf/filepath to delete the folder gives me the same 'unlink file' error I saw in Terminal. I should note that this file is NOT on the boot SSD (in case that is further leading to the conclusion that the SSD is corrupted), it's on one of the HDDs - basically a mass of DMGs and RAR archives for VSTs and audio libraries. They've been installed and the folder is backed up, so I don't need it anymore, but it just refuses to go.

 

[crjackson2134]

If I had known it was an OWC SSD I'd have suspected it was the cause even sooner. MANY people report defects & failures from their drives. I wouldn't recommend them to anyone.

You COULD have another issue, but as a rule of thumb, it's best to fix the 1st problem completely (i.e. new drive) before tackling a new problem. There is a good chance the 2nd problem was related to, or caused by the 1st.

Get a new (non-OWC) drive and move forward... btw, even if you did a new install on the OWC drive, I fully believe there's a strong chance it will reoccur. I whole heartedly recommend a different brand drive.

Just my uneducated 2¢

 

[h9826790]

OK, I removed the SSDs and booted from a Time Machine backup on one of my internal HDDs. Naturally, startup was reeeeally slow, but the shutdown problem was resolved. So it looks like I may have a bad boot SSD... I'm pretty pissed off as I just bought this drive from OWC (it's a 240GB Mercury Extreme Pro 6G, if that matters). Is there a utility I can download to confirm, without a doubt, that the drive is corrupted?

Curiously though, before I removed the SSD I tried to shutdown from the login screen (as in, before logging into my account) and it worked. So is it possible this is still a user account problem and not a bum drive? Wouldn't I be seeing more problems than just these two if the drive was failing? Shutdown and undeletable files aside, the machine runs flawlessly, near as I can tell.

Booting into Single User Mode and trying sudo rm -rf/filepath to delete the folder gives me the same 'unlink file' error I saw in Terminal. I should note that this file is NOT on the boot SSD (in case that is further leading to the conclusion that the SSD is corrupted), it's on one of the HDDs - basically a mass of DMGs and RAR archives for VSTs and audio libraries. They've been installed and the folder is backed up, so I don't need it anymore, but it just refuses to go.

If you suspect it's a file system corruption. Then disk warrior may help. But it's not a cheap software. Can't quite remmeber if there is any trial mode. You may go to their web site have a look.

Anyway, better stay away from OWC.

 

[Mister Speaker]

That's disconcerting... I've got OWC SSDs in Data Doubler kits in both of my 2011 MacBook Pros as well. They've been running without problems for more than a year.

Just to be clear, if I grab a new SSD what's the best practice for cloning my boot drive to it? Carbon Copy Cloner? Might as well ask for brand recommendations while I'm at it.

And what sort of error messages am I looking for if I run DiskWarrior on the SSD? Any other disk utilities comparable to DiskWarrior?

 

[h9826790]

That's disconcerting... I've got OWC SSDs in Data Doubler kits in both of my 2011 MacBook Pros as well. They've been running without problems for more than a year.

Just to be clear, if I grab a new SSD what's the best practice for cloning my boot drive to it? Carbon Copy Cloner? Might as well ask for brand recommendations while I'm at it.

And what sort of error messages am I looking for if I run DiskWarrior on the SSD?

IMO, CCC is the best way. However, if you suspect there is some corruption in the current hard drive. You better start from a clean installation again.

My last time to use disk warrior is at least 3 years ago. It really safed my drive at data, but I can't quite remember what error message pop up. Anyway, if there is any free trial mode. Give it a go. The scanning should able to pick up something.

 

[crjackson2134]

That's disconcerting... I've got OWC SSDs in Data Doubler kits in both of my 2011 MacBook Pros as well. They've been running without problems for more than a year.

Just to be clear, if I grab a new SSD what's the best practice for cloning my boot drive to it? Carbon Copy Cloner? Might as well ask for brand recommendations while I'm at it.

And what sort of error messages am I looking for if I run DiskWarrior on the SSD? Any other disk utilities comparable to DiskWarrior?

I use Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC), but I wouldn't clone a drive with a suspected data integrity issue. You could just transfer the problem to the new drive. A completely clean install would be best.

But, honestly if I were in your shoes... I'd get a cheap rotational drive for testing before anything else. Booting from a TM backup is again... Not the best testbed platform to base your decisions on.

I use only Samsung SSDs at the moment, but I wouldn't hesitate to use other brands with a good reputation. I tend to shy away from anything with a Sandforce Controller (like the OWC models). I would probably also consider newer Crucial drives too.

As for you other computers with OWC SSDs. I would back them up fully incase disaster strikes. That way you are prepared for the worst case scenario. Again, you need more storage than just enough to run a machine. I have 4 backups on 4 different drives of EVERYTHING... It may have an initial cost you don't like, but it's saved me from failures and mistakes more than once. More mistakes than failures though

At least get another drive for a full-bootable-clone on a decent drive for you primary machine.

 

[h9826790]

I can confirm that both Samsung Evo series and the Crucial MX500 works well, and I can't tell any difference between these two SSD. So, the MX500 should be a better choice (better cost to performance ratio).

 

[Mister Speaker]

Update: I have resolved the undeletable file issue. A friend recommended trying a 'sudo chflags -R nouchg,noschg $FILEPATH' command in Terminal. This worked after disabling csrutility in Recovery Mode.