Black screens on logout

[pixellip]

Hi there

I've noticed a couple of macs here on Sierra are just going black when you log out of them.

You then have to force power them down.

The cursor is moving so they aren't freezing.

Has anyone got any advice please on how they might troubleshoot this?

They have all our Final Cut stuff on so it's making me a little uncomfortable.

Thanks a lot

Mike

[AntonioRocco]

Sorry to be the bearer of potentially bad news but in my experience this could be a number of things. One possible 'quick fix' is the delete the com.apple.loginwindow.plist from the Preferences folder. You'll find this in the top level Library folder. Seeing as it's only a couple of Macs this is an easy thing to do either locally or by sending a Terminal command using ARD. When setting a policy for the login window I tend to 'bake it in' or use a script applied via DS. Just some friendly advice but I would consider carefully the school's approach to mac management?

 

As it's only the two macs you could shine a torch on the screen when the problem happens as it could be an intermittent hardware issue? If you see an image behind the black screen then an Apple Repair Centre should be able to run tests to confirm this one way or another. Are the macs affected laptops or desktops? I ask as laptop inverter boards are not that expensive.

 

If none of the above help then how old are the macs? How much RAM? I ask because I think you may be looking at advising/educating everyone on how FC works and the best way to use it in an educational environment. I've emphasised this last point as most people who work in educational institutions only have experience of FC in a standalone/at home environment and don't fully grasp the complexity of using it in a large Active Directory network.

 

For example a 4GB project in iMovie (with FC the processing/disk/network overheads can go up, a lot) can take 3-4 hours to render. Once rendered it can take a further 40-60 minutes to write/export. This additional time is taken up with background processes which can cause issues on logout, especially the sort that you see. If you've ProTools installed and possibly Adobe's suite of programs (usually the case as it's all media isn't it?) as well, then these problems can be compounded. When contemplating Macs or PCs for Video editing, my advice is, usually, to set aside a specific suite with the fastest network possible; work locally; save often; use local accounts and keep the macs 'lean'. By lean I mean don't install or use anything else apart from FC. If the students want to do a bit of internet, email or Word, direct them to another terminal, PC preferably, instead. Of course the advice does depend on budgets and other factors etc and the above is only what I'd call ideal.

 

Hope this helps?

 

Antonio Rocco (ACSA)

Edited November 21, 2017 by AntonioRocco

[pixellip]

Hi there.

Thanks Antonio. I thought at first it could be Adobe as these macs had Adobe CC just installed on them - but we have others with it on as well.

They haver 8gb RAM / Core I5s ......not joined to AD just using local accounts. I wonder if it's because they have lots of apps open. Trouble is in a subject like media they will use Final Cut, After effects, ITunes, Photoshop, Word,Garageband.

 

Things have been fine so far but this issue has cropped up since I installed Adobe CC ( that is not to say it's causing the issue).

 

I can't take any macs out of the suite at the moment as I don't have spares and all their work is on them.

 

Thanks for your help.

[AntonioRocco]

You're welcome!

 

Machine spec you've given is under-powered in my view for iMovie let alone FC. I know it's not ideal but it may be better if you uninstalled those applications and installed them on another suite of macs instead. Video editing is in a league of its own when it comes to media and really should be dealt with differently. If this can't be done then educating users to quit out of applications when not using them may 'fix' this in the short term. It's going to be difficult but certainly worth a try?

 

This may or may not help but I recently set up a video editing suite at a college where I disabled all unnecessary apps prior to deployment leaving only the apps necessary for the students to do their work active. Similar spec hardware to yours. Just my opinion but it's something you could try and look at moving forwards.

 

Antonio Rocco (ACSA)

Edited November 21, 2017 by AntonioRocco

[pixellip]

Hi Antonio

We have been using these macs fine with Final Cut for 5 years now - zero problems. So whilst 8gb is not as ideal as 16gb it has been fine for us for 5 years ( for 5 minute movies ).

 

I have asked them to quit applications. I don't think it made a difference.

[jessica]

did you ever get to the bottom of what was causing this? our macs seem to randomly go to a black screen when logging off