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Turning "ON" himself ?!

S

smok46

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 31, 2009
19
0
My 20' - 3 years old iMack is "ON" every morning for the last 10 days, after being turn "Off" for a night.
Any kind of program with timers to automatically start not installed on computer.
It is only happening sometimes between 12.00 AM and 6.00AM.
No help from Mac Support. Run out 14 days ago.
:confused:
 
smok46 said:
Thank you. I did it before I wrote thread.
Click to expand...
To clarify, is your issue still unresolved?

Do you have any bluetooth devices connected to your computer that might be waking it up? Check System Preferences > Bluetooth, to see a list of connected devices, and uncheck "Allow bluetooth devices to wake this computer" (under "Advanced").
 
Is it put to sleep, or turned off ?

Do you have wireless mouse/keyboard ? My 27 " was turning itself on when put to sleep. I noticed when the desk is bumped it vibrated the mouse and turned on the computer. Someone walking by the desk and vibrating the floor would wake it up. Mouse or keyboard is too sensitive maybe ?

The OS runs maintenance programs at 3:00 am and 5:30 am, maybe this has been waking the computer ?
 
EricNau said:
To clarify, is your issue still unresolved?

Do you have any bluetooth devices connected to your computer that might be waking it up? Check System Preferences > Bluetooth, to see a list of connected devices, and uncheck "Allow bluetooth devices to wake this computer" (under "Advanced").
Click to expand...

My problem is still unresolved.
I do have wireless keyboard & mouse.
Just to make clear. I do not have problem with Wake Up.
My computer is Shut Down and Start-Turn ON by himself.
I did test by let him Shut Down automatically after 60 sec. and immediately by pressing Shut Down button. I also turned off mouse and keyboard. Make no difference.
I am sure the problem exist in the iMac.
Maybe is possessed ? ;)
Thank you for trying to help.

Ecoh said:
Is it put to sleep, or turned off ?

Do you have wireless mouse/keyboard ? My 27 " was turning itself on when put to sleep. I noticed when the desk is bumped it vibrated the mouse and turned on the computer. Someone walking by the desk and vibrating the floor would wake it up. Mouse or keyboard is too sensitive maybe ?

The OS runs maintenance programs at 3:00 am and 5:30 am, maybe this has been waking the computer ?
Click to expand...

It is Shout Down - turned off.
Is any way to turn maintenance programs OFF ? Is it maintenance programs
running when computer is Shut Down ? Sorry if my questions sound stupid - but I do not know and I am trying to eliminate all possibilities.
 
Try changing the mac clock time to see if it is related to time or not.. And btw, the imac is a woman.
 
Try pulling the plug at night. If it still starts up , you will know for sure it is possessed. :D
 
wesleyh said:
Try changing the mac clock time to see if it is related to time or not.. And btw, the imac is a woman.
Click to expand...

As you suggested I changed time clock- (+15hrs). Looks like it is related to the time. Today morning iMac was OFF. So what do you suggest now?
 
As bizarre as it may sound, our cat walks across the keyboard in the early morning hours, waking the Mac.
 
I used to have a G3 iMac that would turn itself on in the middle of the night and start doing stuff. The scariest thing about it was that it would immediately shut down as soon as I entered the room. I got a quick look at what it was doing once before it was able to shut down on me and I saw a big purple progress bar on the screen. I still wonder to this day what on earth it was doing.
 
if you have unticked all boxes in energy saver and under schedule everything blank there should be no way it can turn on itself as somebody needs to press the power button or have you got another program that could override these settings in energy saver maybe some sort of maintanance program or something like it ?
other option would be
Wake-on-LAN is an Ethernet computer networking standard that allows a computer to be turned on or woken up by a network message. The message is usually sent by a simple program executed on another computer on the local area network. Wake-on-LAN is also known as Wake on LAN, WOL, or sometimes WoL. It may also be known as Remote Wake-Up or RWU.

In case the computer being woken is communicating via Wi-Fi, the wake-up-packet can be sent via Wireless Multimedia Extensions (WMM).[1]. This may also be called Wake on Wireless LAN (WoWLAN).[2] Wakeup over Wi-Fi networks was not possible in previous implementations of Wake-on-LAN.
so if you use ethernet and there is another computer connected or wifi with another computer then it could be that computer that wakes up yours
i know that and it works great via ethernet, i drove a mate mad in the house with that feature(he is via ethernet connected to my router ) as as soon as i did hear his livingroom door closing, so i knew he has switched of his mac , then i woke up his mac ...was funny .. especially as he asked me to look at it and i got remote access, then i just let it play some itunes in the middle of the night ... who needs enemies when you got such good mates :D
(i did not do it every day and i told him about it after a couple weeks that his mac is not a new lifeform )

but if you are not connected via wireless or ethernet ...
...you are not sleepwalking are you?
 
It sounds very much like what my old Performa 6300 started doing many, many years back. In the middle of the night it would start up all on it's own and sit there waiting for me to shut it down, a few minutes after I shut it down it would start up again.

Although I never solved that issue (it was an old machine and I'd already moved on to a newer model) other than pulling the plug, I have a feeling that it may have had something to do with the power.

My thinking was that the PSU had an issue and was kicking in whenever it wanted. Another thought was that the internal battery was dying and it was turning itself on to preserve date specific settings and preferences.

So while not a resolution for your problem it may be worth thinking along these lines. People get so hung up in the software that they forget that sometimes the hardware goes tits up as well.

I still have the Performa and turn it on now and again to travel back to simpler times - OS 8.6!
 
You may also try unpluggin the ethernet cable and disabling airport before you shut down the computer to see if it's related to wake on lan.
 
Pachang said:
I used to have a G3 iMac that would turn itself on in the middle of the night and start doing stuff. The scariest thing about it was that it would immediately shut down as soon as I entered the room. I got a quick look at what it was doing once before it was able to shut down on me and I saw a big purple progress bar on the screen. I still wonder to this day what on earth it was doing.
Click to expand...

Kitty porn!!!
 
wesleyh said:
You may also try unpluggin the ethernet cable and disabling airport before you shut down the computer to see if it's related to wake on lan.
Click to expand...

Thanx. I will try that over weekend and let you know.

mikeoc said:
It sounds very much like what my old Performa 6300 started doing many, many years back. In the middle of the night it would start up all on it's own and sit there waiting for me to shut it down, a few minutes after I shut it down it would start up again.

Although I never solved that issue (it was an old machine and I'd already moved on to a newer model) other than pulling the plug, I have a feeling that it may have had something to do with the power.

My thinking was that the PSU had an issue and was kicking in whenever it wanted. Another thought was that the internal battery was dying and it was turning itself on to preserve date specific settings and preferences.

So while not a resolution for your problem it may be worth thinking along these lines. People get so hung up in the software that they forget that sometimes the hardware goes tits up as well.

I still have the Performa and turn it on now and again to travel back to simpler times - OS 8.6!
Click to expand...

Thank you. Interesting thoughts.
 
I think this might be the beginning of the end...seriously. In the past week my ps3 has turned itself on twice, and two different radios.

I hear this story of the imac and I am getting scared. :eek:

Seriously though...if after checking all the settings and following the suggestions in this thread, I too would chalk it up to faulty power supply. Somewhere along the way the computer is getting the startup command...
Good luck and let us know. I am interested in finding out what it is...

::Goes off to make foil hats and wait for the mothership to land:: :D
 
ok as i always say to my two imac g3s they are like my pets
maybe its the same with other macs too
they are little pets and want your attention and turning themself on is their way to tell you .."come play with me , i'm bored"
 
Dear smok46,

You have received a warning at Mac Forums.

Reason:
-------
Consecutive Posting
 
Backup computer to time machine.

Reinstall OSX. BUT, don't restore with time machine.

Test to see if the computer comes on at night with just the basic OSX bare install.

If it does, you must have a faulty mac.
If it doesn't, the issue lies within OSX or the software installed.
 
"My problem is still unresolved.
I do have wireless keyboard & mouse.
Just to make clear. I do not have problem with Wake Up.
My computer is Shut Down and Start-Turn ON by himself."

THIS solution will work.
100% guaranteed.

Get yourself a power strip with an on/off switch.

Hook up the Mac and peripherals to it.

At night, before bed, shut down the Mac, then:
REACH DOWN AND FLIP THE SWITCH ON THE POWER STRIP TO "OFF".

It will STAY off - absolutely, positively guaranteed.

In the morning, just reach down and flip the switch on the power strip to "on".

Then power up the Mac normally.

This WILL work, when every other solution frustrates you.
 
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