Admin Password Prompt Broken

cmsict · May 30, 2012

Hello,

Any time I get prompted to enter administrator account information during a software installation, the prompt is broken and is missing text on the window and buttons. For example, when trying to update Adobe Flash Player:

The operating system was updated from Leopard to Snow Leopard to try and fix the problem but this was unsuccessful.

Is there a way to repair this part of the OS?

Thank you!

Lifeisabeach · Jun 1, 2012

It looks like you tried to post a screen cap, but it's missing. At any rate, if upgrading the OS didn't even resolve the issue, then the problem is more likely to be hardware related. A screen cap might help. If the screen cap doesn't show this defect, then that would actually help confirm that the problem is hardware, such as the graphics card.

If it is simply text that looks odd, then you may have a corrupt font. In that case, run Font Book, click on one of the fonts in the list, then press COMMAND-A to select all of them, then run Validate Fonts from the menu.

cmsict · Jun 1, 2012

Thanks for responding. The image appears to be showing on some computers but not all, so I'll repost just in case:

This only happens on admin password prompts to my knowledge. It's not that the fonts look weird, there's just no text at all. Unless those prompts use a unique font, I don't see how it could be font corruption without it affecting other windows.

I ran the font validation anyways: there were a ton of duplicates, and a couple that said "'kern' table structure and contents" (Bauhaus, MIHAELAB.TTF). If either of these is the font used by the prompt you're probably right. Otherwise something else is going in.

Anyways, I can still use the prompt, knowing roughly what text is missing, so it's just more of an annoyance. Thanks for your input!

Lifeisabeach · Jun 1, 2012

cmsict said:
Thanks for responding. The image appears to be showing on some computers but not all, so I'll repost just in case:

<snip>

This only happens on admin password prompts to my knowledge. It's not that the fonts look weird, there's just no text at all. Unless those prompts use a unique font, I don't see how it could be font corruption without it affecting other windows.

I ran the font validation anyways: there were a ton of duplicates, and a couple that said "'kern' table structure and contents" (Bauhaus, MIHAELAB.TTF). If either of these is the font used by the prompt you're probably right. Otherwise something else is going in.

Anyways, I can still use the prompt, knowing roughly what text is missing, so it's just more of an annoyance. Thanks for your input!

Does this happen only with the Flash installer? The error does suggest you have a font problem. Make backup copies of those two fonts, then delete them, reboot, and re-try the installer. You might want to clean up the duplicates also.

cmsict · Jul 23, 2012

No, the problem occurs on all prompts like that one. I tried your suggestion but it did not help (those were weird fonts not used by the prompt anyways). However, I did manage to solve the problem by installing Onyx and clearing the font cache for System, Adobe, and Microsoft fonts. When I restarted I got several prompts for fonts that conflicted with system fonts, and I click "Move to Trash" on all of them. Then I ran the installer successfully. I did not clear duplicates but I assume this was part of the problem due to the nature of the errors I received.

Thanks for your help!

Admin Password Prompt Broken

cmsict

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Lifeisabeach

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