Determine what is causing random restart

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Hi,

Over the last 12 months my 2011 Mac Mini has started to randomly restart. It could be part way through boot up, 20 minutes after restart or a couple of hours. There could be no load (sitting idle) or during any form of load. Generally once it has restarted like this a few times in a row it gets into a loop during boot and hangs with the fan going mental. I did all the normal checks and resets with no luck.

Originally I thought it was something to do with High Sierra so I went back to El Capitan but its doing the same thing.

What is interesting is this.... when I run it in Safe Boot mode it won't restart. Ever. Based on this I can rule out some hardware such as power supply, wifi, and heat issues.

My next check was to see if I could disable individual components in a similar way to safe boot to try and isolate the fault. Is anyone aware of how this could be achieved?

Thanks
 

IWT


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A warm welcome to Mac-Forums.

FYI only, this Apple article discusses the uses and significance of Safe Mode: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201262#issue

Apart from blocking auto log in items, it also blocks a lot of third party applications, so it might be worth looking at those third party apps which you run frequently. It's a tedious process.

Ian
 
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...my 2011 Mac Mini has started to randomly restart..

In the past 30+ years I've seen a surprising number of instances where Macs restart randomly. Often I am consulted after others have thrown up their hands at finding a solution. This problem has always turned out to have been due to one of two situations.

The first is a sag in the powerline. For instance, some laser printers have such a draw when they begin a new job, that if they are on the same circuit as your Mac they will cause a huge sag in power to your Mac that will instantly result in a shutdown, and then a restart. I've seen the same thing caused by having a refrigerator on the same electrical circuit. Look for things that cycle on and off and which have a large draw and are on the same electrical circuit. If this is the problem, a good UPS with automatic voltage regulation (AVR) to plug your Mac into will be the solution if you can't isolate the offending appliances onto a different circuit.

The second situation is either a failing power supply on your Mac's motherboard, or possibly just a cold solder joint where your power supply is attached to your Mac's motherboard. (Constant heat cycling leads solder joints to break after they have expanded and contracted a bunch of times. Mini's tend to run hot, which adds to the possibility of this happening.) This would logically require either than the solder joints around your power supply be re-flowed with the touch of a soldering pen, or that your power supply itself be replaced, but these days very few shops do component level repairs. More likely they will just replace your entire motherboard, which is also what Apple would do if you returned your Mac to them for repair. However I doubt that Apple will touch a Mac as old as yours. In any case, I doubt that the cost of replacing the motherboard on a 7 to 8 year old Mac mini will be economical compared to purchasing a newer model used mini.

You can run this program to test your hardware, but I doubt that it will give you any results that will be helpful in fixing the problem yourself:

Hardware Test
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201257

Good luck.
 

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@Randy

I greatly respect your contributions to our Forums, all the more so because you are a very busy man with a busy legal practice.

With respect to the power problem the OP discussed, and your two principal causes of such; how do you explain the Mac working perfectly in Safe Mode?

To quote the OP:
What is interesting is this.... when I run it in Safe Boot mode it won't restart. Ever.

The OP goes on to suggest:
Based on this I can rule out some hardware such as power supply, wifi, and heat issues.

Do you agree with that statement?

Ian
 
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Do you agree with that statement?

I've told you my experience from the past 30+ years. Those are the only two things that I've ever seen be the cause of random restarts.

It's certainly possible that random restarts could be due to a third thing. What third thing, in your experience, might be causing random restarts? Feel free to add your experience to the discussion.
 
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Thanks everyone for the suggestions so far.

- I've completed a clean install of El Capitan with no additional apps. Figured if its a clean install then its either an OS issue OR a hardware fault. This rules out third party apps being the cause, unless Apple installs some as part of the OS

- Correct it does only happen in a full boot. Safe Boot / Mode won't cause it to take place. In fact its been running beside me in safe boot for the last 24hrs with out any restart. I've also run disk and hardware tests across it while in safe boot with no issues being found.

My conclusion is that in safe mode a hardware or kernal driver isnt being loaded that is causing it to restart. Suspect a hardware driver of some kind, hence asking what I can do to systematically stop certain components from loading during boot.
 

chscag

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My conclusion is that in safe mode a hardware or kernal driver isnt being loaded that is causing it to restart. Suspect a hardware driver of some kind, hence asking what I can do to systematically stop certain components from loading during boot.

Why don't you download the free EtreCheck app, run it in normal mode (not safe mode), and copy/paste what it reports here for us to look over. That will give us some idea of what you're running and what kexts are being loaded for which apps.

I suspect the sudden restarts are actually kernel panics.
 

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I've told you my experience from the past 30+ years. Those are the only two things that I've ever seen be the cause of random restarts.

It's certainly possible that random restarts could be due to a third thing. What third thing, in your experience, might be causing random restarts? Feel free to add your experience to the discussion.

Randy, you are in a different knowledge and experience league from me. My request for your comments was an honest and sincere attempt for clarification as to why the OP's Mac runs without a hitch in Safe Mode; even over an extended period?

And in doing so, asking you to delve into your considerable experience with any further suggestions. I do hope that you appreciate that there was no attempt at insult or challenge to your authority on the matter. Quite the reverse.

Ian
 
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Why don't you download the free EtreCheck app, run it in normal mode (not safe mode), and copy/paste what it reports here for us to look over. That will give us some idea of what you're running and what kexts are being loaded for which apps.

I suspect the sudden restarts are actually kernel panics.

I have attempted to run etrecheck while the system is running normally. Unfortunately every attempt made the mini restarts in the middle.

Is there anyway to get further logging on a kernal panic? The normal console logging that Ive checked shows some disk errors a couple of minutes prior. Ive ruled this out for now as I ran a disk checker while it is in safe boot and doesnt find or cause a problem.
 

chscag

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It appears that this is going to be a lot more difficult to find if you can't keep the Mini up long enough to use Etrecheck. Let's try running Etrecheck in safe mode to see what it says. The difficulty about trying to find wayward kexts in Safe Mode is that only what is required to run the machine is allowed to be loaded when in Safe Mode. All third party kexts and startup apps or drivers are suppressed.

If all else fails, you're going to need to carefully examine all your apps and startup items to see what's causing the panics. Make sure you're not running any kind of clean up app such as "Clean My Mac", MacKeeper, or any virus checkers or any app that interferes with the system.

One of the problems in tracking down this sort of thing is that drivers can be loaded from obscure places. It all depends on the app. You may wind up having to do a clean install of your macOS and then, one by one, load your apps until you find which one or which driver is causing the panics.
 
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Let's assume that the problem is an extension since your Mac runs fine in Safe Mode.

Here's the thing...if the problem is an extension, it's almost certainly a third party extension. Apple's software and hardware are made for each other and extensively tested, so you should never have a problem with an Apple extension.

The first thing that I'd try is disabling all of your Login items.
System Preferences --> Accounts --> Login Items
System Preferences --> Users and Groups --> Login Items
(Path depends on version of macOS you are running)
Restart your Mac and see if the problem is gone.

If that doesn't fix the problem, the logical, and probably the easiest course would be to do a clean install of the macOS and hold off on migrating your third party software over from your backup drive.
Upgrading To The Very Latest Macintosh Operating System
See if things are better running with just a clean install of the macOS. If things are better, migrate your third party software over just a few bits at a time. Restart each time and see if everything is okay. Migrate applications over first, things that install low level components last. When the problem re-appears, you will have isolated it.
 
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I think it may be worth running Etrecheck in Safe Mode. I'm wondering if the problem is heat-related. Safe Mode, by using simple setup, doesn't pound on the CPU like normal mode but Etrecheck may be enough to trigger any heat issue. If Etrecheck can't finish in Safe Mode, but triggers a panic, we will have eliminated the kexts and add ons of a normal boot. I think that may be a better first step than doing a full reinstall and then having to install everything only to find out it still panics. if Etrecheck runs to completion in Safe Mode, we haven't eliminated heat, but it does become a slightly lower value suspect.
 
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The normal console logging that Ive checked shows some disk errors a couple of minutes prior. Ive ruled this out for now as I ran a disk checker while it is in safe boot and doesnt find or cause a problem.


Have you tried running Disk Utility.app and do any fixes or repairs?





- Patrick
======
 
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Can you boot to Recovery, and run Disk Utility > First Aid from there?
 
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Can you boot to Recovery, and run Disk Utility > First Aid from there?


Thanks Bob, I should have added that method, at least as an option. DU seems to be able to fix things better running it that way sometimes it seems.





- Patrick
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Raz0rEdge

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Once the restart happens, do you get a message saying something like "Your machine was unexpectedly restarted" or something? Can you check the Console app for any .panic or .crash files which could lead to a program as opposed to a system level issue?
 
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Thanks everyone.

Let me cover off a few things that I've already done that will save some time for everyone. Some of these I've already mentioned:

1. The issue first started in High Sierra
2. I cleared all logins then and any new app that was recently installed (Kodi and a remote keyboard app)
3. Completed a fresh install down to El Capitan. Nothing else was installed. Just the OS
4. Run Disk Utility / Checker multiple times with no errors found
5. Run Etrecheck from Safe Boot - no errors reported
6. Attempt to run Etrecheck in normal mode - restarts part way through.
7. Thought it was a possible heating issue as well so installed a Temp Monitor / Controller. Ran fan at half speed and full speed, both in safe boot and normal mode. No difference. Normal mode the fan speed being on full would cause it to restart sooner

To add:

- Never reports a failed restart on boot
- Never reports a failure in the console messages
- If a restart take places multiple times (after it auto boots up) it will hang on grey screen and fan will run at full speed

I'm half tempted to install Linux on it and see if it does the same thing.
 
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You seem to have neglected to run:

Apple Diagnostics
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202731

- If a restart take places multiple times (after it auto boots up) it will hang on grey screen and fan will run at full speed

In my experience a grey screen on startup just about always indicates a hardware problem. Though it might be hard to pin down. Most often it is caused by bad RAM, or a failing external hard drive, or an external peripheral (of any kind, even a keyboard or USB hub) that your Mac doesn't get along with.

Detach all peripherals, including mouse and/or keyboard if they are non-Apple (and replace with Apple supplied ones), restart, and see if that helps.

You can test your Mac's RAM with:

Rember (free)
Rember | Kelley Computing

If you have third party RAM installed, I'd consider uninstalling it, replacing all the Apple-supplied RAM, and seeing if that makes a difference.
 
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I ran the Apple Hardware Test (this is a Pre-2013 Mac). It found no issues.

Agree that it is a hardware fault. What I'm attempting to do is determine what that hardware fault is during a normal boot. Remember the machine runs fine in Safe Boot.

I have two memory sticks installed. I've removed each and tested individually. Neither cause the fault or show any errors during tests.

This isnt a keyboard, mouse or external hard drive issue. The issue happens even when all peripherals are disconnected and only in Normal boot mode.

What I need to find out is how I can progressively disable the startup of devices to determine what the hardware fault is.
 
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Agree that it is a hardware fault. What I'm attempting to do is determine what that hardware fault is during a normal boot. Remember the machine runs fine in Safe Boot.


It sure sounds like software problem to me, especially when everything works well in safe boot mode.

As you say, the problem is finding out what is the cause???

We need something like the old OS System Conflict Catcher that doesn't have any conflicts of its own.

There must be something in the Console logs that could give some sort of indication as to the cause.

Sorry I can't be of more help.






- Patrick
======
 

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