Double Shutdown Problem Solved!--Revisited

As usual, personal computers are more complex than I sometimes give them credit for.

I got a lot of mail on this one saying that I was wrong yesterday in fingering FinderPop v1.5.6 as the problem source. Some claimed Surf Express 1.1 was the source citing Connectix's agreement that it causes the problem. Others pointed out that they never had FinderPop v1.5.6 installed yet they had the problem. Another mentioned that disabling Energy Saver (the other half of Tom Brown's duo) solved the problem and yet another mention the problem occurred even with Mac OS 7.6. Finally, one reader mentioned that it was a conflict between Netscape 4.04 and ATR. There seems to be more than one cause of the double shutdown problem.

In my case, I had the problem with only one computer, the newly setup 9600. Disabling FinderPop v1.5.6 ended the double shutdowns for many shutdowns. I reinstalled FinderPop v1.5.6 to determine if the problem was reproducible but the double shutdown problem did not reoccur. The only other thing recently installed was ObjectSupportLib Check but I had removed OSL Check previously to see if it was the culprit and it wasn't--at least not by itself. Subsequently, MacFixIt carried a reader claim that OSL Check caused the problem but not for me, at least not alone. I placed OSL Check in the shutdown folder with FinderPop v1.5.6 enabled and the double shutdown problem returned. Removing both ended the double shutdown problem. Replacing both caused it to return. The 9600 was the only computer with FinderPop v1.5.6 installed. [Updated: While I was confident that this was one combination that caused the problem, after three more shutdowns with OSLCheck and FinderPop disabled, the double shutdown struck again. I'm giving up for now.]