I have a weird problem...my Mac keeps crashing! I don't mean beachballing, I mean crashing. Every so often, it will freeze up and cease responding to keystrokes or mouse clicks. (Right now, I can't even *move* the mouse.)

Any ideas, other than restarting it with the power button? The usual force-quit keystrokes aren't doing me any good.

(Obviously, the solution to the crashing problem in general is to not run all of my video editing/encoding applications at once, but right now I just need to get it responsive again.)

You could try logging in remotely from a command-line, but if you don't already have remote access enabled, it's too late.

If you upgrade to Firefox 2.0.0.1 and your menus start acting funny, not working all the time when you use your mouse to select a menu, then revert back to the default Firefox theme.

This happened to me. The person who developed the theme I've been using updated it today, so now the menus work, but the fix doesn't appear to be a particularly elegant one (i.e., the menus are now kinda funny looking).

Jessica - what kind of Mac?

Does this only happen when you're maxing out the CPU? The only thing I can think of is if you have a Mac that changes CPU speed depending on load (isn't that all of them now?) and if the cooling fan isn't working, it might be overheating during times of heavy use.

It's an almost-new Intel MacPro, and yes, it seems to only happen when I'm running a million different programs at once. I wonder if it could be the fan...

I think the MacPros have about six cooling fans.

Can you monitor CPU temp? iPulse [link] can do that (at least on my MacBook). Then if we can figure out what the max temp should be, we can see if you go over that.

eta: Also, when you're running the gazillion programs at once, are they using the CPU a lot? If not, then maybe you have bad memory and it's only a problem when the memory is maxed out, or nearly so.

Most likely a fan, but it could also be memory.

You can run this and see what's going on in your system.

There's also this utility which can adjust how hot a system gets before the fans come on, but I don't know if it works on the MacPro or not.

This is scary

And like a lot of scary things, not true.

Any unsecured WiFi network (one that doesn't require a password) is open to snooping by anyone on the network. They don't have to be acting as the access point.

However, if you access a site using ssl (https), the contents of your browsing will be encrypted so that eavesdroppers will be frustrated.

This page has some better advice about dealing with public hot-spots.

And like a lot of scary things, not true.

The first point in your link describes the same thing that Tommyrot is describing. I don't think that you ever manage to make a secure connection via these sites. They just collect whatever they can while you get frustrated attempting to make a connection.

1. Make sure you're connected to a legitimate access point! This first step is probably the least obvious, but one of the most important. Rogue access points in public areas have been springing up that have the same SSID as what you'd expect (such as "Wayport" or "tmobile"), but really connect directly to hijackers' databases to collect the passwords and usernames you use to sign in. Even worse, they can collect credit card data from people who sign up for new accounts.

The first point in your link describes the same thing that Tommyrot is describing.

Not exactly. The article Tommy linked to claimed that the fake *free* access points were a hazard. They aren't, at least no more so than any unsecured wireless network.

The first article in my link talks about not putting your T-Mobile HotSpot password into a fake access point or using one to sign up for service.