Mac Pro wont wake from sleep
 

Its a 2008 dual 3.0 ghz model. I'm running Snow Leopard and Final Cut 7. This was never a problem before. I have had the computer for almost a year. I didn't notice it when I switched to Snow Leopard a few months ago either. Just randomly stated happening. It will wake from sleep if I only let it sleep for 5-30 minutes. Its long overnight or all day sleeps that it will not wake from. Ive reset the PRAM and the SMC. Ive ran disk utility from my apps and from the Snow Leopard disk. Software update says that my system is running all the current updates. Apple support just suggest the Pram/SMC reset and said I would probably have to do a clean install or take it into a mac store. Anyone have a solid grasp on this issue. There seems to be bits a pieces of info scattered around the internet but nothing that has helped me so far.

First, if you're leaving your system in an unattended state for such long periods you'd be much better off completely shutting down. The days of "too much wear and tear" on a system's HDD's or power supply for rebooting are long gone and these days it's all about being "green" and power-responsible. You're burning up hundreds of watts of power needlessly overnight in sleep.

To your issue at hand: You don't need to "clean" install Snow Leopard ever, unless your applications have themselves become corrupted. Follow my thread about "Self Healing Snow Leopard" on how to fix your OS without spending all day reinstalling your apps and stuff.

But chances are a software refresh won't take care of the problem. Both the G5's and Mac Pro's have had intermittent issues with the main-board power controllers where they ignore the power-on commands from sleep in which case the mainboard itself has to be replaced. That's for the Genius Bar to take care of which is covered by the warranty.

I had an uncle who went the same way.

What do you have attached to the computer besides the keyboard, mouse & monitor?

I have a firewire 800 LaCie external 320 gb HD and some speakers (in addition to the above mentioned items). I bought the computer from B&H about a year ago so I dont think a visit to the genius bar will be covered under warranty. I can probably live without putting it to sleep for a while. Its just frustrating because the computer really didnt see any heavy use. Ive only done 3-4 medium sized edit jobs on it. Im still running the factory ram and internal HD only.

Are the speakers by USB or analog? If they are USB this could be a part of the problem. Also your external hard drive might be interfering with wake up. Do an experiment with the hard drive disconnected from the computer. If it still has a problem, you might be experiencing a problem on the motherboard.

Be grateful that your Mac Pro _can_ sleep. My machine has an Apple RAID card so that I can use a 15K SAS drive as the system disk & has never been able to sleep either spontaneously after inactivity or by selecting Sleep from the menu. What Apple don't tell you when you order the system is that with a RAID card installed the system will never sleep. There is some small print on the Apple web site about the RAID card not being Energy Star certified but that's it. This behaviour is acknowledged by Apple but not seen as a fault & cannot be fixed.

The speakers are analog. I tried messing with the external drive to see if it was interfering with the wake issue and it didn't help. I recently had been running the computer without the external hooked up via Firewire. I noticed the sleep issue soon after. I scheduled an apt. a the Mac store but decided to try a few things the night before the apt. Now it seems to be waking just fine from long sleep periods (overnight). I ran a few diagnostic and repair programs and messed with the sleep settings and its working ok for now. I canceled my visit to the genius bar. Im a bit worried because my warranty is up on the 31st of December. Hopefully there will be some consideration if it acts up soon after that because I have a case number from the Apple online help/support dated before the warranty expires.

Ryan,

3 Things:

1. You're not doing your system or your energy bill any favors by leaving the system in sleep overnight. It's not only a waste of energy but you're also shortening the lifespan of your mainboard by keeping it "hot" with current running through it all the time, which it has to in order to be able to wake from sleep. Shut your system completely off at night; your mainboard and your electric bill will benefit greatly.

2. I strongly suggest you purchase an extended warranty before it expires. Let's say for example that you had to replace that mainboard in another year or so; the cost of that single part would eclipse the cost of the warranty by a factor of 2x easily.

3. Look into getting a Pro Care membership from your local Apple Store. It's a huge benefit in putting you ahead in the wait cue and, if parts are required for your system you get free overnight shipping (assuming parts are available in the CA warehouse). That too can pay for itself in just one visit; without the Pro Care membership you could wait weeks for a system to get back to you whereas often with Pro Care it's usually less than 72 hours (unless the techs have to spend tons of time troubleshooting a unique problem).

This issue that I have seen is nearly always a logic board issue, although Apple will tell you it may be external devices. I had an issue where my tower wouldn't wake from sleep, but I could repeat the issue. It actually went to sleep, you heard the normal click, then the fans would kick up like an airplane taking off and you couldn't do anything. I had to force power off. Strange thing is 2 times in the Apple store they couldn't repeat it. I finally got a tech to hear over the phone and HE put the order to replace the logic board without inspection.

Get the Applecare. It's worth it.

Now my tower is running great. I also erase/install a few times a year. Sometimes updates/permissions/application installs do a number on your drive. I also shampoo my carpets from time to time. But that isn't related to the computer. Haha.