Comments on: Restart Will Be Required

By: RTNA

RTNA — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 13:01:37 +0000

FALSE YOU CAN RELOAD THE KERNEL WITHOUT HAVING TO REBOOT THE SYSTEM ON SOFTWARE THAT AFFECTS THE KERNEL OR REHASH MEMORY IF THE SOFTWARE REQUIRES CACHE REFRESH. USUALLY USER WORLD APPS ONLY NEED TO UPDATE THEIR OWN CONFIGURATION IN MEMORY OR CACHE TO TAKE AFFECT AND DOES NOT REQUIRE A SYSTEM REBOOT.

By: RTNA

RTNA — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:55:46 +0000

WAY STUPID. I AM OFFICIAL A HATER OF MAC! THEY SHAMED THEIR FRAMEWORK OS (FREEBSD) WITH ALL THE REBOOT ON UPDATES! STUPID APPLE.

By: Bjarte Aune Olsen

Bjarte Aune Olsen — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:20:21 +0000

I have to agree with SGJ here. There is no reason why you need to reboot a system to do system upgrades. What is particularly annoying with the mac is the frequency. I’m using a mac mini as a media center, and use it pretty much every evening, and I have to reboot almost every time I use it. And most of these updates that require me to reboot are just updating Safari or iTunes or other software I don’t even use.

By: SGJ

SGJ — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:34:37 +0000

I agree with reply #31: GNU/Linux systems demonstrate that no reboot is required even for major system updates (even Linux kernel updates can now be performed without rebooting). I use a Mac every day, but I often find myself putting off installing software updates because they require me to quit all of the programs I have open and all of the documents I am working on in order to reboot. It’s better than Windows, maybe, but that’s not saying much.

By: emacs

emacs — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 05:17:23 +0000

No, system updates do not require restarts. Only buggy, misdesigned
systems do. i use Debian GNU/linux and i can update anything i want
without restarts until the hardware itself fails. The only time a
restart is even recommended is when i change to a new kernel. i can
even upgrade to the next version of the operating system with multiple
users logged in, all running applications, without restarting, without
accumulating performance penalties after weeks, months, perhaps even
years. There is /no/ excuse for reboots.

By: cbg » Blog Archive » Restart Will Be Required

cbg » Blog Archive » Restart Will Be Required — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 08:44:44 +0000

[...] covered this last year, but things seem to be getting worse with each day. Is Apple outsourcing software updates [...]

By: Gregory Lloyd

Gregory Lloyd — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:10:58 +0000

I am a software developer that uses a mac pro. It takes me minimum of 20 to 30 minutes to recover from a restart, launching IDEA, vmware, oracle, etc etc. I am sick and tired of the updates requiring a restart. They need to group them together and limit them to once every 3 weeks or so. I just opted to not update safari because it would have required a restart. I cannot fathom why an update to safari should require a restart and I think it is no better than M$ at this point. APPLE – MAKE IT STOP.

By: Kendall Tawes

Kendall Tawes — Tue, 15 May 2007 18:08:36 +0000

If a restart will prevent five restarts in the future I think I can put up with those few restarts. After all Macs do boot much faster than Windows computers anyway and currently it’s certainly better than the old days of extension madness where one might need to restart twelve times before getting the computer to accept new hardware or something.

Though I agree the less reboots the better.

By: Steve Simitzis

Steve Simitzis — Sat, 12 May 2007 08:55:49 +0000

Occasionally restarting for a system update doesn’t bother me, though I don’t see why Apple can’t sort this out. On any of my Linux servers, almost all updates will restart the necessary services on their own without restarting the machine itself (the only exception being kernel updates).

I think it’s a valid complaint. I use my desktop as a web server for clients to see works in progress, and I avoid restarting whenever possible.

By: LC

LC — Fri, 11 May 2007 23:53:50 +0000

For the record, I only have OS X’s own clock, calendar, and 2 weather widgets on my dashboard at all times and sometimes a package tracker.

By: LC

LC — Fri, 11 May 2007 23:45:55 +0000

While I do find occasionally restarting does make my rev. 1 MacBook Pro (2.16 ghz, 2 gb RAM) run better, it seriously takes about 5 minutes and 10% of my battery’s power to restart, sign in, and wait for it to to get up and running. The only apps that I have set to start at login are Quicksilver and iClip, but the real problem seems to be the Dashboard—when I call it up for the first time, I get treated to a spinning beachball for about 2 minutes. I’m guessing this is one of the quirks of a first generation product. I only reboot when absolutely necessary, or when my machine gets sluggish. And I work it into a nice breaking point in a project when it won’t be a big deal to close all apps.

By: sjmills

sjmills — Fri, 11 May 2007 02:51:56 +0000

A reboot once in a while is a good thing. Many users have lots of 3rd party crap installed, and lots of 3rd party software doesn’t get anywhere near the testing that Apple software does. Poorly-written or under-tested software (especially driver/extension/etc stuff) can have memory leaks, overstuffed caches, corrupt other parts of the OS, etc. A reboot makes things clean again. If even Apple software can have obvious memory leaks (Activity Monitor does – fixed in Leopard), it should surprise anyone if 3rd party software has even more.

Do what I do: Go ahead and download and install the updates. In many cases, you can continue working even after the updates have been installed. Then when you break for lunch, a smoke, or you stop working for the day, then reboot. Just be sure to bring Software Update to the foreground when it’s done installing updates to stop the bouncing Dock icon.

By: Ken

Ken — Thu, 10 May 2007 19:45:30 +0000

“but it certainly is disruptive”

@Louis Gray – you are correct it can be disruptive. But you still have a choice. Currently on one of my macs I haven’t updated it because my wife and I are both doing something and we don’t want to restart. So I’ll wait until the weekend to update it. Is that a big deal or a bad thing?

Pick a day or time when you’re not using your system and update then. When you get back it’s all good.

That’s what I do anyway.

By: tony

tony — Tue, 08 May 2007 15:54:02 +0000

I can’t believe you wasted your time writing about a restart. I can’t believe I wasted my time reading it, and I can’t believe I wasted my time commenting on it. I am, in short, awash in disbelief regarding this post. Reality bites.

By: Christian

Christian — Tue, 08 May 2007 14:44:08 +0000

I restart every day! Because i shutdown my mac when i’m done with work to save energy?
I know a mac or linux box can run unattended for months or even years – so why should i care?
The windows xp machine i’m using for work at my customer’s site has to be resetted at least once a week due to network hangs or stuff like that?
Don’t become over anxious about rebooting as long as it is a reboot with an intension! ;-)

By: Jenny

Jenny — Tue, 08 May 2007 04:28:25 +0000

I definately agree with the comments. Restarting once every fews months is nothing compared to having to deal with windows. I have to schedule work breaks around rebooting my office computer about twice a day…windows bah.