By Graham K. Rogers

After more than a year of good service, as well as a trouble-free month with Yosemite, my 13" Retina display MacBook Pro had several Kernel Panics. I eventually took it to an Apple service center in Bangkok. After a few difficult days with alternative solutions, it was returned: nothing found.

After I had reinstalled the most recent Time Machine backup from the iMac I had used over the weekend, I let it run for a few hours in my office and all seemed OK. However, not long after starting Aperture and changing the tet-based screensaver, I left the office. On my return, I was disturbed to see that the Login screen was shown.

I logged into the Admin account but was not asked to send a crash report to Apple. When I examined Console, no crash was shown. I restarted made some quick checks and went back to work in the user account. I did check Aperture: editing and exporting a few pictures. I quit the application. I also changed the screensaver from the text, "Message" to "Flurry."

One thing that had bothered me when using the iMac as a stand-in for the MacBook Pro (apart from its glacial speed) was that one Time Machine disk stopped working. I was unsure if this was a problem with the cable, the iMac Firewire 800 port, or the disk. It was the iMac.

In bringing the MacBook Pro back up to its former working state, I had backed up with the USB 3 hard disk I keep at the office. At home there are two more disks to try. I connected the disk that had failed to work to the iMac and immediately the icon appeared on the desktop. As before, I was asked if I wanted to "inherit" (I love the term) the backups on the disk, which I agreed to.

I checked the System Preferences > Time Machine panel and saw that the backup was working, but also noted that the other (Thunderbolt) disk had a red marker beside its name: this has not been backed up since 9 December I read.

After running the Mac for a few hours, I connected the disk with the Thunderbolt cable and ran that backup process. Despite being a fairly large backup, this was completed quite soon and with no problems.

So far - now more than 48 hours - there has been no repeat of either the surprise logout or a Kernel Panic, although I am a little on edge still: hoping it won't happen, but thinking it might.

See Also:

• 2 December 2014:Creating an Overdue Yosemite Boot Disk

• 5 December 2014: Kernel Panics Galore: Unwelcome Problems (now apparently cured)

• 8 December 2014: Kernel Panics Galore: Unwelcome Problems (not apparently cured)

• 9 December 2014: Kernel Panics Galore: Unwelcome Problems (preparing for the service center)

• 10 December 2014: Kernel Panics Galore: Unwelcome Problems (sailing into dry dock)

• 11 December 2014: Kernel Panics Galore: Unwelcome Problems (adapting to change and making changes to images) - Resize, Auto Resize and Simple Resize)

• 12 December 2014: Kernel Panics Restore: Macbook Pro Time Machine Backup onto a Spare iMac

• 13 December 2014: Back to the iMac with a Time Machine Backup - A Quart in a Pint Pot

• 15 December 2014: Return of the MacBook Pro - Planning to Restore

• 16 December 2014: Return of the MacBook Pro (2) - Restoring and First Hours

  
  

  Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand where he is also Assistant Dean. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs. He is now continuing that in the Bangkok Post supplement, Life.