There is a new "iMac Graphic FW Update 2.0" here: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1389 released yesterday, but there are no details of which iMacs would benefit, nor whether to check the firmware details first so you know if it's being updated...

I read somewhere that it's the "Early - Mid 2011" iMacs which would be the most recent ones.

A few questions/points:

If it's a new machine, why did you need to update to 10.6.7? It was released two months ago...
I don't trust "Software Update" to update my OS, I use combo updates and have done without a problem.
If you ever get that again and are feeling geeky, you can use another machine to SHH in and use the `top` command to see what is causing the computer to be unresponsive, you can then kill that process....But that is rather geeky

<replied again later>

It was brand new, purchased from Apple store this week, it was running 10.6.6 out of the box, software update suggested 10.6.7 as the first update, so foolishly I agreed to the update. It was first thing I did after connecting it to my network, if only I'd have known...

Only later on a reinstall did I notice the actual DVD installers are 10.6.7. Bizarre. Factory installed HDs I suppose.

Certainly won't touch a update like that again, without using a download / combo version.

It's now hanging again on shutdown, and startup. Great. B* thing, Going to flash the firmware, erase, partition and start from scratch *again*. Gotta love Apple... If that doesn't fix it, it's going back to the store. 7 hours wasted so far, joy oh joy.

Still here, keeping this updated... I think we have a breakthrough And here's the procedure in case if it affects anyone else later on in this forum (it only affects 10.6.7, so if I'd have stuck with the factory install 10.6.6 I'd have been ok) :

1. Boot to DVD, erase HD (actually I've also partitioned it into 100GB for the system and 900GB for Data, but that's not the issue here), reinstall onto freshly formatted HD.

2. Restart.

3. Open software update, found that the iMac EFI Firmware Update 1.6 and iMac Graphics Firmware Update 2.0 were both being offered (they weren't during all the other issues today), downloaded and installed both these from the update dialog.

4. Rebooted, long single chime, then normal chime, then the grey firmware update screen (with progress bar), takes a couple of minutes, then it auto reboots, normal chime and back to OS X.

5. Ran a manual download of the latest Security Update 2011-003, installed and then rebooted, all working fine so far...

6. Tested Shutdown - works perfectly in 5 seconds.

7. Tested Start from power off, 24 seconds from power button to desktop.

Very happy!


Thanks to everyone's advice today, been a tricky and tedious afternoon, hopefully it'll behave itself, will stay up now to install apps!

God, that was painful.
Sorry to hear it, glad you're sorted.

There it is.

I think they were only recently released...



You can always count on me

You might only be offered those updates after you install 10.6.7 then restart - but as that went a bit pear-shaped, it didn't get the chance! Software Update's much more intelligent than it used to be, but sometimes you still need to install one update before you get offered another.

Yes I think that was the issue Steve, catch-22. Everything working perfectly now, but was a right royal pain in the **** last week!
I notice that Software update is much better than before, with a progress indicator of installation etc, I obviously didn't get to see that during the crashes, but seen it since!