Insomnia: venting frustration

OK, I'm not looking for help here, just wanting to vent a bit of frustration.

Why the hell is it that no matter how certain I am that I have 'cured' my iBooks insomnia than it crops up again? It seems to bear no relation to, well, anything. You can narrow it down to one application, and confirm that it is that application at fault by starting it on its own (insomnia), running a dozen apps but *not* that app (sleeps), then starting that app as well as those dozen other apps (insomnia).

So I'm totally sure I've cured it, and it sleeps normally for a couple of days. Then one day I'll go into the spare room while getting ready and see that the sleep light isn't on.

What the hell is happening? Argh, argh, argh.

Oh, just for the hell of it, here's the diary I've been keeping just so I know I'm not misremembering things. I think most of it is self-explanatory. an arrow (<---) is just notation for me meaning "this is as far as I know works". D: means Dashboard.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

11/3/06 21:00
Installed virgin copy of OSX, including most bundled applications, onto both magicbox disk and lasthope (one is a clone of the other) Booted from lasthope (on firewire). Set energy saver to one minute, on mains and battery. Run tests on mains

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book <--
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal <--
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal <--
Garageband
[fail]

Garageband
[fail]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
iPhoto
[fail]

iPhoto
[fail]

12/3/06 17:42
Booted from magicbox disk (internal). Set energy saver to one minute, on mains and battery. Run tests on mains.

(nothing)
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book <--
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
iPhoto
[fail]

iPhoto
[fail]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
Garageband
[fail]

Garageband
[fail]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD <--
iMovie
Mail
[fail]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie <--
[pass]

Mail (airport off)
[pass]

Mail (airport on)
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
Audio Hijack
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
Audio Hijack
MacSOUP (empty)
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
Audio Hijack
MacSOUP (with data)
[pass]

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
Audio Hijack
MacSOUP (with data)
Omniweb
[pass]

Remove trackpad and try again....

TextEdit
iTunes
Safari
Address Book
iCal
Quicktime
iDVD
iMovie
Mail
Audio Hijack
MacSOUP (with data)
Omniweb
[pass]

Garageband
[fail]

iPhoto
[fail]

Now try with real machine. Turn off all login items, run on mains. Then turn on login items one by one.

Login items were:
-Quicksilver
-Internet Reminder
-Stickies
-ts4engine
-Quicksilver (again?)
-iTunesHelper
-USBOverdrive
-Application Wizard
-Audio Hijack Pro
-TrashTimer
-Missing Sync Monitor

(nothing running)
[pass]

Stickies
Mail
MacSOUP
Quicken
iTunes
iPhoto
Activity Monitor
TextEdit
[pass]

Stickies
Mail
MacSOUP
Quicken
iTunes
iPhoto
Activity Monitor
TextEdit
OmniWeb
[pass]

Stickies
Mail
MacSOUP
Quicken
iTunes
iPhoto
Activity Monitor
TextEdit
OmniWeb
Quicksilver
[pass]

Stickies
Mail
MacSOUP
Quicken
iTunes
iPhoto
Activity Monitor
TextEdit
OmniWeb
Quicksilver
Audio Hijack
[pass]

--restart--

TextEdit
USB Overdrive
Quicksilver
[2146]

------------------------------

20/3/06 Started again
I recently reinstalled Palm Desktop - wild goose?

Insomnia whilst following are running
(* indicates startup item, [] indicates headless - from Activity Monitor)

ON MAINS - BATTERY NOT TESTED
(reset power saving for battery before testing)

Finder
OmniWeb
Mail
MacSOUP
Terminal
iTunes
Activity Monitor
TextEdit
[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
* [USBOverDriveHelper] - in login items twice, for some reason [UniversalAccessApp]
* [Transport Monitor]
[AppleSpell]
[tcsh]
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
* Quicksilver
* Palm Desktop Background

All login items removed.
Tested with above to confirm it doesn't sleep
[fail]

Quit Palm Desktop, Quicksilver, iTunes, Terminal leaving:

[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
Finder
* [USBOverDriveHelper]
[UniversalAccessApp]
* [Transport Monitor]
MacSOUP
OmniWeb
Mail
[AppleSpell]
Activity Monitor
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
TextEdit
[fail]

Quit Transport Monitor (and ensure turned off in Hotsync), leaving:

[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
Finder
* [USBOverDriveHelper]
[UniversalAccessApp]
MacSOUP
OmniWeb
Mail
[AppleSpell]
Activity Monitor
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
TextEdit
[fail]

Quit USBOverDriveHelper, Activity Monitor, MacSOUP leaving:

[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
Finder
[UniversalAccessApp]
OmniWeb
Mail
[AppleSpell]
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
TextEdit
[fail]

Quit OmniWeb

[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
Finder
[UniversalAccessApp]
Mail
[AppleSpell]
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
TextEdit
[pass]

Restart OmniWeb

[ATSServer]
[loginwindow]
[pbs]
[Dock]
[SystemUIServer]
Finder
[UniversalAccessApp]
Mail
[AppleSpell]
D:LevelWidget
D:Dictionary
D:Calculator
D:Unit Converter
D:Weather
D:World CLock
D:Calendar
TextEdit
[fail]

Quit OmniWeb, again
[pass]

Restart Omniweb, put everything into 'temp' workspace
(and restart, then quit MacSOUP, but it won't be that) [pass]

Open temp workspace in OmniWeb and close MP3
[pass]

Shift all back to main workspace.
[2108]

28th March
Not sleeping again.
Quit stuff until it did - last thing I quit was all the dashboard widgets - world clock was taking 80% CPU. Start unplugged....

Now it's sleeping, start applications one by one;

Omniweb + TextEdit: [pass]
Mail [fail]

WTF? Hold on, Mail has crashed. It's beachballing to hell. Leave Mail to recover, start MacSOUP. Plug iBook in.
Gave up - force quit Mail. [pass]

Restart Mail [pass]

Leave it for now...

30th March - first thing
It's not fricking sleeping again.

---------------------------------------------------------------------