I want to start off by saying that I have a 2014 Mac mini that's currently running on High Sierra. Yeah, I know, I'm out of date. A few nights ago I put my Mac on sleep mode and the next morning I noticed that the white Mac indicator light wasn't flashing as usual and pressing any key did not start it up as usual. It was off like it was shut down. I pressed the power button and when the loading screen showed up, it did not have the usual Apple logo with a solid loading bar. Instead it had a bunch of individual vertical ovals below the Apple logo. It seems as though my Mac was shut down but I don't remember clicking on the shut down option. My TextEdit was still opened as was my VLC player. Normally when I turn off the computer or restart it with those two apps still opened my VLC player will clear out the current playlist and my TextEdit window will lower slightly from its original placement that I had it in. Neither of that happened. I also use a Compaq keyboard with my Mac and they normally don't sync up when I turn the computer on, I always have to unplug and replug. However, this time the mouse was affected as well. As far as I know there wasn't an electrical outage overnight. The next night sleep mode worked fine and there was no shut down. Now on the third night it happened again with the same unusual loading screen. And once again my keyboard disconnected and my mouse was frozen for a few minutes. I do not have energy saving mode turned on for my Mac. And a recent development, I am unable to log out of my Mac. Clicking on log out twice and nothing happens. Even did the countdown to log out automatically twice. Nothing happens. However, opening Firefox gives me a message that the log out process has been interrupted. Can't even get the chance to do any potential troubleshooting tomorrow since I have to go to work. Last night the shutdown during sleep mode happened again. First Aid showed zero problems with my Mac. I don't even know what the Hell is going on with my computer.

a.chan1847 said:

I want to start off by saying that I have a 2018 Mac mini that's currently running on High Sierra.

I don’t think that’s even possible. The 2018 Mac mini shipped with macOS Mojave. Unless you did some sort of hack that I’m not aware of. Maybe you have a 2014 Mac mini?


I know there’s a way to check system logs for shutdowns, but I can’t think of it now and I’m out of the house away from my Mac

russell_314 said:

I don’t think that’s even possible. The 2018 Mac mini shipped with macOS Mojave. Unless you did some sort of hack that I’m not aware of. Maybe you have a 2014 Mac mini?


I know there’s a way to check system logs for shutdowns, but I can’t think of it now and I’m out of the house away from my Mac

Yeah, I just checked, it's a late 2014. I was thinking of the date that I bought it. So I did a Google to search for the system logs for my last shutdown and said that I can access it via terminal. I did so and it said that my last shutdown was on Thursday. Friday was when I started having the weird sleep mode issues. Neither the Friday or the one last night was logged.

Fishrrman "simple-minded™" solutions:
- get into the habit of shutting it off each night, and rebooting in the morning. The Mini may run better coming off "a fresh start".
- if it's sleeping, and pressing a key doesn't wake it, try other ways. I suggest a right-click of the mouse (control-left click is the same), or, reach around and quickly press AND RELEASE the mouse button (and THEN try a key on the keyboard).

Fishrrman said:

Fishrrman "simple-minded™" solutions:
- get into the habit of shutting it off each night, and rebooting in the morning. The Mini may run better coming off "a fresh start".
- if it's sleeping, and pressing a key doesn't wake it, try other ways. I suggest a right-click of the mouse (control-left click is the same), or, reach around and quickly press AND RELEASE the mouse button (and THEN try a key on the keyboard).

- I was told otherwise by an Apple employee. I had a different problem with my 2011 Mac Mini. I kept shutting it down every night and eventually after several years it stopped shutting down normally. It would get to the shut down screen and hang there with that spinning logo. It would never shut down unless I use the power button. Eventually it started having problems where it periodically kept restarting itself ranging anywhere between a few minutes and a few hours. I took that Mac to an Apple store and they did not find any problems with my Mac whatsoever and I was told not to shut it down every night and only to do so when problems start arising. The current Mac I have now, the 2014 model, a few years back it had start up problems where the loading bar never fully completed and would hang. It wasn't until I reinstalled Mac OS did it go back to normal.
- That's the thing, it wasn't sleeping normally. It acted like it shut down with the indicator light being off and disconnecting my keyboard. The mouse acted like it wasn't connecting either. Pressing the power button is what started it back up but it did not do the start up sound and the start up screen was completely different and not something I've seen before. My Mac is now acting up. It's not letting me log out and my preview app is unable to quit. Force quitting my preview app isn't working either.

Is it possibly going into deep sleep/hibernate mode where it powers off the ram and writes its contents to storage? The unusual boot screen may be the one shown as the contents of ram are restored and the machine begins restarting stopped processes. It’s been a while since I’ve had a Mac that does this, but seem to recall that type of behavior when the battery got very low on a sleeping MBP. It could take a while for the system to stabilize as it comes back if you have a lot of ram and/or a spinning hard drive. This mode is pretty much everything but a full reboot.

There are terminal commands to modify when and which sleep modes get activated, but I would go that route as a last resort.

A couple other things to try on machines of that era is to reset the SMC and PRAM. Those resets can often help with some odd behaviors. The is also a button battery that maintains power to the PRAM. It is possible that it may be time to change it on a system that old.

If the odd behavior still exists I would try reinstalling the OS on top of what you have (no need for a clean install). If that doesn’t work, then go with a clean install and manually begin moving your data into place and reinstalling apps.

meson said:

Is it possibly going into deep sleep/hibernate mode where it powers off the ram and writes its contents to storage? The unusual boot screen may be the one shown as the contents of ram are restored and the machine begins restarting stopped processes. It’s been a while since I’ve had a Mac that does this, but seem to recall that type of behavior when the battery got very low on a sleeping MBP. It could take a while for the system to stabilize as it comes back if you have a lot of ram and/or a spinning hard drive. This mode is pretty much everything but a full reboot.

There are terminal commands to modify when and which sleep modes get activated, but I would go that route as a last resort.

A couple other things to try on machines of that era is to reset the SMC and PRAM. Those resets can often help with some odd behaviors. The is also a button battery that maintains power to the PRAM. It is possible that it may be time to change it on a system that old.

If the odd behavior still exists I would try reinstalling the OS on top of what you have (no need for a clean install). If that doesn’t work, then go with a clean install and manually begin moving your data into place and reinstalling apps.

Click to expand...

My Mac has never done that before and I've never had that setting activated. I doubt it's a battery thing either since it's a Mac mini and not a laptop.

I get the feeling that I might have to do a reinstall like last time. I also asked this question about my computer's behavior on reddit and the one person who replied to be suggested that my computer might be getting close to the end of its life and I should do a time machine backup as soon as possible.

Update: Both of my computer's restart and shut down options did not work either and I had to be forced to use the power button on my mini to turn off the computer. I'll be keeping an eye out for any further odd sleep modes.

meson said:

The only thing I understood from that thread was the part about sleeping crashes. Aren't batteries a laptop thing and not a Mac mini thing?

Using batteries to power the whole computer is a laptop thing, but for many years computers used a chip that needs low power to keep certain settings saved. This is the PRAM module. It’s one of those things you never realize is there until you start digging around inside of the computer. They are powered by little button batteries.

You’ll even see them in things like graphing calculators. I replaced the button battery in my TI-85 that has been in service since 1998 this year, an exceptionally long time for one to last. The indication on the calculator being that user settings were not saved, so it would power on in radian mode rather than degree mode. In the past, you would figure out it was dead on a computer because the date would reset, but that gets masked by most machines syncing time with a web server these days. Try setting your date and time to manual mode and restart to see if the date and time come back wrong. If so, you know this is the issue.

From what I understand, those batteries are good for 5-10 years. You are certainly in the window where it is likely to fail.

Newer machines are less likely to have one of these batteries, but they were still part of the 2014 mini.

I linked the ifixit article to my last post to show you where to find it on your model of max mini.

When that battery dies, symptoms include things like keyboard issues, mouse issues, waking from sleep issues, as the Mac Pro thread indicated being forced to power down with the power button. If you do some searches for symptoms of dead PRAM battery, you will find some bizarre side effects, including some you have mentioned.

After reading up more on hibernate mode, that seems to be a laptop only thing. I missed the mark there, but the way your machine was waking up sounded a lot like it at first.

meson said:

Using batteries to power the whole computer is a laptop thing, but for many years computers used a chip that needs low power to keep certain settings saved. This is the PRAM module. It’s one of those things you never realize is there until you start digging around inside of the computer. They are powered by little button batteries.

You’ll even see them in things like graphing calculators. I replaced the button battery in my TI-85 that has been in service since 1998 this year, an exceptionally long time for one to last. The indication on the calculator being that user settings were not saved, so it would power on in radian mode rather than degree mode. In the past, you would figure out it was dead on a computer because the date would reset, but that gets masked by most machines syncing time with a web server these days. Try setting your date and time to manual mode and restart to see if the date and time come back wrong. If so, you know this is the issue.

From what I understand, those batteries are good for 5-10 years. You are certainly in the window where it is likely to fail.

Newer machines are less likely to have one of these batteries, but they were still part of the 2014 mini.

I linked the ifixit article to my last post to show you where to find it on your model of max mini.

When that battery dies, symptoms include things like keyboard issues, mouse issues, waking from sleep issues, as the Mac Pro thread indicated being forced to power down with the power button. If you do some searches for symptoms of dead PRAM battery, you will find some bizarre side effects, including some you have mentioned.

After reading up more on hibernate mode, that seems to be a laptop only thing. I missed the mark there, but the way your machine was waking up sounded a lot like it at first.

Click to expand...

Didn't even see the ifixit article and only saw the forum link to an older thread. I clicked on the ifixit link and that is a lot more than what I can understand. I'm not a tool/handy man and I wouldn't be surprised if I end up screwing up and do something damaging to my Mac. Do Apple stores provide battery replacements?

I've actually never used automatic time for my Mac since I sometimes set my clock a few minutes early so I can get the announcing hour alert so I can turn on the TV before the TV shows that I watch comes on. So I would not be able to test that way.

Thanks for the replies. Now I have a better idea of what might be happening to my Mac. I still have my previous Mac mini that I think was the previous model and now I'm wondering if a dead PRAM battery is what caused it to fail the way that it did. Can't remember if the clock was affected though. Might have been.

No problem. I’m glad I could help a bit. Swapping one of those batteries is not a simple process for sure. You would think they would make them a little more accessible, but I suppose Apple assumed that most people would upgrade the whole machine before that battery failed.

I am sure the Apple Store could replace the battery, as it is something that can be done in-house, but I have no idea what they would charge for it. Stop in and ask if you aren’t comfortable doing it yourself.

meson said:

No problem. I’m glad I could help a bit. Swapping one of those batteries is not a simple process for sure. You would think they would make them a little more accessible, but I suppose Apple assumed that most people would upgrade the whole machine before that battery failed.

I am sure the Apple Store could replace the battery, as it is something that can be done in-house, but I have no idea what they would charge for it. Stop in and ask if you aren’t comfortable doing it yourself.

You've certainly been more helpful than reddit or even the Apple community forums. That one person on reddit just suggested I do a time machine backup without providing much of an explanation of why my Mac was behaving the way that it was. Only explanations were possible powerloss then telling me to use smartctl to determine my Mac's lifespan. Apple communities just had one reply and they told me to use EtreCheck. A quick Google search indicated that it's malware.
I expect most people would rather buy an entire new machine if it failed but I'm not one of them. They're so expensive that I expect at least 10 years of life or more. My 2004 Mac mini that my sister gave me still works although I really only use it as more of a file archive of sorts. Thanks. I'll definitely be asking them the next time I'm at the mall where the Apple store is.

I have another question I want to ask the community here, but I'm not 100% sure if it's really Apple related since it's my Sandisk thumbdrives having issues but my Mac could have affected it in some way.

Feel free to ask about the thumb drives. People here talk about all sorts of things we connect to our Macs and how to troubleshoot them.

Great! Thanks for letting me know!

I have a pretty busy schedule while at work so I'm not sure when in the future I'll be able to get the battery replaced. I am planning on buying an external hard drive that isn't a thumb drive, but what can I expect to happen to my computer with a faulty battery? Will it just be weird systems or will there be more and more damage over time?