Common Problems After Installing macOS Sierra & How to Fix Them

by Tom Nelson

It seems every version of Mac operating system that you install may have a few issues that pop up. Now, we’re not saying you can expect to experience all or even any of the issues we outline here. In fact, the vast majority of users upgrading to macOS Sierra won’t have these problems.

But if you do experience an issue after upgrading, it’s probably going to be one of the issues we mention here. Not to worry; we’ll show you how to resolve it.

Screen shot © Coyote Moon, Inc.

macOS Sierra Freezes During Install

There are two common freezing issues; one can occur during the install process, the other when your Mac reboots after the install is complete.

Freezes After Restart: Let’s start with the easier of the two issues to fix: when your Mac seems to stall during the final reboot of the installation. At this point, you’ve selected the target drive for the Sierra install, agreed to the licensing, and your Mac was displaying a progress bar with an estimate for time remaining.

The screen goes black, and your Mac reboots. So far, so good. The next step is for your Mac to finish the restart and display the Setup Assistant, for finishing up any needed details before the login or desktop is displayed. Instead, your Mac seems to be frozen on the dark screen, or perhaps with a wait icon spinning away.

The problem is that your Mac failed to restart correctly, but because all the install guides warn you that the first restart can take a long time, you don’t know how long to wait. To be on the safe side, a half hour is more than long enough, and if your Mac hasn’t brought up the Setup Assistant by then, you can give your Mac a figurative kick in the pants.

Force your Mac to shut down by pressing and holding the power switch. After your Mac shuts off, you can go ahead and power it up again. Your Mac should power on and display the Setup Assistant, letting you finish the installation of macOS Sierra.

Read more on Rocket Yard, The MacSales.com Blog

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Customize Safari Toolbar, Favorites, Tab, and Status Bars

by Tom Nelson

Like many applications, Safari lets you tweak its interface to suit your preferences. You can customize, hide, or show the toolbar, bookmarks bar, or favorites bar (depending on the version of Safari you’re using), tab bar, and status bar. Having each of these Safari interface bars configured to meet your needs can make using the web browser a lot easier, and fun. So go ahead, give the various Safari toolbars a once over.

You can’t hurt anything, and you may find a few new features or capabilities you didn’t know Safari had.

Screen shot © Coyote Moon, Inc.

Customize the Toolbar

1. From the View menu, select Customize Toolbar. Click an item you want to add to the toolbar, and drag it to the toolbar. Safari will automatically adjust the size of the address field and the search field to make room for the new item(s). When you’re finished, click the Done button.
2. Nifty tip within a tip: You can quickly customize the toolbar by right-clicking in any open space in the Safari’s toolbar, and selecting Customize Toolbar from the popup menu.
3. You can rearrange icons in the toolbar by clicking and dragging them to a new location.
4. You can delete an item from the toolbar by right-clicking it and selecting Remove Item from the pop-up menu.

Some of my favorite toolbar items to add include iCloud Tabs, to easily continue browsing sites right where I left off when using other Macs and iOS devices, and Text Size, so I can quickly change the size of text on a page.

Read more on Lifewire: Macs.

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