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MacBook Pro, Super Slow after Mavericks Install

The Hardware:


Late 2011 Macbook Pro.

2.5Ghz Core i5

320GB used of 500GB HD space.

16GB 1600MHz DDR3


Running OS X 10.9 Mavericks



The Problem:


I installed Mavericks and all of a sudden, beach balls all of the place, with every single click. Transfering files into my external hard drive took 8 hours. Activity Monitor (takes about a million years to open that up), shows no major processes or rougue processes running. My CPU usage is below 3%.



What I've Done Thus Far:


- Safe Boot, Still running the same issue.

- Hardware Tests - All passed

- Reinstalled Mavericks

- Resetting NVRAM / PRAM


Took it to the Apple Store, and got the, re-install Mavericks suggestion.


I'm out of things to do. I find it hard to believe that this computer is failing as it's in mint condition and is only used once or twice a week for a couple of hours, if that.


Any suggestions on what do to?

MacBook Pro (13-inch Late 2011), OS X Mavericks (10.9), 500GB HD, 16GB Ram

Posted on Oct 27, 2013 1:12 AM

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82 replies
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Nov 7, 2013 7:38 AM in response to mikerodriguez

Well I finally called Apple Support (I'm still on the 3-year warranty thing) and what they told me to do seems to have SOLVED it. My 2011 MacBook Pro is now running well. Some things like "Go to Mission Control" are actually running faster and better than before. (It used to sometimes get stuck for about 15 seconds.) Excel and Word seem to open up a little faster than before. There is possibly still something slightly clunky about Apple Mail -- I'm still deciding -- but I think it's okay. So I'm very relieved. Here's what they told me to do:


1. Re-set the NVRAM. This didn't work but it's a good thing to do, apparently. The computer was still painfully slow after I did it.


2. Re-set the System Management Controller (SMC). This also didn't work. No improvement.


3. Shut down, start up in Safe Mode, shut down again, start up in ordinary mode. This also didn't work, computer was still painfully slow, but again it seems like a good thing to do. When you read the info about it, it seems like it re-sets some important stuff.


4. Reinstall Mavericks in a special way, which I will describe. This really worked. Finally! But it was not without pain. The actual download was very slow, despite my having 100Mbs internet. But the installation itself was really slow, it took about 2 1/2 hours. And I had forgotten to turn the energy saving features off so I had to sit there and move the mouse every so often to keep the system from going to sleep. At one point the indicator was telling me it would take 5 hours and 35 minutes. At that point I panicked and called Apple back, but they told me to persevere. After that the indicator gradually changed its mind, and became slightly more reasonable, ie reduced its estimation of how long it would take.


Here are the instructions they referred me to, on the Apple website:

Use the built-in recovery disk to reinstall OS X while keeping your files and user settings intact.

Important: You must be connected to the Internet to reinstall OS X.

  1. Choose Apple menu > Restart. Once your Mac restarts (and the gray screen appears), hold down the Command (⌘) and R keys.
  2. If you’re not connected to the Internet, choose a network from the Wi-Fi menu (in the top-right corner of the screen).
  3. Select Reinstall OS X, then click Continue.
  4. Follow the onscreen instructions. In the pane where you select a disk, select your current OS X disk (in most cases, it’s the only one available).

Here's the link to that page:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ph13871?viewlocale=en_US


I'll put the links to the other procedures below.


Good luck, everyone. I can't tell you how relieved I am and I hope you experience the same relief. My work was totally stopped and now I can work again, thank heavens.


NVRAM and PRAM:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379


Resetting the SMC:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3964


Starting up in Safe Mode:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1455


Reinstall Mavericks

http://support.apple.com/kb/ph13871?viewlocale=en_US




About NVRAM and PRAM

Intel-based Macs: Resetting the System Management Controller (SMC)

Mac OS X: Starting up in Safe Mode

OS X Mavericks: Reinstall OS X

Reply

Nov 9, 2013 9:04 PM in response to clintonfrombirmingham

Here is my information. I am having the same problem with a slow-running Mac after installing 10.9. I see a couple items in red in the results.


Can you help me with things I could try after you review this info? Thanks so much in advance!


Hardware Information:

MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid 2009)

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro5,2

1 2.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU: 2 cores

4 GB RAM


Video Information:

NVIDIA GeForce 9400M - VRAM: 256 MB

NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT - VRAM: 512 MB


Audio Plug-ins:

BluetoothAudioPlugIn: Version: 1.0

AirPlay: Version: 1.9

AppleAVBAudio: Version: 2.0.0

iSightAudio: Version: 7.7.3


Startup Items:

NUMCompatibilityCheck - Path: /Library/StartupItems/NUMCompatibilityCheck

SymDCInit - Path: /Library/StartupItems/SymDCInit

TrackDelete - Path: /Library/StartupItems/TrackDelete

VolumeAssist - Path: /Library/StartupItems/VolumeAssist


System Software:

OS X 10.9 (13A603) - Uptime: 0 days 2:54:36


Disk Information:

TOSHIBA MK5065GSXF disk0 : (500.11 GB)

EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

Macintosh HD (disk0s2) /: 499.25 GB (212.51 GB free)

Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB


HL-DT-ST DVDRW
GS21N


USB Information:

Seagate
Portable 500.11 GB

EFI (disk1s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

Seagate 500GB External (disk1s2) /Volumes/Seagate 500GB External: 499.76 GB (201.8 GB free)


Apple Inc. Built-in iSight


Apple Inc. BRCM2046 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller


Apple, Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad


Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver


FireWire Information:


Thunderbolt Information:


Kernel Extensions:

com.symantec.kext.internetSecurity (1.3.2f5)

com.symantec.kext.pf (4.2.1f7)

com.symantec.kext.ips (3.2f8)

com.symantec.kext.SymAPComm (11.2.2f3)

com.symantec.kext.fw (1.0.3f5)


Problem System Launch Daemons:


Problem System Launch Agents:


Launch Daemons:

[loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.avscandaemon.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.deepsight-extractor.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.diskMountNotify.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.MissedTasks.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.navapd.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.navapdaemonsl.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.Sched502-1.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.sharedsettings.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.symdaemon.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.symSchedDaemon.plist


Launch Agents:

[not loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist

[loaded] com.adobe.AdobeCreativeCloud.plist

[loaded] com.symantec.uiagent.application.plist


User Launch Agents:

[loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist


User Login Items:

System Events

iTunesHelper

PIXMA iP6000D HID Monitor

FaxServer Pro

Yahoo! Widgets

RealPlayer Downloader Agent

YouSendIt Desktop App

AdobeResourceSynchronizer

Canon IJ Network Scanner Selector2

Mac Game Store Helper

SymSecondaryLaunch


3rd Party Preference Panes:

Adobe Version Cue CS2

Flash Player

Flip4Mac WMV

Norton\nQuickMenu


Internet Plug-ins:

AdobeAAMDetect.plugin

CANONiMAGEGATEWAYDL.plugin

CouponPrinter-FireFox.plugin

Default Browser.plugin

EPPEX Plugin.plugin

Flash Player.plugin

FlashPlayer-10.6.plugin

Flip4Mac WMV Plugin.plugin

iPhotoPhotocast.plugin

JavaAppletPlugin.plugin

OfficeLiveBrowserPlugin.plugin

QuickTime Plugin.plugin

RealPlayer Plugin.plugin

Silverlight.plugin

Yahoo! Installer 3.plugin


User Internet Plug-ins:

CitrixOnlineWebDeploymentPlugin.plugin

Move_Media_Player.plugin

Picasa.plugin


Bad Fonts:

None


Time Machine:

Auto backup: YES

Volumes being backed up:

Macintosh HD: Disk size: 499.25 GB Disk used: 286.74 GB

Destinations:

Seagate 500GB External [Local] (Last used)

Total size: 499.76 GB

Total number of backups: 21

Oldest backup: 2013-10-27 08:38:02 +0000

Last backup: 2013-11-10 04:06:30 +0000

Size of backup disk: Too small

Backup size 499.76 GB < (Disk used 286.74 GB X 3)


Top Processes by CPU:

3% WindowServer

1% EtreCheck

1% NortonAutoProtect

1% RealPlayer Downloader Agent

1% Memory Clean

0% firefox

0% Microsoft Word

0% fontd

0% Creative Cloud

0% notifyd


Top Processes by Memory:

594 MB
firefox

184 MB
Mail

131 MB
SymAVScanDaemon

119 MB
mds_stores

102 MB
com.apple.WebKit.WebContent

78 MB WindowServer

49 MB Finder

49 MB NortonAutoProtect

37 MB Microsoft Word

37 MB com.apple.appkit.xpc.openAndSavePanelService


Virtual Memory Statistics:

105 MB
Free RAM

1.11 GB
Active RAM

1.01 GB
Inactive RAM

600 MB
Wired RAM

939 MB
Page-ins

54 MB Page-outs

Reply

Nov 9, 2013 10:39 PM in response to mikerodriguez

When you install Mavericks, Mavericks will optimize your system. Basically its making everything (files, music, pictures, etc.) more friendly with Mavericks. This wont damage any files or corrupt any files. Just let your computer sit for an hour or so (assuming you have a normal hard drive versus a Solid State drive so optimization will take a little longer)

Reply

Nov 11, 2013 5:34 PM in response to Iowa

Hi Iowa! I find your message very helpful, but I did not try to do that because I do not have any external hard drive, today I am going to buy it and try. But here comes the question, if I I will reinstall Mavericks and will do all steps what you described, and AFTER that will upload my back up copy to a new OS, will it bring all the previous system mistakes to a new OS? I ask because my Mac also is running very slow, all these dock apps jumping for like 15 sec, and no free RAM. I have MacBook Pro 15 (early 2011) 4Gb RAM, 2,2 Ghz i7 Quad core. A few hours ago I did a permission repair in the Disc Utility, and now my mac is running a bit faster, this process took about one hour to fix all bugs in permission repair. I have 250 free space on my hard drive, I checked my mac with Norton antivirus, but it seems that there are no viruses, this all happened when I changed my previous Snow Leopard to Mavericks, SL was its first OS from the manufacture. Thank you for reading!

Reply

Nov 11, 2013 6:01 PM in response to evghenii

Hi evghenii,


Yes it's very important to do a full backup first before reinstalling Mavericks.


However I don't think you need to expect that you will need to re-upload your backed-up files back to your Mac hard drive after reinstalling Mavericks. The Mavericks reinstall procedure that the Apple people showed me keeps all your files and settings in place on your Mac hard drive. Once the reinstall procedure is done they are all there on your Mac hard drive ready to use. The Mavericks interface looks just like Mountain Lion.


If it was me I certainly would not try to re-upload backed up files. I would just keep them on my external hard drive in case something bad happened during the Mavericks reinstall.


I assume you're using Time Machine? I use it myself for my external backup hard drive but I don't know anything about re-installing from the back-ups it creates. So far it's a mystery to me, so I can't advise you about that.


Have you thought about getting another 4GB RAM? If you're using your MacBook Pro for multiple applications at the same time, or for graphics-heavy work, 4GB is on the low end these days, or so my techie friends tell me.


Cheers,

Iowa

Reply

Nov 11, 2013 6:17 PM in response to Iowa

Thank you for your respond!!!


I will use Time Machine only for a bad case. Actually, I do not know what to do, I plan to do all the steps that you described. Also I was today at the Apple Store, and checked new Macbook pro, but with i5 processor, and 2.5 Ghz. (mid 2012) it was running prety fast, opening many apps at the same time. So, I could work there really fast, and it also had 4 Gb RAM. But my mac has always like 100 Mb of free RAM, there are some processes like kerne task that always take to much of RAM. There also is Spotlight indecsing, I always switch it off in a System Monitoring, but it still runs itself again. So, I think to do a "big" system restore for my mac, after then put all my files and programs back, see how it works, and then may be if it will work the same way bring it in apple service center. But did you fix all your luggs after reinstalling Mavericks?


Best regards

evghenii

Reply

Nov 11, 2013 7:44 PM in response to Iowa

But how long does it take for you to run for example Windows Microsoft office, or Keynote? And what kind of RAM do you have? I ask because as already said I have 4 GB, but the wired particion is 1 Gb, so for my needs I always have 3 GB, 1,5 is active, 1,2 is inactive, and I always have about 250-300 mb free RAM. And it is really hard to work with it, may be schould I upgrade it to 16 Gb, will my mac be a bit faster, what do you think?!


Best regards!

Reply

Nov 11, 2013 8:54 PM in response to evghenii

Well, as I say, my techie friends all recommend at least 8GB RAM these days. And they all say the more RAM you have the happier you'll be.


250-300 mB free RAM doesn't sound like enough. But I'm no techie.


Office apps are loading nice and fast now.


Cheers.

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MacBook Pro, Super Slow after Mavericks Install

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