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It's been like that for more than 5 days now. I'm assumimg that it is never going to end. Ultimatly, I would like to turn FileVault back on, but there is no way to do it in it's current state. I even did a full reboot and when I go into the filevault settings, it's still the same message, "Decrypting... Estimating time remaining"
Filevault will only encrypt/decrypt while using the power adapter and only while the laptop is booted. The time it takes Filevault also depends on the size & speed of the drive. The process goes quicker when the drive is not being accessed for other reasons so Filevault doesn't have to fight for access to the drive.
If your hard drive is failing, then it may never finish. If your computer has a spinning hard drive then you can use DriveDX to check the drive's health. If DriveDX reports the drive as healthy, then post the DriveDX report here using the "Additional Text" icon which looks like a piece of paper.
I hope you have good verified working backups regardless of the issue.
Filevault will only encrypt/decrypt while using the power adapter and only while the laptop is booted. The time it takes Filevault also depends on the size & speed of the drive. The process goes quicker when the drive is not being accessed for other reasons so Filevault doesn't have to fight for access to the drive.
If your hard drive is failing, then it may never finish. If your computer has a spinning hard drive then you can use DriveDX to check the drive's health. If DriveDX reports the drive as healthy, then post the DriveDX report here using the "Additional Text" icon which looks like a piece of paper.
I hope you have good verified working backups regardless of the issue.
I was having a similar issue on an older MBP last week. Reading that encryption/decryption slows waaaaay down when you aren’t actively using the laptop, I just opened Notes and put a stack of quarters on the slash key so that it kept typing. I’d check in every hour or so, delete the text, and start over to keep it from getting overwhelmed. Time decreased from days to 5 hrs. :)
kr365 wrote:
I was having a similar issue on an older MBP last week. Reading that encryption/decryption slows waaaaay down when you aren’t actively using the laptop, I just opened Notes and put a stack of quarters on the slash key so that it kept typing. I’d check in every hour or so, delete the text, and start over to keep it from getting overwhelmed. Time decreased from days to 5 hrs. :)
The encryption/decryption process is faster when the drive is not being accessed. It sounds like your laptop was going to sleep. I would suggest making sure to uncheck "Put hard drive to sleep when possible" and maybe even temporarily disabling the sleep functionality in the Energy Saver System Preferences. Then re-enable them after Filevault is finished.
Oh I had tried changing all the power settings including unchecking that. I’m not the only one who’s noted the process counter-intuitively goes considerably faster when their laptop is in use. I found multiple other queries/comments about it in the forums. Maybe it’s not true for all machines, but it certainly was for mine. If I left the laptop alone for even just two minutes, the process slowed to a crawl.
Besides, typing a key isn’t likely to require accessing the drive, is it? Just the working memory, I would think.
Last week I turned off FileVault and it said "Decrypting... Estimating time remaining"
