eliminating the rainbow spinning ball

mildred36gallup Said:

"I can not figure out how to go to get to the activity monitor.[...]"

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Use Spotlight Search: Use Spotlight on your Mac - Apple Support

1. Hold Down: Command
2. Press: Spacebar
3. Type: activity monitor
4. Select: Activity Monitor.app

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Screenshot of Activity Monitor Revealed in Spotlight Search:

This is like asking why there’s a car horn sounding out in the street. Lots of reasons are possible for that noise.

The “system wait cursor” or beachball or rainbow spinning ball means that your Mac is doing something else, and is only slowly responding to user input.

That something else could be a busy Mac.

Too many apps running, too little memory, too much storage I/O, all sorts of possibilities exist.

Could be some add-on app that’s malfunctioning.

Add-on anti-malware apps and add-on cleaner apps and such are notorious for causing problems.

Could be a failing hard disk drive too, or some other hardware problem.

Lots of possibilities for that car horn honking, or that beachball cursor.

Now, do you have complete and current backups?

On the off chance this is failing hardware, you will absolutely want to have those backups.

Once you have those backups, you can then either investigate yourself using Activity Monitor and other tools...

Or you can download and run and post the output of EtreCheck here. To post that data, run EtreCheck and copy the data to the clipboard, then open a new reply here, and within that reply then press the button that looks like a printed page, and you’ll then get a text input box that’s big enough to paste the entire hardware and software configuration report into the forum here.

Somebody here can then look at the report for some of the usual causes, whether overloaded hardware, failing hardware, add-on apps, or whatnot.

Activity Monitor is in a folder in your Applications folder in Finder.

Applications > Utilities > Activity Monitor.app

You can open that folder and double-click on the Activity Monitor.app to launch it.

Yes, Spotlight can also be used to get to and launch Activity Monitor.app, and as was mentioned in another reply. I probably wouldn’t go with Spotlight as a first approach for this case, though some folks do use that heavily for launching the apps that they use. Spotlight is more powerful than many folks might initially realize.

Given your level of familiarity with macOS, using Activity Monitor.app might prove a little more complex or more confusing. Accordingly... Please post the EtreCheck report, as we can review that. The generated report intentionally omits or obscures the sorts of data that can be used to identify the user; it’s intended to be posted here.

Yes, Apple Support and a local Apple Store can potentially also help here, and various Apple Stores do offer classes and overview sessions. The Apple Today web site has a listing of what’s scheduled and available in your area.

Depending on which apps you’re using with and need on your macOS system, an iPad may also be an option. Many macOS apps have alternative versions available on iPad and iPadOS. Though I’ve been using a Mac for many years, an iPad is a very capable and very handy device to have, and I too use an iPad heavily. The folks at the Apple Store can show you the available iPad models, if you’re interested.

mildred36gallup Said:

"eliminating the rainbow spinning ball: I AM ASKING FOR HOW TO GET RID OF A SPINNING RAINBOW COLORED BALL WHICH IS SPINNING ON MY COMPUTER WHEN I AM TRYING TO USE IT."

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Force Quit Non-Responding Items Manually:

If an item is not responding, and you are stuck with the spinning rainbow-colored ball, then you need to escape out of that item, then force quit it manually:

So...

First, Exit Out of the Item:

1. Press: [command + tab] to exit
2. Select: Finder icon (Smiley Face)

Then...

Force Quit the Item that is Not Responding:

1. Go To: Apple Menu
2. Select: Force Quit...
3. Select: the item
4. Click: Force Quit button

The "wait cursor" appears when your Mac is doing something time-consuming. To determine what it might be use Activity Monitor.

Activity Monitor User Guide for Mac - Apple Support

Please don't post in all CAPS. It's hard to read and is considered shouting in forums.