Final Cut Pro version 10.6 extremely slow!!!

UPDATE: Yes, Terry, rolling back to FCPX 10.5.4 is the best advice. After I did that (and luckily my most critical Library had not been updated to 10.6 yet), everything worked as fine as before, even with it running on Monterey 12.0.1. So it looks like the issue is with FCPX 10.6 and not Monterey. But as I said before, it could be a problematic combination with both of those in play at the same time.

Is anyone from Apple Engineering listening in?

Friendly obvious advice: please make sure you backup to Time Machine regularly and before any updates — it's a life saver, especially in reinstalling an earlier version of FCPX. Also, save a copy of your Library in the current FCPX version before updating to a newer version. Once the Library is updated, there's no going back to an earlier version unless you have a backup Library from that version.

Good luck to everyone here in trying to work around this! "Frustrating" hardly begins to describe it.

CleanMyMac has most likely damaged your system. Chrome is consuming resources even when it’s not running. You have multiple third party plugins that probably need to update, which have crashed often, Color Finale to start and others.

i would recommend you do a clean wipe off the system and during OS installation migrate only the users. Reinstall your applications. Do NOT install CleanMyMac or Chrome. Run FCP without plugins installed to see how it performs. Installed updated versions of the plugins.

Find a Mac running Catalina, login with your AppleID you used to purchase FCP. Launch the AppStore, click your name in the bottom left to see your previous purchases. Click on FCP to download. You'll likely get a warning saying that the current version won't run on Catalina but you can download the last version that will, which is 10.5.4. After it's installed, make a zip archive and copy it to your Mac.

OK… here is the simple answer to my problem: For FCP 10.6, Apple recommends a minimum of 4G Video Graphics memory and the 2015 MacPro I have maxes out at 2G. So my 2015 is headed off to the Big Recycling Place in the Sky after my tricked out new 16” MacPro arrives next month. My advice to others in my situation? Bite the bullet and buy more horsepower. It is 2021 and a major tribute to the entire Apple team that I have been able to use FCP for 6 years on the same machine thru numerous app and OS releases! It was a great ride on this old thing! Onto the new!

In addition to what Tom asks, did you reset FCP preferences? Hold option and command when launching FCP and choose Delete Preferences. FCP will open with the default Untitled library. Open the library you were working on, set the prefs back to the way you like them (disable background rendering, etc.) and see if it behaves better.

The problem became bearable after moving the FCPX cache from external SSD (it's a NVME SSD connected by TB, shouldn't be slow) to local SSD (I put cache on external SSD before due to want to save some wear and tear on the local irreplaceable SSD). I will update more after upgrade to 12.1.

https://etrecheck.com It was written by a respected Apple Support Community member here to report the relevant information of your Mac to others user here so we can help you diagnose your issue. Search here and you'll see many posting their Etrecheck report. Typical things it can help identify are disk space issues, old, incompatible software that's been migrated from a previous Mac, whether Chrome has been installed (it can break the ProApps), if a "cleaner" application has been used, etc.

FCP 10.6.1 just released! It fixed all my 10.6 issues.

I'm having this problem, too, and also 10.6 unexpectedly crashing [2020 27" iMac, 128G RAM, 3.6 GHz 10-Core Intel Core i9, AMD Radeon Pro 5700 XT 16 GB, running OS 12.0.1]. Spoke with Apple Support twice yesterday — and please know, I love the Apple Support Staff. But in true stereotypical IT fashion, they want to shift the cause of the issue onto the user, i.e., not doing something right, or problems with AVCHD files and 3rd party plug-ins, etc.

Seems to me that if the previous version of FCPX was working just fine with all those conditions, and yet not when updated to 10.6, then that's a problem with the update (or maybe the interface with Monterey, or a combination of the two). I asked that the issue be kicked upstairs to Engineering for a closer look.

This is indeed frustrating, especially when so many of us are on deadlines. One would think that an update would be rigorously tested and spanked before release, even using 3rd party plug-ins and AVCHD like we do in the real world.

Here's one work-around: turning off Background Rendering in FCPX Preferences stops 10.6 from crashing. You'll have to render manually — Render All in the Modify tab. But unfortunately, that doesn't affect the sluggish, snail-like issues.

And of course, we still have the issue which started with the 10.4.9 update where previously rendered material has to be re-rendered every time you launch FCPX. Why does it lose the link with those pre-existing render files? Another colossal waste of time, especially when the clock is ticking and clients are breathing down your neck. If FCPX wants to compete in the Pro market, then these types of issues have to be addressed and fixed ASAP.

For now, I'll re-install the earlier version of FCPX from Time Machine and use that until 10.6 is re-spanked and ready to go.

Cheers and thanks!

@Currawong - Depending on how much work has been done since the library was updated and therefore how much work you'd have to re-do, you can open a backup of the library (the library database only, no media) that was created prior to the update. By default backups are created every 15 minutes and stored in ~/Movies/Final Cut Backups/

If you get your new computer and install FCP on it without migrating or installing anything else it will just work. As soon as you start to migrate you run risks. Most users don’t do clean install when they upgrade to a new operating system. You won’t have that problem as you’ll get a clean system without Chrome or AVAST or CleanMyMac or a lot of other stuff that just wrecks pro apps systems. We’re seeing people with systems that have kernel extensions from 2015 and launch daemons that are still running doing nothing any more than bogging down system resources.

Etrecheck is free btw.

Try rolling back to FCP 10.5.4 from your backups and wait for FCP 10.6.x. If your problem is due to 10.6 and not Monterey that should get you up and running again.

Just upgraded to 10.6.1 and confirmed the issues have been fixed!!!!

Did you update to the new FCPX 10.6.1? That update resolved all of my issues.

Back to 10.5.4! All working OK again. So nothing to do with OS. The issue is definitely FCP. Stopped auto update.