Finder is painfully Slow

Oh, CMM claims another victim. First, there is no reason to ever install or run any 3rd party "cleaning", "optimizing", "speed-up", anti-virus, VPN or security apps on your Mac.  This documents describe what you need to know and do in order to protect your Mac: Effective defenses against malware and other threats - Apple Community and Recognize and avoid phishing messages, phony support calls, and other scams - Apple Support.  

There are no known viruses, i.e. self propagating, for Macs.  There are, however, adware and malware which require the user to install although unwittingly most of the time thru sneaky links, etc.   

Anti Virus developers try to group all types as viruses into their ad campaigns of fear.  They do a poor job of the detecting and isolating the adware and malware.  Since there are no viruses these apps use up a lot of system resources searching for what is non-existent and adversely affect system and app performance.

There is one app, Malwarebytes, which was developed by a long time contributor to these forums and a highly respected member of the computer security community, that is designed solely to seek out adware and known malware and remove it.  The free version is more than adequate for most users.  

So uninstall CMM and ClamXAV according to the developer's instructions. You can check to see if you've removed all of the supporting files by downloading and running the shareware app Find Any File to search for any files with the application's or the developer's name in the file name.  For the mentioned software you'd do the following search(es): 

1 - Name contains cleanmymac

2 - Name contains macpaw

3 - Name contains clamx

Any files that are found can be dragged from the search results window to the Desktop or Trash bin in the Dock for deletion.

FAF can search areas that Spotlight can't like invisible folders, system folders and packages.  

If you get warnings that the file can't be deleted because it is in use or used by another app boot into Safe Mode according to How to use safe mode on your Mac and delete from there.

Note:  if you have a wireless keyboard with rechargeable batteries connect it with its charging cable before booting into Safe Mode.  This makes it act as a wired keyboard as will assure a successful boot into Safe Mode.

Terry Q Brinkworth wrote:

<Etrecheck Report as suggested.log>

Report as suggested

You have so much garbage installed I would Erase all content and settings then create a new user (don't use same name you will migrate, later).

See if it works correctly. If it doesn't, call AppleCare. You are still under warranty.

If it does work correctly, it was one or many of the unneeded "maintenance" programs you installed.

You have other system modifications installed which could also cause problems.

It also could just be using the external SSD as a startup drive. It will never be as fast as the internal drive.

Have you installed and run any "cleaning", "optimizing", "speed-up", anti-virus or VPN apps on your Mac?

Download and run Etrecheck. Be sure to give it Full Disk access before running.

Copy and paste the results into your reply. Etrecheck is a diagnostic tool that was developed by one of the most respected users here in the ASC and recommended by Apple Support  to provide a snapshot of the system and help identify the more obvious culprits that can adversely affect a Mac's performance.

Copy the report

and use the Additional Text button to paste the report in your reply.

Then we can evaluate the report to see if we can determine the cause of the problem.

Try deleting the Finder preference File.

In Finder, press Command-Shift-G and paste this

~/Library/Preferences/

Delete: com.apple.finder.plist

Drag the file to the trash, then force-quit the Finder, or log out and back in.

Force Quit: Click Apple logo in upper left menu or key ‘option + command + esc’

Terry Q Brinkworth wrote:

Does this apply to ALL such programs?

I also use Cocktail, Clean my drive and Onyx.

One needs such programs I thought to do things like clearing caches (as below)

cheers,

TerryB

None of those are necessary. Some of the single tools in OnyX can be useful, but never any of the automated stuff.

Your Mac doesn't need any maintenance.

You need to remove both those apps ASAP. Neither work without multiple problems to your macOS. Check their websites for instructions or uninstaller to remove them. Don't just delete the apps.

clean cache