I cannot open most apps after and pre Sequoia 15.2 upgrade and a reinstall of the OS too. It's back to being slooooow very much like Sonoma did. It feels like tow years of fighting the Mac, something we always seem to be doing with a PC!
iMac 21.5″, macOS 15.2
Is the user using a iMac 2019 that was previously running Sonoma that was sluggish prior to updating to Sonoma ?
A 2019 iMacs can come with a Fusion Drive or also an ALL SSD Drive configuration
Fusion Drives are good for Additional Storage but at the expense of a negative performs hit especially when running under Sonoma or Sequoia
These versions of macOS are really specifically engineered to run at tip top performance on SSD Drives
Anyways, all this information would show up in the Etrecheck report if you care to run and share this report
Post back the Full Report - copy and paste - >>>> using the Additional Text Icon <<<<
To be fair minded about this
As the Original Contributor made the suggestion to use the Etrecheck application
It would be appropriate to let them take the First Analysis of the report
I will only say, the machine is a Fusion Drive with q 32 GB SSD coupled together by the magic of Apple to fusion the SSD to a very slow Rotational 5400 RPM Platter / Spinner HD Mechanical Drive
That specific matter has been already been mentioned, earlier
Yes. It took months for Apple to provide a version that solved the issues. Etrecheck does not report any major issues. The install needed safe mode to work and three reboots. It took over five hours. A simple app like Textedit refuses to load in this scenario. I did a recovery of the OS and it seems that things are returning to normal but nothing seems to explain the delays I get.
I run a 2019 iMac 3.6 GHz 8-Core Intel Core i9 with 64 GB 2667 MHz DDR4 and "pure" SSD, and haven't had any noticeable negative impact through the various OS versions. I did however experience a problem when I installed Sequoia. 15.1 - my Time Machine started to play up. I back up via Ethernet to an 8TB Synology NAS (specifically to a 4TB Volume dedicated to the backup). I started getting warnings that the available drive space was becoming critical, and then backups began to fail. None of the usual steps helped, and two sessions with Apple support didn't get anywhere. Eventually I tried completely erasing the TM backup (I have a secondary backup to a portable SSD) and started from scratch, but that didm't work. I got back to Apple today, the tech read through the previous case notes, and came back within a few minutes and told me to update to 15.2 - he said that I could get back to him of it didn't work but was pretty sure it'd be OK, so I guess it's been an issue for others. So far it's working perfectly. I hope it stays that way because I'm awaiting delivery of a new. Studio M2 and display, and I'd prefer not to migrate to the new kit with an outstanding problem.
Just wondered if anyone has had similar issues?
If I remember correctly from my first iMac the Fusion drive combines a conventional HDD with a (small) NAND SSD; they appear as a single volume. Frequently accessed files get routed to the SSD, less-frequently accessed files sit on the HDD. So performance may well vary significantly depending on what activity is involved...
I get your point about upgradeability (or lack of) on Macs. I guess it makes sense from the manufacturer's perspective, because it can push a buyer into purchasing a higher spec item on day one in case they need better performance or more storage in the future. I go for the maximum RAM available, but for storage there're plenty of 3rd party external SSD drive with high data transfer rates.
emcas wrote:
Safari won’t respond or is very sluggish.
I recommend posting a new question along with the details of your machine. There are many different solutions that can be provided to you that are specific with Safari and network performance that may simply get lost here on this post. I would also include the EtreCheck report in your new post as has been recommended here for a faster resolution.
I was running the Sequoia in the old version and it was fine. But in the 15.2 update it's very sluggish. Browser took more time to open, IntelliJ is slow on completions, also with 16GB ram I've noticed a increase in the memory swap.
I have an MBP M2 PRO, the early versions of sequoia were fine, but this one is so slow, probably because of the useless "Apple version of the microsoft copilot" that is so irrelevant that I don't know the name.
When I have some time I'll probably downgrade to Sonoma, but that's very frustrating because I'll have to setup all my working env again and also more frustrating, because nobody asked for a "Copilot" (I don't remember the name) version on Mac machines
I think RAM is a big factor. On my first iMac I just went with the basic. On my 2019 iMac I went with 64GB, and I haven't had any obvious sluggishness right through to Sequoia 15.2 (except for some operations with McAfee LiveSafe - long periods of "beachballing"). It's frustrating that Apple don't have an option to add additional RAM, especially as each OS upgrade adds to the overhead - but I I guess that's a marketing decision, not Technical. I would always go for the highest available RAM option on any new Mac I bought, even though it pushes the purchase price up significantly.
Contact Apple Support as it’s a new product you have.
Then I suggest that you might have placed this question over to MacBook issues as it has no relevance to my original question. Delete it from this specific feed.
Jonah82 wrote:
Yes. It took months for Apple to provide a version that solved the issues. Etrecheck does not report any major issues. The install needed safe mode to work and three reboots.
A - Technically, Safe Boot is not a recently issued fix . It has been around for Years. It is one of the First Trouble Shooting methods to identify issues on the computer. It just took the user years to discover just what it can fix
It took over five hours.
A - Five hours to perform a SaFe Boot ?
A simple app like Textedit refuses to load in this scenario.
A - That in and of itself ir a very good indication of some serious issues that do exist on this computer . TextEdit is such a Basic application that should, by rights, require next to no computer resources
A - Not providing the Etrecheck report, sometimes but not always, is also an indicator that the user is aware of certain Types Third Party Applications that are installed and not well received on these forums would the revealed
A - Should you decide at a later time to Post the report. We are reasonable certain someone may or may not have a good look at it and offer suggestions / insights
Hello PRP_53
I appreciate that your knowledge is far greater than my own in the world of iMac. I was not aware of Etrecheck as being something that Community would require.
I thought that Apple automatically were aware of this and used it to improve OS.
When I bought this second iMac as a 70 year old, I was unaware of a Fusion Drive as being something that clearly is not like my older iMac's contents.
I just wanted a more up to date iMac. When I came to upgrade the RAM memory, I also discovered that this iMac cannot have an upgrade as I expected. On iMac one I had been able to buy new RAM and install it. This was not the case with the second iMac. I felt cheated by Apple.
With Sonoma performing poorly and experiencing the frustrations created by it, I became aware of Sequoia also doing similar things. I had previously had lots of Apple Support and felt that this was another round with the iMac!
If you are aware of the problems I have from my Etrecheck Report, I would be very pleased to hear from you with some possible solutions.
As an investigative sort of old guy, I did find that the queue of backups was an issue with the Sonoma experience, and once they were deleted, then the iMac became much more effective at running my Microsoft 365 software etcetera.
I see that my backup was not done in the report and have now allowed the iMac to update. Previously I had made a point of going to each piece of out of date software and updating where possible. It seems that this could once again be an issue.
I think you can feel my disappointment with this iMac. Such a shame that Steve died and Apple sometimes feels unled!
Best regards,
Jonah
Thankyou all. I appreciate the knowledge here. I will be modifying my apps list and found the comments on VPN use highly informative. The promotion of VPNs on the internet is quite dominant and I for one have been convinced by such advertising.
I still have Sonoma , today nothing works on both my 2021 desktop as well as my MacBook . It’s so frustrating cause i can’t do my work when nothing is working!! Apple fock the AI just get it working plzzz !! Not a fan of AI anyways!!!
For info I traded in my iMac a few weeks ago and am now running with a Mac Studio M2 Max (4TB SSD) with 96GB RAM. MacOS Sequoia 15.2. I still have McAfee LiveSafe, and so far it's not misbehaved. McAfee version is 4.25.0.0.
Main problem with McAfee on the iMac was with unlocking and changing configuration (for example switching firewall on or off), but those operations seem to run smoothly on the Studio. It may also be that McAfee have made some improvements; auto-installing new software versions used to be a nightmare and I used to end up downloading and re-installing manually, but recently updates have run in the background with no problems (so far!)...
Just bought my first MAC for my wife and upgraded to Sequoia 15.2 for her birthday. Pretty much the worst experience I have ever had with a computer. The app program doesn't work, chrome doesn't work, any email other than apple does work. Almost everything hangs and I'm typing on my old 8 year old Windows 10 pc right now running Hyper-V while simultaneously running 5 windows 2022 servers, 3 linux instances, 1 Windows 11 and a BSD server and I have better performance.
I'm hoping I just need to downgrade. Gotta figure that out now.
Thank You. I had to double check and we're actually running Sequoia 15.3. I will check out the utility but since we have only had 1 day with it I guess we're being a little premature to judge. She got her email working and we're getting familiar with the system. We just haven't figured out why the App Store isn't working yet. I think gmail is problematic for a lot of email clients so she is fine running it inside Safari.
Sequoia 15.2 upgrade causing a very sluggish machine.
