How to make my Mac mini faster

I was playing sneaky Sasquatch, then snake.io Apple Arcade, then among us ( it is very bad). all this is past

steve626 wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

how to make my Mac even faster

Mac mini m4, 256 gb, 169 free, no anti virus or cleaner app

<etrecheckPro app.log>

This shows in your recent software installs:

2026-05-23 Norton (26.4.0)

That can slow down a Mac significantly. Maybe it has since been uninstalled but if there are any leftover pieces, those can create problems.

Also, I can't tell exactly but it appears that you are using this Mini for various gaming activities. If you are, then exactly what games are being run and how they work (local, over the internet, etc.) can greatly impact loading of the Mac and lead to beachballs if it can't handle the load.

A beachball now and then does not necessarily indicate a problem, even for an app like Etrecheck. I get a beachball for about 3 seconds every time I open TurboTax and every time I close TurboTax on my MacBook Pro. And with large and complex tax returns, or when I have 3 or 4 open at once, it will show a beachball for maybe 5-10 seconds when closing the program, while it saves changes, cleans up, etc.

steve626 wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

I used to. but etrecheckPro crashes and beachballs I dont know what is happening

You posted an Etrecheck report than indicated "Excellent" performance and lots of free disk space. So you did get Etrecheck to run. "Etrecheck crashes" -- what does that mean? What happens when it "crashes?"

With utm you were running virtual machines. Those emulate other hardware using software and the Mini's processor, not actual other hardware, so not only are virtual machines much slower than real computers with those other OS, but they can tax the Mini's processor in a major way. Including beachballs.

You indicated the utm is now uninstalled, but again, as with Norton anti-virus, the software has to be COMPLETELY uninstalled and removed or remnants could remain and impact what you see when operating normally.

As for your original question, unless there is some remnant of Norton still lurking in the background somewhere, there really is not anything you can do to "make my Mac mini faster." You have plenty of free disk space, you cannot change the 16 GB memory (which is somewhat minimal but should be adequate), your processor can only run as fast as it runs, but it is an M4, that's a powerful chip. So what you see is what you get.

I would say: make sure what you uninstalled is really completely uninstalled, but barring that, don't worry about your Mac and just go ahead and use it.

If you see beachballs that are disrupting your use of the Mac, please take note of exactly what was running and what you were doing, as just saying "beachballs" here is too vague for anyone to try to diagnose anything.

it just crashes without even opening, it just beach balls and crashes

steve626 wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

it just crashes without even opening, it just beach balls and crashes

(1) Start up your Mac in Safe Mode. Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support If the beach balling goes away in Safe Mode, then something is still installed causing your problem. Owl-53's "atomic" option could fix that.

(2) Boot into Recovery. How to start up from macOS Recovery - Apple Support Select Disk Utility and have it perform First Aid on each and all the levels of volumes shown (from within Disk Utility select View => Show all devices). Repeat until no errors are reported. Then reboot normally and test.

(3) Reboot normally. Create a new user, this is for testing only. Log in as that new user. Test to see if the beachballs are gone. If they are, then something in your main user configuration is improper and causing the problem.

If none of the above help, and beachballs remain, then try Owl-53's "atomic" option. If that does not resolve it, and constant beachballs occur with just ordinary operations, then you should contact Apple for Service. Note that the first thing Apple usually does is what OWL-53 described as the "atomic option," they wipe the computer and install a new MacOS.

not the macOS,

the etrecheckPro pro app beach ball every then crashes, it is very rare for that app to start, the question remains about other apps, it works fine

steve626 wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

it just crashes without even opening, it just beach balls and crashes

(1) Start up your Mac in Safe Mode. Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support If the beach balling goes away in Safe Mode, then something is still installed causing your problem. Owl-53's "atomic" option could fix that.

(2) Boot into Recovery. How to start up from macOS Recovery - Apple Support Select Disk Utility and have it perform First Aid on each and all the levels of volumes shown (from within Disk Utility select View => Show all devices). Repeat until no errors are reported. Then reboot normally and test.

(3) Reboot normally. Create a new user, this is for testing only. Log in as that new user. Test to see if the beachballs are gone. If they are, then something in your main user configuration is improper and causing the problem.

If none of the above help, and beachballs remain, then try Owl-53's "atomic" option. If that does not resolve it, and constant beachballs occur with just ordinary operations, then you should contact Apple for Service. Note that the first thing Apple usually does is what OWL-53 described as the "atomic option," they wipe the computer and install a new MacOS.

I did first aid when booted to mac os and it shows it is fine

steve626 wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

I used to. but etrecheckPro crashes and beachballs I dont know what is happening

You posted an Etrecheck report than indicated "Excellent" performance and lots of free disk space. So you did get Etrecheck to run. "Etrecheck crashes" -- what does that mean? What happens when it "crashes?"

With utm you were running virtual machines. Those emulate other hardware using software and the Mini's processor, not actual other hardware, so not only are virtual machines much slower than real computers with those other OS, but they can tax the Mini's processor in a major way. Including beachballs.

You indicated the utm is now uninstalled, but again, as with Norton anti-virus, the software has to be COMPLETELY uninstalled and removed or remnants could remain and impact what you see when operating normally.

As for your original question, unless there is some remnant of Norton still lurking in the background somewhere, there really is not anything you can do to "make my Mac mini faster." You have plenty of free disk space, you cannot change the 16 GB memory (which is somewhat minimal but should be adequate), your processor can only run as fast as it runs, but it is an M4, that's a powerful chip. So what you see is what you get.

I would say: make sure what you uninstalled is really completely uninstalled, but barring that, don't worry about your Mac and just go ahead and use it.

If you see beachballs that are disrupting your use of the Mac, please take note of exactly what was running and what you were doing, as just saying "beachballs" here is too vague for anyone to try to diagnose anything.

I have uninstalled utm, Norton , completely

and it does not show it crashed in the report

den.thed wrote:

weeklycod wrote:

I have uninstalled utm, Norton , completely

and it does not show it crashed in the report

Everything looks good as far as runtime, drive speed and available storage, except for:

1) You still have no Time Machine or other local backup.

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/a33f9d39-5e87-40ea-92cd-7ef8ac3a750b

2) Why is the FireWall blocking Innersloth.amongus...?

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/5289c9c0-b427-4160-b850-6961d8d7d772

3) Business has Crashed 14 times starting on Jun. 8 2026

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/c8c7eaee-3afb-4c4e-8118-96633ab2b118

4) Game Center has Crashed 2 times starting on Jun. 14 2026

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/fe0d0ffa-0a3b-4838-a0ca-65309bb24708

how to fix the issue

beach balling because etrecheckPro was beach balling but no other apps showed that problem

etrecheckPro crashes and beach balls

tbirdvet wrote:

What are you using to determine if slow? Some apps may be beach ball when starting.

recently it got discontinued. but I have 169 gb left