OS X Lion is incredibly slow (even after index)

Thanks again. Yep I've been doing support on Macs since 1984 and this is the strangest situation I've probably ever come across in terms of something being not exactly thought out right by Apple IMHO.

My other MBP will beinefit from this but the one in question I suspect is a year too old: http://www.macrumors.com/2011/09/14/apple-brings-lion-internet-recovery-to-curre nt-macbook-pro-models/

Hey guys, having started this discussion I also want to thank all of you. I learned a lot. Especially how to do the clean install. I would have simply wiped my HD from an external HD and then tried to install Lion from the DVD that I made...

You can as I understand all this (not forgetting clone the drive first). I never made a Lion DVD but I will be doing so once my clone is made. Interestingly the article that was referenced as to how to do that says the file to open the contents of is in Applications. Mine isn't and I suspect they meant Downloads.

What I don't understand: if I clean my HD and then use TM to retrieve my apps, settings and files - won't I get all the crap back, too, that currently slows down my HD?

E.g. I discovered that in HD/Library/Frameworks there are some pgp-files. I once used pgp disk, then removed it. Now I am wondering if these files in the frameworks may be part of the problem. I don't dare to delete them, cause I am not sure. Would they be gone after a clean install if they don't belong there?

In my case, I'm sure there was some corruption on the hard drive - could have been a bad sector that possibly corrupted the operation of the OS.

Early on I did a Disk Verify and it failed - so bad I had to use an install disk to repair it - which was another whole bucket of worms - point is, I was FINALLY able to get the verify to work.

When I finished the clean install I found some stray files in the wrong subdirectory leading me to think that what ever corruption I had somehow orphaned those files.

My system drive is 1TB and I had about 1/2 or more of it filled. So there was lots of room for problems.

As I understand it, MA basically pulls back over your Applications, user file(s) and Library settings. Since all this is being laid down on (hopefully) a nice clean hard drive "floor" you should be in pretty good shape.

Of course, if you wanted, you could (and I have done this with some faculty laptops) manually restore, say, just a particular user folder or even just the "Documents" and "Desktop" folders. Forget the Library - their settings will have to be done again.

All I can say is I used the MA on both my Mac Pro and, today, on my MacBook Air and don't see any of the problems I had before - PARTICULARLY the "laggy" performance of my Mac Pro. Considering I've got dual Xeon processors and a boatload of RAM in this baby - there is absolutely NO EXCUSE for "laggy" performance.

I would think that if the Migration Assistant was restoring the original image, then, yes, you have the same potential for problems. But I don't think it does that. It's not like System Restore or Net Restore - it's more like a file copy. (WARNING: I'm not an Apple Engineer so I can't swear to this, but it seems logical to me based on my experience.)

HTH

Thanks a lot. That clarifies my questions. In the meantime I found out how to uninstall all pgp-junk and I was able to speed up mail by removing disabled bundles.

Here is what is working for me for last 30 minutes.

I turned off the router firewall and have now great internet speed. If I turn on the router firewall then the speed drops again.

My all other devices work fine with router firewall settings of ON and OFF but os x lion macbook pro and air have a terrible bad experience with router firewall set to ON. With the router firewall off os x lion clients are speeding fast now.

srnmu

I think we've just have to face it.. I've been a mac user for 20+ years, before OSX and ipods and when macs became cool. I run the alfa version of OSX back in the day, and even as an alfa it was great. Snow leapord was a good sign because a lot of grot seemed to get stripped out.

So what happened with Lion? Apple dropped the ball, this is certain. As far as computers are concerned it looks like they've become yet another company where the technology has become less important that the brand. Its a shame because apple's brand was built on substance but looks like those days are over.

We can only hope that folk get wind of this balls up in apple and fix it once and for all. If they need to lock the marketing dept up in a cupboard while things get fixed then all the better. Its not about how many new features there are for the next release, its about convincing people that apple is still focused on the basics.

It reminds me of when apple booted steve jobs in favor of a pepsi cola sales man.

Sounds like you need a hug. :-)

Hundreds of people have been helped this thread. Some issues were a permissions, incompatible applications or some required an archive and install. Even the last, most extreme option required no cd, no backup, just a recovery reboot, and four mouse clicks over a lunch hour. I am sure there are some that have issues but a quick stop by an Apple Store should nail it. Lion has taken some color away but replaced it with many other great ideas focused on human computing needs.

Every company grows. Every perspective is different. One operating system release cannot represent a brand. The community around a company is as important as the product. You've been a part of it for longer than most.

I respect your opinion but I can't think of another consumer electronic community that has the drive, patience, innovation and positive attitude that the Apple users have.

Merry Christmas!

Nice post :)

Meanwhile I'd like to report on my efforts to speed Lion up as it may contain a few things that help others.

I like many upgraded many Macs over many versions of OS X over the years and always clone my old Macs HD either literally of using Migration Assistant.

I discovered by placing my entire user Library's Preferences Folder ( use GoTo Folder ~/Library ) in an enclosing folder called Old Prefs and rebooting my Mac increased in speed dramatically. I was able to then add back preferences I really needed one by one as I discovered apps that needed them. This is was akin to OS 9 days and extension manager. I am left with hundreds of preferences still in the old folder so something in there was making my Mac unhappy so they can stay there!

Another thing I found that helped was I put my Aperture Library in the Spotlight exclude list. I have a 50 GIG library and it was seemingly not happy with the move from my previous Mac and required some TLC itself but its continuous work of creating thumb nails was driving Spotlight to insanity. My fan was always on and Activity Monitor showed me the culprit was indeed Spotlight's engine. Since then I fixed my Aperture Library but intend to leave it off Spotlight's radar.

Its not a loyality issue.. The fact is doing a full installation from scratch (snow leopard then lion update) not installing any applications that aren't available on the app store that mac slows down after a few days running.

I've set spotliight have no folders to index, fixing the permissions works for a bit sometimes. But this is all pretty basic stuff. The fact is that all of these fixes wont last long as the problem is that the lion is broken.

The fact is that apple have shipped lion before its ready, probably because they know that there aren't really any alternatives. Luckierly for me I work in this stuff, so although I don't like geeking around that much I can fall back to linux. I don't know how many people I've convinced to change to macs over the years, because there never used to be these issues, but that has already changed.

It's over, and has been for a while. Macs are purely focused at consumers, where macs where a pretty good choice for people working as developers and sys admins, but now lion i can see this will change. So devs and sys admins will be a minority but they are influencers. If lion is a sign of things to come, Macs will be on a downward trend. Ipads and iphones will last as long as the legal disputes, but as we start to talk more of tablets and smart phones their influence will fade. iOS5 on iphone 4 ***** pretty bad as well, slow unresponsive (sound familiar).

Who knows if someone in apple will wake up and realise that they got where they did by having the correct balance between tech, design and marketing. Their strategy now appears to be more focused on patent litigation and substanceless marketing. Its a shame

I would say you clearly have a one off issue and it is not sensible to attribute your problem to Lion per se. I have had a few issues and found the reasons and fixed them so yes I agree Lion has a few compatability issues with legacy code and obviously a few wrinkles such as I mention where I had a damaged Aperture Library fighting with Spotlight for disk access in a viscious loop. All things Apple should address but if you truly have a virgin set up that slows down that badly in a few days there is something else is a foot. Tell me this, if you create a new user and log out of the normal one and in as the new user how is the relative speed compared to the one that has slowed down?

One of the reasons I suspect this may be happening to many is the new, increased use of inter - applications and iCoud data sharing all updating. Things like Face recognition in iPhoto, iTunes Match updating, wireless syncing of iDevices ... it goes on and on. Apple are creating a very interconnected set up and if the w-fi or internet isn't up to the highest speeds these things can create a very slow response until all is updated. Throw in a Time Machine backup and Spotlight re build and it starts to get silly. Many of us here know how to turn much of this off and allow them in sequence but the average Joe out there could be lead to believe their system will always be this slow not realizing just how much is going on behind the scenes to begin with.

I sympathise with what you're saying. But its a virgin install right down to zeroing the hard disk before i started.

Time machine is off. No iphoto or similar installed.. Spotlight the whole harddisk is in the ignore list.

running top as root doesn't reveal anything too untoward. If I get really board or suffiently irritated I might spend some time to pin point what rancid offshored mess has been shoe-horned into the release.

Oh.. no itunes wont open.. I better go and mess around with that!!!

I really lost just about everything for Apple now! All about image, nothing about the values Apple once were all about - a second to none rock solid fast system!

I bourght the most expensive I7 MBP there is available, matte high res display - everything! First of all I got an early 2011 version, when I'm supposed to get a late 2011 version! (Yes, Directly from Apples website!)

It never ran very well, and had these problems too. Mine would hang, crash, stop copying files, fail backup, from 5-infinite sec. of response lack. I been through T1 support, and they came up with the "brilliant" idea, of a overwrite install. That ****** it up completely! Now indexing didn't work, tried to remove HDD and add it back in indexing, no luck and all of the above, got worse! Tried fixing rights, no luck. "Of cause" support has NEVER heard of this problems. I used 20 workdays!!! (Being a photographer, I cannot do anything, without my computer!) To get throug to T2 support - talked to three supporters, all of them, suddenly stopped replying emails, and then it was COMPLETELY impossible, to get to talk with anybody, anywhere. So I took it to Corporate Apple in Europe, and then they suddenly could "help"

T2 employee no. 4's fix was complete reinstall! What a support!!? So now I and everyone else, is just waiting for this to happen again. Useless!! Embarrasing!!

I have had 5 machines,

2 MBP

2 MB

1 MM

Running Leopard, Snow Leopard, Snow Leopard Server and Lion

EVERYONE has ****** up more or less like this, over time - and upon overwrite reinstall, it never did a complete fix!

I feel for you, dude, and I'm sorry your experience has been so terrible.

I have to say, if you did a complete, clean, install of Lion and are still having problems, then this has GOT to be a hardware issue and Apple should stand by you.

My experience with Apple has been nothing short of spectacular.

My boss bought one of the very first MacBook Airs when it came out. Six months later it starts kicking up. Can't remember what the problems were, but he took it into the Apple store and they gave him a BRAND NEW ONE!

Six months later, same problems - guess what - he got a BRAND NEW ONE!

This summer I had some techs come in to repair an iMac (almost three years old). The idiots took a chunk out of the metal frame and scratched the glass surface. I documented everything, sent an email to Apple repair and, guess what, got a BRAND NEW IMAC. (I had only asked for a refurbished one since the one we had was almost three years old, but they sent a new one.)

Had a (almost three year old) server crash this summer. Admittedly it took a couple of days of troubleshooting, which, in the past, would have gotten me very upset. But, in the end, Apple replaced the server with two (count 'em - 2) Mac Minis. (Yeah, there is no more XServe, but I really wanted Minis in the first place.)

Maybe it's Europe and the financial crisis and the euro going down the drain, I don't know, but Apple has been great to us over here.

BTW LOVE YOUR WEBSITE - your photos are OUTSTANDING!