Q: Macbook Pro Kernel_task using loads of CPU

My macbook pro retina presented the same symptoms as the original post. I read through many of the recommendations in these posts but decided to just logout out of my profile and then shut down the machine. When I reopened it a few minutes later everything was back to normal and has stayed that way all day.

This solve the problem for me.

1. Go to About this mac under the apple in the upper left and click on More info

2. Click on system report

3. make a note of what it says after Model Identifier

4. go to your master drive – System -Library – Extensions – IOPlatformPluginFamily.kext -Contents – Plugins – ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin.kext – Contents – Resources – find the name from step 3 and move it to a folder that you can find again if needed.

3. Restart and you’re done

I hope this helps.

This solve the problem for me.

1. Go to About this mac under the apple in the upper left and click on More info

2. Click on system report

3. make a note of what it says after Model Identifier

4. go to your master drive – System -Library – Extensions – IOPlatformPluginFamily.kext -Contents – Plugins – ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin.kext – Contents – Resources – find the name from step 3 and move it to a folder that you can find again if needed.

3. Restart and you’re done

I hope this helps.

insteresting.....

How do I move the file to a folder (and what's a good location to store it in . External hard drive?). Also when I move the plist file, the original still remains in the folder? Should I erase this or move to trash? Please advise thanks!

hi ... i can't find my Model Identifier in System -Library – Extensions – IOPlatformPluginFamily.kext -Contents – Plugins – ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin.kext – Contents – Resources...

please advise if there is any other way to fix the problem...

Thank you ..

I have the exact same problem as anchitfromtustin.  In the Resources folder there are exactly 50 .plist Model Identifiers, but not a single one is my MacBookPro10_1.  As far as the MBPs are concerned, the Model IDs stop at MacBookPro8_3.  Anyone know a fix?  I've scoured the web and can't turn anything up...

Same problem as the last 2 comments. Over a year and no response to his problem? No file for my Model Identifier (MacBookPro11,1) can be found. Any help would be very much appreciated.

Unplugged my charger and the kernal_task dropped from ~600% to 12%.  Goes back up when I plug the charger back in.  

I suspect if the system is "indexing" as mentioned in other posts that it suspends this operation when running on battery.

Old thread, still the same problem. (rolls eyes.. APPLE!)
Macbook Pro 2012 9.1 here, same issue.

I got my macbook in mid 2012, when it launched and this issue for me has lingered from day one.

The quick fix below doesn't work for my model, or any model above 9.1 (someone asked this question but no one ever answered)

This solve the problem for me.

 

1. Go to About this mac under the apple in the upper left and click on More info

2. Click on system report

3. make a note of what it says after Model Identifier

4. go to your master drive – System -Library – Extensions – IOPlatformPluginFamily.kext -Contents – Plugins – ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin.kext – Contents – Resources – find the name from step 3 and move it to a folder that you can find again if needed.

3. Restart and you’re done

I hope this helps.

So basically like many of you I have just dealt with it over the years.

But recently the issue has come back with a vengeance.. hence why I'm here, and like everyone else I found zero useful information.

So I wanted to add to the almost dead thread to kind of revive it and help a few people out.

First off, I believe this is a sensor malfunction ;(  as I have another macbook pro (same year, same model) and its never had this issues, ever..

Second, I think it gets worse depending on what version of OS X your on. For example, last year durning the Yosemite beta's and even first public launch the issue was so bad I resorted to going back to Mavericks just because I needed my macbook to work lol, and now that El Capitan is out the issue is resurfacing all over again. It did get better overtime with Yosemite for me, but I found jumping on Betas would sometimes throw it off.

With all that said, it could be a buggy OS X causing the issue, a malfunctioning sensor OR both, which unfortunately for me at least makes the most sense.

There are a couple sensors that could be causing the issue, one is on the battery, another is the palm rest (if I'm wrong sorry, trackpad) and the other few are located on the logic board (chip set and onboard abeyant)

Im going to start with the battery as I'm due for a new one, then if the problem continues I think ill finally break down and take it into apple for servicing.

I hope my experience has sort of helped answer something for some of you.

I hate saying this but I do not think this is an indexing issue or thats it'll just go away because in my many years of mac ownership have never had to "leave my mac for a day" just so I can use it again. I believe that happened for those users, but the issue was still sensor related and it just worked itself out. Mine comes and goes too so we all can't deny that lol

Anyways

Most of this was just my opinion, if i do get an official answer from apple one day I will definitely find this thread again and share how i finally squashed the kernel_task bug!

Cheers

ok so I don't understand. do nothing? I can't do the roxem thing as there is no file in my computer to remove. tried everything else.

Hello guys,

I recently got this problem on my good old MB Air (Late 2010). I use it for more than five years, and never had this issue before.

My Core 2 Duo notebook becomes unusable when kernel_task eats up CPU cycles.

Uptime command gives insane numbers of average loads: 40,0+

I was lucky to link the issue with my recent enabling of time machine function – I didn't use it before.

Disabling time machine calmed down the kernel_task process!

kernel_task problem apparently solved by replacing battery

My kernel_task began to run amok a few days after I upgraded from Mavericks to Yosemite.  Apple hardware diagnostics turned up nothing, and none of their suggestions worked long-term; removing OS files eventually broke the installation.  After trying just about everything doable in software that had been mentioned in the forums, I reverted to Mavericks and the problem went away.

A year or two later, I upgraded from Mavericks to El Capitan (the next upgrade past Yosemite).  After 10 days, kernel_task ran amok again.  I took it in to Apple, who ran hardware diagnostics and found a sensor fault on the logic board.  They sent it in for repairs.  The work order said that they had replaced the battery and the top case, the latter to fix what they had found to be an unresponsive trackpad.  They did not touch the software yet the problem seems to be fixed, so this fix is probably going to work long term.

I've heard that a defective battery can cause kernel_task to run amok but I've never seen nor heard a description of how the one can cause the other - not even from Apple after they replaced my battery.  While this secretive policy may protect them legally, it is very costly in time and expense to their customers.

I have had a problem on and off with both my Mac Mini Server (Late 2012, v10.11.6) and my MacBook Pro (Early 2013, v10.11.6) that sounds IDENTICAL to yours from the symptoms, but I had a completely different and easier resolution. SteWilliams apparently wasn't running many applications, but I'm sharing what I found in case anyone else has these symptoms too and is doing what I did to cause them.

My kernel task was running 119 threads, and eating flops at a wildly varying rate around 200%. I paged through the Activity Monitor CPU tab, took a few notes about what was going on in there, and then quit Chrome (I tend to have a whole mess of tabs open at one time... and by whole mess, I mean 40-50 on average). The CPU usage plunged. The fans slowed. Life back to normal. Restarted Chrome, no problems.

Sometimes your system will get leaky or corrupt, and the average user can't be sure if it is the reason for our problems, so we may need to do a clean install. BUT BEFORE YOU RESORT TO THAT painful process, note that instances of your apps are even more likely to become leaky or corrupt, especially if you sleep and reawaken your computer, or leave stuff running for days/weeks at a time. Or your installation of your app can become corrupt too. Redo of an app is way easier than a new system, so it pays to check that first. Just quit apps one by one and see which one (if any) kills the CPU overuse. If you identify a culprit, restart that app... and if it runs for a while without running up the CPU, great; if not, then uninstall and reinstall the app. If that doesn't do it, you can always get a new system or play around in sudo.

(For me, I believe Chrome got corrupted when I had several tabs going in Chrome, some of which no doubt had some Java going on, and I did a Java update in the middle of running all that. Don't try this at home.)

Btw, one last note, the kernel_task seems to track app usage, but usually at way less than half of the amount... like so:

Hope this helps someone.