Macbook Pro is running slowly, no applications will open except for finder, and the screen flashes grey every minute or so.

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Macbook Pro is running slowly, no applications will open except for finder, and the screen flashes grey every minute or so.

My macbook is a little over a year old. This afternoon I was using it as usual, not many programs open. Actually, I was in finder moving files to different folders, so nothing too crazy. All of a sudden it slowed right down to a crawl, it took a while for me to even drag and drop a file. So I restarted it. When it came back up, I tried to do it again, but it was still rediculously slow. The desktop background disappears and turns grey for about 3 seconds every minute or so, but all of the icons on the desktop are still there. None of my applications will open except finder. I've turned it off and left it off, and turned it back on again, and just restarted about 5 times. No changes. I hope someone knows a quick fix to this!

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)

Posted on Feb 8, 2013 4:48 PM

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Answer 1

CMCSK

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Feb 8, 2013 4:51 PM in response to dveinot

How large is your hard drive and how much hard drive space do you have left?

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Answer 2

dveinot Author

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Feb 8, 2013 4:59 PM in response to CMCSK

Hard drive is 320 GB, 185 GB free.

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Answer 3

dveinot Author

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Feb 8, 2013 5:11 PM in response to dveinot

Turns out I can open applications, but only through Macintosh HD.

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Answer 4

CMCSK

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11,452 points

Feb 8, 2013 5:13 PM in response to dveinot

Sluggish Finder - Bunch of icons on your desktop? An overcrowded desktop slows down your Mac.

Get rid of needless Finder calculations - Open a window in Finder/View/Show View Options: ensure "Calculate All Sizes" option is unchecked.

Internet related - It's likely that your broadband connection is the bottleneck. You can check your speed on http://www.speedtest.net to see how fast your connection is. If your web browser specifically performs slowly, quit and relaunch it.

If browser remains sluggish, empty its cache.

Safari/Empty Cache

Firefox/Preferences - select the Network tab of the Advanced preferences and click the "Clear Now" button in the "Offline Storage" area.

Application related - Launch "Activity Monitor" - Applications/Utilities - click the CPU heading and see what float to the top. If an application takes up a large chunk of CPU and won't let it go, it could be dragging down your Mac's performance. Quit it by clicking the Quit Process button at the top of the Activity Monitor window.

Too little ram - max out your ram.

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Answer 5

dveinot Author

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Feb 8, 2013 5:26 PM in response to CMCSK

I keep my desktop spotless. My internet is fine, it's working on this computer and all of my other devices. Activity monitor was the first thing I checked, that's all clear. It's not my ram. None of that explains why my desktop keeps flashing grey. Thanks.

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Answer 6

CMCSK

Level 6

11,452 points

Feb 8, 2013 6:19 PM in response to dveinot

Trash the Finder.plist file in your Home Preferences folder, repair permissions and restart your computer. If that does not work.....

If you have Apple Care, give them a call and get a case number. Otherwise, take the computer to an Apple store or an AASP. Whichever is more convenient for you. The repair techs have the tools to properly diagnose the issue. Diagnostic testing is free.

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