Mac gets gradually slower until it's almost unusable

Question

Level 1

4 points

Mac gets gradually slower until it's almost unusable

A couple of months ago something got corrupted on my hard drive which caused the computer to not boot properly. I was able to back it up, repair the drive, and reinstall the OS.

Everything was fine, but things seemed to be slower, though that could just be in my head.

Fast forward to now... I always leave my computer on. Yeah. I hate the environment. I came in one day and my computer had powered down sometime during the night, so I rebooted it and noticed that my battery no longer charges. I keep my computer plugged in, so not sure if the battery issue would have powered down my computer in and of itself. It shouldn't have.

Then I noticed slowness. Like unbearable slowness - just using Office and surfing the web. A lot of pages become unresponsive and/or take forever to load. It's not my internet connection. I was able to finally get a speedtest to load and speed was fine (25mbps down and 20 up). Also, I have a bunch of other computers, including an Air and they were fine on the same network. Also, EVERYTHING becomes slow, not just my browser. Even System Preferences and Finder take forever to open (spinning beachball).

It's not RAM, diskspace or CPU, based on looking at my activity monitor, so the only think I can think is perhaps my hard drive is failing.

If I close everything and reboot, then speed will resume back to normal, but then it will start to slow again after a few hours of usage. I guess the other thing it could be is one of the programs I run. I generally run Chrome, Outlook, word, excel, powerpoint, itunes (streaming via icloud), Lync and Skype. I supposed it could be one of those programs, but nothing in Activity Monitor shows any high usage by any one process.

I have an appointment to take my computer in, but my fear is that it'll be running fine. I have to be doing things for a few hours before it becomes super super slow. It almost seems like a memory leak somewhere.

I've run disk utility and it can't find anything wrong with the hard drive. The drive isn't making any strange noises or clicking. My computer does take about a minute to boot up these days though. I don't recall it being that sluggish before, but maybe it was.

Any ideas on what could be the problem or recommendations for other things to try? I was unable to successfully do a Hardware Test. I tried a zillion times (booting up while pressing "D") and nada.

Macbook pro 15" Early2011

8G RAM

2.3 ghz i7 core

OSX 10.8.4

MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011), OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.4)

Posted on Aug 15, 2013 3:00 PM

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Answer 1

Aug 15, 2013 3:24 PM in response to h3atherz

Not enough free space can slow the system down ...

Click your Apple menu  top left in your screen. From the drop down menu click About This Mac > More Info > Storage

Make sure there's at least 15% free disk space.

Slow startup? Open System Preferences > Users & Groups > Login Items. Remove all items.

Same for HD > Library > StartupItems

Then restart your Mac.

More suggestions here > Mac troubleshooting: What to do when your computer is too slow | Macworld

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Answer 2

OGELTHORPE

Level 9

57,329 points

Aug 15, 2013 3:26 PM in response to h3atherz

Do you have you data backed up? I suggest that you do so.

What you might consider is cloning your Internal HDD (Using Disk Utility>Restore or Carbon Copy Cloner) and swapping the two HDDs. This way you might be able to determine if your current internal HDD is failing.

Ciao.

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Answer 3

John Galt

Level 10

155,738 points

Aug 15, 2013 3:39 PM in response to h3atherz

Upgrading to Lion or ML tended to erase the version of Apple Hardware Test that was installed on your hard disk. Boot from your original grey Applications Install DVD while holding the d key.

You can also force the Internet version of AHT to load by simultaneously holding the option and d keys while starting the Mac. You will need an Internet connection (obviously).

There is a technique to reinstall AHT from your original grey disc onto your internal hard disk if you so choose. Write back for instructions.

Consider running EtreCheck and posting its results. You may have installed one or more system modifications that could be responsible for your Mac's slow performance. EtreCheck may help reveal them.

Apple Support Communities contributor etresoft wrote a very useful app to quickly gather certain system information that may help point to a cause of this problem. Go to his website, download and run EtreCheck:

http://www.etresoft.com/etrecheck

Etrecheck will be in your Downloads folder. Open it from there. You may see the following dialog box:

Click Open - etresoft contributes to this forum frequently and can be considered a trustworthy developer.

It will take a moment to run as it collects its data.

Copy and paste its output in a reply.

Do not be concerned about anything that says "Problem" or "failed".

EtreCheck was designed to remove any personal information (such as your computer's name and serial numbers) but if you see anything that looks like an email address or any other personal information that should not be divulged to others, please delete or obscure that information when you post the reply.

When you are finished with EtreCheck, quit the program. It occupies very little space, and you can keep it or drag it to the Trash as you wish.

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Answer 4

h3atherz Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 15, 2013 3:53 PM in response to Carolyn Samit

Like I said in my original post, I know t's not disk space. I deleted pretty much everything from my harddrive that I possibly could just to be sure. I have more than 90% free.

The slow startup isn't the startup items either.

But thanks for the response. I appreciate people trying to help troubleshoot.

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Answer 5

Aug 15, 2013 4:11 PM in response to h3atherz

Hopefully other suggestions on this thread will help 🙂

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Answer 6

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Aug 15, 2013 5:29 PM in response to h3atherz

Back up all data immediately as your boot drive may be failing.

If you have more than one user account, these instructions must be carried out as an administrator.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

syslog -k Sender kernel -k Message CSeq "I/O error" | tail | open -f -a TextEdit

Copy the selected text to the Clipboard (command-C).

Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.

Paste into the Terminal window (command-V).

The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign (“$”) to appear.

A TextEdit window will open with the output of the command. Normally the window will be empty. If you get output like this:

kernel[0] <Debug>: disk0s2: I/O error

the boot drive is failing, or there's some other hardware fault in the storage subsystem.

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Answer 7

CaptH

Level 1

59 points

Aug 15, 2013 8:46 PM in response to h3atherz

I've seen similar problems caused by the following:

Hard drive failing
Spotlight constantly indexing due to indexing errors
Kernel being tied up trying to load bad kernel extensions
launchd attempting to repeatedly launch a bad startup process
Bad cables connecting the hard drive
Bad software

If you follow Linc's steps and you see an I/O error listed, make sure there's a drive ID associated with it. I've found that some apps like to toss out the phrase "I/O error" rather loosely, but they don't have a drive associated with it because it's not drive related. Cable problems can also cause I/O errors. For drive and system problems I refer people to the following site because they have a fair amount of information on various performance problems in their downloads and how-to section:

http://scsc-online.com

Kernel extension problems can be difficult to troubleshoot because they're often from third party vendors. ML seems to have more problems with these than earlier OS versions. Kernel extension problems and launchd problems can only be evaluated by lookiing at the log files. With Console.app under utilities you might be able to catch a clue by watching its output as the system runs.

If process named mds or mdworker (or simiar, like mdworker32) are having problems indexing some types of files, which happens, Spotlight will be continually running and eat up a lot of CPU and I/O cycles.

Hope this helps.

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Answer 8

h3atherz Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 16, 2013 4:52 AM in response to Linc Davis

didn't get an error, but this was helpful. tx

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Answer 9

h3atherz Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 16, 2013 5:17 AM in response to h3atherz

New upate: I left my computer on all night (rememer I hate the environment). Last night it was running fine (I had just rebooted. The only thing I had opened since boot was chrome and that was still open. This morning it's noticablly slower. Even typing this note hangs sometimes and there are pauses between my typing and the letters appearing. I type fast, but not THAT fast. Scrolling on this page hangs too. I have two tabs open: gmail and this thread.

I didn't get any I/O errors, but I was able to run the Hardware Test thanks to John above and I got a memory error (4MEM/62/4000000: Ox8478c698).

Also, in looking at the Activity Monitor, system CPU usage looks high (hovering around 72%)

Looks like "kernel_task" is eating a bunch of CPU

I don't have any programs or data that I need to keep. Maybe I should just try and just re-install OS X and start over from scratch?

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Answer 10

h3atherz Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 16, 2013 5:36 AM in response to h3atherz

EtreCheck info:

Hardware Information:

MacBook Pro (15-inch, Early 2011)

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro8,2

1 2.3 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4 cores

8 GB RAM

Video Information:

Intel HD Graphics 3000 - VRAM: 512 MB

AMD Radeon HD 6750M - VRAM: 1024 MB

System Software:

OS X 10.8.4 (12E55) - Uptime: 0 days 11:41:47

Disk Information:

TOSHIBA MK7559GSXF disk0 : (750.16 GB)

disk0s1 (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

Macintosh HD (disk0s2) /: 749.3 GB (718.77 GB free)

Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB

MATSHITADVD-R UJ-898

USB Information:

Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)

Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

Apple Inc. BRCM2070 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver

FireWire Information:

Thunderbolt Information:

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

Kernel Extensions:

Problem System Launch Daemons:

[loaded] com.seagate.TBDecorator.plist

Problem System Launch Agents:

Launch Daemons:

[loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

[loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist

Launch Agents:

[loaded] jp.co.canon.CUPSCMFP.BG.plist

[loaded] jp.co.canon.UFR2.BG.plist

User Launch Agents:

[failed] com.apple.CSConfigDotMacCert-[redacted]@me.com-SharedServices.Agent.plist

[loaded] com.google.GoogleContactSyncAgent.plist

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist

User Login Items:

iTunesHelper

Dropbox

Nike+ Connect Helper

3rd Party Preference Panes:

Flash Player

Java

Paragon NTFS for Mac ® OS X

Internet Plug-ins:

AmazonMP3DownloaderPlugin101750.plugin

Flash Player.plugin

FlashPlayer-10.6.plugin

GarminGpsControl.plugin

JavaAppletPlugin.plugin

MeetingJoinPlugin.plugin

QuickTime Plugin.plugin

SharePointBrowserPlugin.plugin

Silverlight.plugin

User Internet Plug-ins:

Google Earth Web Plug-in.plugin

WebEx64.plugin

Bad Fonts:

None

Top Processes by CPU:

4% WindowServer

3% Activity Monitor

3% EtreCheck

2% activitymonitord

1% Google Chrome

0% UFR II BackGrounder

0% cupsd

0% Canon CMFP BackGrounder

0% Dropbox

0% ps

Top Processes by Memory:

147 MB Google Chrome

74 MB Snagit

74 MB Dropbox

66 MB WindowServer

57 MB Finder

49 MB mds

49 MB Google Chrome Helper

41 MB Dock

33 MB SystemUIServer

33 MB SnagitCapHelper

Virtual Memory Statistics

5.42 GB Free RAM

1.35 GB Active RAM

157 MB Inactive RAM

1.07 GB Wired RAM

482 MB Page-ins

0 B Page-outs

Hardware Information:

MacBook Pro (15-inch, Early 2011)

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro8,2

1 2.3 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4 cores

8 GB RAM

Video Information:

Intel HD Graphics 3000 - VRAM: 512 MB

AMD Radeon HD 6750M - VRAM: 1024 MB

System Software:

OS X 10.8.4 (12E55) - Uptime: 0 days 11:41:47

Disk Information:

TOSHIBA MK7559GSXF disk0 : (750.16 GB)

disk0s1 (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

Macintosh HD (disk0s2) /: 749.3 GB (718.77 GB free)

Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB

MATSHITADVD-R UJ-898

USB Information:

Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)

Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

Apple Inc. BRCM2070 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver

FireWire Information:

Thunderbolt Information:

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

Kernel Extensions:

Problem System Launch Daemons:

[loaded] com.seagate.TBDecorator.plist

Problem System Launch Agents:

Launch Daemons:

[loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist

[loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist

Launch Agents:

[loaded] jp.co.canon.CUPSCMFP.BG.plist

[loaded] jp.co.canon.UFR2.BG.plist

User Launch Agents:

[failed] com.apple.CSConfigDotMacCert-[redacted]@me.com-SharedServices.Agent.plist

[loaded] com.google.GoogleContactSyncAgent.plist

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist

User Login Items:

iTunesHelper

Dropbox

Nike+ Connect Helper

3rd Party Preference Panes:

Flash Player

Java

Paragon NTFS for Mac ® OS X

Internet Plug-ins:

AmazonMP3DownloaderPlugin101750.plugin

Flash Player.plugin

FlashPlayer-10.6.plugin

GarminGpsControl.plugin

JavaAppletPlugin.plugin

MeetingJoinPlugin.plugin

QuickTime Plugin.plugin

SharePointBrowserPlugin.plugin

Silverlight.plugin

User Internet Plug-ins:

Google Earth Web Plug-in.plugin

WebEx64.plugin

Bad Fonts:

None

Top Processes by CPU:

4% WindowServer

3% Activity Monitor

3% EtreCheck

2% activitymonitord

1% Google Chrome

0% UFR II BackGrounder

0% cupsd

0% Canon CMFP BackGrounder

0% Dropbox

0% ps

Top Processes by Memory:

147 MB Google Chrome

74 MB Snagit

74 MB Dropbox

66 MB WindowServer

57 MB Finder

49 MB mds

49 MB Google Chrome Helper

41 MB Dock

33 MB SystemUIServer

33 MB SnagitCapHelper

Virtual Memory Statistics

5.42 GB Free RAM

1.35 GB Active RAM

157 MB Inactive RAM

1.07 GB Wired RAM

482 MB Page-ins

0 B Page-outs

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Answer 11

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Aug 16, 2013 7:21 AM in response to h3atherz

You have a faulty memory module, or the machine is overheating.

Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store, or go to another authorized service center.

Back up all data on the internal drive(s) before you hand over your computer to anyone. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional — ask if you need guidance.

If privacy is a concern, erase the data partition(s) with the option to write zeros* (do this only if you have at least two complete, independent backups, and you know how to restore to an empty drive from any of them.) Don’t erase the recovery partition, if present.

Keeping your confidential data secure during hardware repair

*An SSD doesn't need to be zeroed.

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Answer 12

Aug 16, 2013 7:34 AM in response to h3atherz

kernel task at 577%???

Can somebody help? I personally can't.

Have you got fenough free disk space for virtual memory to work properly?

Cheers

Simon

PS: can you post pictures of the processes by CPU usage?

PS2: try wit just a memory module and then just with the other.

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Answer 13

Aug 16, 2013 7:32 AM in response to OGELTHORPE

Good idea as HD proces are getting once again interesting, but why not backup everything with carbon Copy Cloner, boot from the cloned HD, re-initialised theinternal HD and restore?

Simon

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Answer 14

h3atherz Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 16, 2013 7:32 AM in response to Linc Davis

Pretty sure it's the memory (got a memory error doing hardware check). It definitely doesn't feel hot, so I don't think it's a heat issue.

I made an appointment already, but figured I'd try and narrow down the issue first.

Already backed up as soon as it started getting dog-a** slow. Getting ready to erase the drive.

thanks for the help.

-h 😍

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Answer 15

John Galt

Level 10

155,738 points

Aug 16, 2013 8:17 AM in response to h3atherz

h3atherz wrote:

... I got a memory error (4MEM/62/4000000: Ox8478c698).

... Maybe I should just try and just re-install OS X and start over from scratch?

The problem with faulty memory is that using it can result in disk corruption. Replace it with reliable memory first, verify that it passes AHT, then proceed with reinstalling OS X.

Beware that restoring from a backup of a corrupted system will also restore the corruption.

Chrome is not the direct cause of your problems but it is a notorious resource hog. Google has yet to demonstrate the ability to write an OS X app that isn't. Why people continue to use Chrome on a Mac is a mystery to me.

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