My MacBook suddenly started running slow

First, back up all data immediately, as your boot drive might be failing.

Step 1

This diagnostic procedure will query the log for messages that may indicate a system issue. It changes nothing, and therefore will not, in itself, solve your problem.

If you have more than one user account, these instructions must be carried out as an administrator. I've tested them only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, they may not work as described.

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

syslog -k Sender kernel -k Message CReq 'Channel t|GPU D|I/O|find tok|n Cause: -' | tail | open -ef

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 command will produce no output, and the window will be empty. If the TextEdit window (not the Terminal window) has anything in it, stop here and post it — the text, please, not a screenshot. The title of the TextEdit window doesn't matter, and you don't need to post that.

Step 2

There are a few other possible causes of generalized slow performance that you can rule out easily.

• Reset the System Management Controller.
• If you have a portable computer, check the cycle count of the battery. It may be due for replacement.
• If you have many image or video files on the Desktop with preview icons, move them to another folder.
• If applicable, uncheck all boxes in the iCloud preference pane. See whether there's any change.
• Disconnect all non-essential wired peripherals and remove aftermarket expansion cards, if any.
• Check your keychains in Keychain Access for excessively duplicated items.
• Boot into Recovery mode, launch Disk Utility, and run Repair Disk.
• If you're booting from an aftermarket SSD, see whether there's a firmware update for it.
• If you have a MacBook Pro with dual graphics, disable automatic graphics switching in the Energy Saverpreference pane for better performance at the cost of shorter battery life.

Step 3

When you notice the problem, launch the Activity Monitor 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 Activity Monitor in the icon grid.

Select the CPU tab of the Activity Monitor window.

Select All Processes from the menu in the toolbar, if not already selected.

Click the heading of the % CPU column in the process table to sort the entries by CPU usage. You may have to click it twice to get the highest value at the top. What is it, and what is the process? Also post the values for % User, % System, and % Idle at the bottom of the window.

Select the System Memory tab. What values are shown in the bottom part of the window for Page outs and Swap used?

Next, select the Disk Activity tab. Post the approximate values shown for Reads in/sec and Writes out/sec (not Reads in and Writes out.)

Step 4

If you have more than one user account, you must be logged in as an administrator to carry out this step.

Launch the Console application in the same way you launched Activity Monitor. Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left. If you don't see that menu, select

View ▹ Show Log List

from the menu bar.

Select the 50 or so most recent entries in the log. Copy them to the Clipboard (command-C). Paste into a reply to this message (command-V). You're looking for entries at the end of the log, not at the beginning.

When posting a log extract, be selective. Don't post more than is requested.

Please do not indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.

Important: Some personal information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting. That should be easy to do if your extract is not too long.

Lex,

There is only one device listen under "Devices" in Finder. The device is named Remote Disc and when I click on Get Info, it comes up with nothing. Here is a picture of hat I am seeing:

As for giving you the non standard applets in System Preferences, can you tell me how to do that? I dont know what non standard applets are and nothing comes up when I search the words in Finder.

Also, it may be beneficial for you to know that I accidentally deleted the hard drive a while back when I was trying to figure out why my computer took so long to log in. I took it to my school's technology center and they reinstalled the software and wiped the computer clean, which (they said) fixed the hard drive issue. It did not fix the slow login issue at all though.

Hopefully this information gives you a better idea of the problem. I will call and make an appt with the apple store today.

Thank so much for your help!

This is what i get after restart.

etrecheck:

Hardware Information:

MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2009)

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro5,5

1 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU: 2 cores

4 GB RAM

Video Information:

NVIDIA GeForce 9400M - VRAM: 256 MB

System Software:

OS X 10.9.2 (13C64) - Uptime: 0 days 0:4:26

Disk Information:

TOSHIBA MK3255GSXF disk0 : (250.06 GB)

EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB

Macintosh HD (disk0s2) / [Startup]: 249.2 GB (101.68 GB free)

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

MATSHITADVD-R UJ-868

USB Information:

Apple Inc. Built-in iSight

Apple Internal Memory Card Reader

Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver

Apple Inc. BRCM2046 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

FireWire Information:

Thunderbolt Information:

Kernel Extensions:

com.seagate.driver.PowSecDriverCore (5.2.3 - SDK 10.4)

com.seagate.driver.PowSecLeafDriver_10_5 (5.2.3 - SDK 10.5)

Launch Daemons:

[System] com.autodesk.backburner_manager.plist 3rd-Party support link

[System] com.autodesk.backburner_server.plist 3rd-Party support link

[System] com.autodesk.backburner_start.plist 3rd-Party support link

[System] com.leapfrog.connect.shell.plist 3rd-Party support link

Launch Agents:

[System] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist 3rd-Party support link

[System] com.adobe.CS5ServiceManager.plist 3rd-Party support link

User Launch Agents:

[not loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist 3rd-Party support link

[not loaded] com.facebook.videochat.[redacted].plist 3rd-Party support link

[not loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist 3rd-Party support link

User Login Items:

None

Internet Plug-ins:

DirectorShockwave: Version: 11.6.4r634 3rd-Party support link

Unity Web Player: Version: UnityPlayer version 4.0.1f2 3rd-Party support link

Default Browser: Version: 537 - SDK 10.9

OfficeLiveBrowserPlugin: Version: 12.2.0 3rd-Party support link

Silverlight: Version: 5.1.20125.0 - SDK 10.6 3rd-Party support link

FlashPlayer-10.6: Version: 11.0.1.152 3rd-Party support link

DivXBrowserPlugin: Version: 2.0 3rd-Party support link

Flash Player: Version: 11.0.1.152 Outdated! Update

QuickTime Plugin: Version: 7.7.3

iPhotoPhotocast: Version: 7.0

AdobePDFViewer: Version: 9.3.2 3rd-Party support link

JavaAppletPlugin: Version: 14.9.0 - SDK 10.7 Outdated! Update

Audio Plug-ins:

BluetoothAudioPlugIn: Version: 1.0 - SDK 10.9

AirPlay: Version: 2.0 - SDK 10.9

AppleAVBAudio: Version: 203.2 - SDK 10.9

iSightAudio: Version: 7.7.3 - SDK 10.9

iTunes Plug-ins:

Quartz Composer Visualizer: Version: 1.4 - SDK 10.9

User Internet Plug-ins:

BlueStacks Install Detector: Version: Unknown

3rd Party Preference Panes:

Flash Player 3rd-Party support link

Growl 3rd-Party support link

Old Applications:

dynamiclinkmediaserver: Version: 6.0.0 - SDK 10.5 3rd-Party support link

/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Common/dynamiclinkmediaserver/1.0/dynamiclinkmediaserver.app

SLLauncher: Version: 1.0 - SDK 10.5 3rd-Party support link

/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Silverlight/OutOfBrowser/SLLauncher.app

SA Color Finesse 3 UI: Version: 3.0.6(275) - SDK 10.5 3rd-Party support link

/Applications/Adobe After Effects CS6/Plug-ins/Effects/Synthetic Aperture/(CF3 Support)/SA Color Finesse 3 UI.app

ClamXav: Version: 2.3.6 - SDK 10.5 3rd-Party support link

dynamiclinkmanager: Version: 6.0.0 - SDK 10.5 3rd-Party support link

/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Common/dynamiclink/CS6/dynamiclinkmanager.app

Time Machine:

Time Machine not configured!

Top Processes by CPU:

16% Google Chrome

12% WindowServer

7% coreaudiod

1% hidd

1% EtreCheck

Top Processes by Memory:

143 MB Google Chrome

77 MB mds_stores

45 MB softwareupdated

37 MB Dock

33 MB Console

Virtual Memory Information:

1.75 GB Free RAM

1.38 GB Active RAM

187 MB Inactive RAM

449 MB Wired RAM

412 MB Page-ins

0 B Page-outs

Well Lets just say both tests say that my disk is "failing"....bummer.

I guess I have to take it in and get the hard drive replaced huh?

=== CURRENT POWER CYCLE STATISTICS ===

Data Read : 1.6 GB

Data Written : 3.1 GB

Data Read/Write Ratio : 0.51

Average Throughput (Read) : 529.3 KB/s

Average Throughput (Write) : 312.8 KB/s

Operations (Read) : 40,102

Operations (Write) : 72,273

Operations Read/Write Ratio : 0

Throughput per operation (Read) : 41.5 KB/Op

Throughput per operation (Write) : 45.1 KB/Op

Latency Time (Read) : 0 ns

Latency Time (Write) : 0 ns

Retries (Read) : 0

Retries (Write) : 0

Errors (Read) : 63

Errors (Write) : 0

=== PROBLEMS SUMMARY ===

Failed Indicators (life-span / pre-fail) : 0 (0 / 0)

Failing Indicators (life-span / pre-fail) : 2 (1 / 1)

Warnings (life-span / pre-fail) : 0 (0 / 0)

Recently failed Self-tests (Short / Full) : 0 (0 / 0)

I/O Errors Count : 63 (63 / 0)

Time in Under temperature : 0 minutes

Time in Over temperature : 0 minutes

=== IMPORTANT HEALTH INDICATORS ===

ID NAME RAW VALUE STATUS

5 Reallocated Sector Count 563 45.3% Failing

197 Current Pending Sectors Count 6,880 1.0% Failing

198 Offline Uncorrectable Sector Count 0 100% OK

199 UDMA CRC Error Count 0 100% OK

=== TEMPERATURE INFORMATION (CELSIUS) ===

Current Temperature : 38

Power Cycle Min Temperature : 37

Power Cycle Max Temperature : 40

Lifetime Min Temperature : 4

Lifetime Max Temperature : 48

Recommended Min Temperature : 0

Recommended Max Temperature : 60

Temperature Min Limit : -40

Temperature Max Limit : 65

=== DRIVE HEALTH INDICATORS ===

ID | NAME | TYPE | UPDATE | RAW VALUE | VALUE | THRESHOLD | WORST | STATUS

1 Raw Read Error Rate Pre-fail online 0x42C0000 77 62 77 39.5% OK

2 Throughput Performance Pre-fail offline 0 100 40 100 100% OK

3 Spin Up Time Pre-fail online 1 174 33 174 84.4% OK

4 Start Stop Count Life-span online 4,589 98 0 98 98.0% OK

5 Reallocated Sector Count Pre-fail online 563 48 5 48 45.3% Failing

7 Seek Error Rate Pre-fail online 0x0 100 67 100 100% OK

8 Seek Time Performance Pre-fail offline 0 100 40 100 100% OK

9 Power On Hours Life-span online 6,973 85 0 85 85.0% OK

10 Spin Retry Count Pre-fail online 0 100 60 100 100% OK

12 Power Cycle Count Life-span online 4,573 98 0 98 98.0% OK

160 Unknown Attribute Life-span online 0x0 100 0 100 100% OK

191 G-Sense Error Rate Life-span online 2 99 0 99 99.0% OK

192 Power-Off Retract Count Life-span online 0x53E00000051 93 0 93 93.0% OK

193 Load Cycle Count Life-span online 66,323 94 0 94 94.0% OK

194 Temperature (Celsius) Life-span online 38 157 0 157 78.5% OK

195 Hardware ECC Recovered Life-span online 0x49004E0 34 0 34 34.0% OK

196 Reallocated Event Count Life-span online 566 84 0 84 84.0% OK

197 Current Pending Sectors Count Life-span online 6,880 1 0 1 1.0% Failing

198 Offline Uncorrectable Sector Count Life-span offline 0 100 0 100 100% OK

199 UDMA CRC Error Count Life-span online 0 200 0 200 100% OK

223 Load Retry Count Life-span online 0 100 0 100 100% OK

254 Free Fall Sensor Life-span online 14,560 44 0 44 100% OK

=== DRIVE ERROR LOG ===

# | TIME OCCURRED | ERRORS | PRIOR COMMAND

5 6973 hours UNC READ DMA EXT

4 6973 hours UNC READ DMA EXT

3 6973 hours UNC READ DMA EXT

2 6973 hours UNC READ DMA EXT

1 6973 hours UNKNOWN ERROR READ FPDMA QUEUED

=== DRIVE SELF-TEST LOG ===

self-test log is empty

MadShy you compounded your problems by installing CleanMyMac2. It was not present in your earlier report.

No one suggested installing that garbage. You now have a complete mess on your hands. At worst you may need to erase your Mac completely and rebuild it from the ground up, but short of that extreme you may be able to recover by reinstalling OS X from the Recovery partition, which will restore any required OS X components that CleanMyMac "cleaned".

Uninstall CleanMyMac before you reinstall OS X. That will be a challenge all to itself since I understand its uninstaller is not completely effective.

This is the problem with hijacking someone else's Discussion. In the future pleasestart a new Discussionso that your own circumstances can be properly addressed.

@brz4

Nothing serious in this list.

Some advice:

1. Uninstall Sleeptime.

2. Remove Bittorrent from SystemPreferences/Users&Groups/LoginItems , remove with the minus sign. You should start it when needed only, after that Quit (from the menu).

You know that torrent downloading can be illegal.

3. Java is not installed, so you can remove the Java plugin: In Finder go to Macintosh HD /Library/InternetPlugins folder and delete the JavaAppletPlugin

4. In Finder go to yourname /Library/LaunchAgents folder and delete com.apple.CSConfigDotMacCert-[...]@me.com-SharedServices.Agent.plist (this is one entry).

5. Empty the trash bin.

6. Make a backup plan (on a different disk).

7. Make a backup plan (on a different disk).

8. Make a backup plan (on a different disk).

and so on....

When you still have this "same issue" after this: it is not because of too less ram, nor too less space on disk.

Then you can do a SMC reset and a PRAM reset:

SMC: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3964

PRAM: http://support.apple.com/kb/ph4405

Lex

inanna hunter until LexSchellings gets back to you, get rid of both the MacKeeper and CleanMyMac garbage. Both of them are scam products that will only cause problems. Never pollute a Mac with trash like that.

Follow the instructions below to remove MacKeeper. Earlier versions than the one released in 2012 require more extensive work to uninstall all its components. Unfortunately CleanMyMac's uninstallation instructions do not remove all its components, and in an abundance of caution I recommend nothing less than erasing your Mac completely and rebuilding it from the ground up.

The fastest way to take an exquisitely designed and painstakingly engineered Mac and make it run like a steaming pile of dung is to install and use so-called "cleaning" or "security" products. Using them to "clean" your Mac of files or operating system components it considers wasted space will result in system corruption that makes merely removing those products insufficient to restore a Mac to its previous state. The only way to do that is to restore your Mac's content from a backup created prior to using it or similarly categorized junk.

Those are not the only programs capable of performing such extensive harm. They are not even the worst of them, but they are very popular due to marketing techniques that are as aggressive as they are effective.

You may have other problems but those are the most obvious. You may be better off erasing your system and reconfiguring it. Don't reinstall the junk.

• If you used MacKeeper to encrypt any files or folders, use MacKeeper to un-encrypt them first.
• Quit the MacKeeper app if it is running.
• Open your Applications folder: Using the Finder's Go menu, select Applications.
• Drag the MacKeeper icon from your Applications folder (not the Dock) to the Trash.

You will be asked to authenticate (twice):

You do not need to provide a reason for uninstalling it:

Just Click the Uninstall MacKeeper button. You will be asked to authenticate again.

After it uninstalls you may empty the Trash and restart your Mac. All that will remain is an inert log file that does nothing but occupy space on your hard disk.

LexSchellings wrote:

My first impression is to make a clean install of OSX, and then only install your work apps, and then only the latest version.

I would guess that nine out of ten Mavericks users have benefited from a simple OS X restore from the Recovery Partition. I know that when I had some major issues with 10.9 in the early days, that took care of everything. It's relatively fast, only restores the OS and doesn't disturb any User files. It doesn't touch third party apps, though, so if it doesn't work, then a clean install is definitely in order.

Oh, and let's not forget that Flash Player update.

LexSchellings,

I bought the Macbook Pro in late 2012 and never been used a lot, but recently its very slow and having the spinning wheel problems. As per your instructions in the previous post i downloaded Etrecheck and here is the link for the log i posted

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6024392

Please help me.

Thanks in advance

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6033095

Hi Lex, My Mac is also running slow. I've posted the diagnostic as per your instructions on the new thread listed above. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks!

LexSchellings - hey there. If you have the time and patience do you mind taking a look at my EtreCheck results at:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6035452?answerId=25299111022#25299111022

Thanks in advance,

Hi Lex,

I would really appreciate your help if you've got some time to look at this EtreCheck report. My Macbook pro has been so slow that I worry it might crash anytime. I'm backing it up just in case. Here is the report:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6042203

Many thanks in advance!

Hi MadMacs0

Sorry for the very brief hijack, but trying to get your attention. I've posted a question for you to this older thread to which you possibly no longer subscribe. Can you please take a look. Thanks.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5141063?answerId=25366636022#25366636022

Hi...my mac book pro got really slow recently, too...I've read through the discussions and started by uinstalling some programs and emptying my downloads folder which seems to have already helped but there's still some weird things here, like 'TuneupMyMac' and 'iTunesHelper' with warning signs next to them showing in the login items...or should those be there? I've run etrecheck and wonder if somebody would be able to have look at my thread and give me some feedback...perhaps there's something I could improve...I'd really appreaciate it! thank you in advance! Here's the link: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6093157

Hi Lex, I've been reading this thread, I've deleted some old unused bits of software. My question is this has happened over the last three days, suddenly, I haven't downloaded any new software for a while, so why now is slowing down and turning jittery?

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6109437