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Swift1113 Author

Level 1

0 points

OS X Mavericks - Awful Performance

Well, here we go again...

Apple releases an updated OS and it turns my Mac which is less than a year old into an underperforming little box of frustration for no apparent reason. I installed Mavericks last night and the overall performance of my system has taken an absolute nosedive. Seemingly every operation (booting up, launching apps, playing video/audio, browsing the filesystem, etc) is noticably slower. I really don't feel like this should be the case considering the hardware I am running on which is listed below:

Mac mini (late 2012):

2.6GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7

8GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x4GB

1TB Fusion Drive

I literally got this thing (maxed out on specs and $$$) less than a year ago and already Apple's awesome OS update has already devalued it. Is this the strategy these days? Release OS updates that run like crap on hardware that isn't even a year old in order to force people to keep purchasing newer hardware? All of a sudden a system that left nothing to be desired in terms of performance is now exhibiting early-2000s behavior that includes stuttering video/audio, spinning beach balls galore, and apps that sit and bounce in the dock 15 times before it even launches and becomes useable.

Is anyone else seeing this stuff? The memory and CPU useage on my system looks fine to me so it's tough for me to just blame a bad install for all of this. I can't see any reason why it's performing so badly now given all of the features Apple bragged about that are supposed to speed up your system (App Nap, Compressed Memory, OpenCL, etc). This is worse than going from Snow Leopard to Lion, IMHO.

Apple - You can keep your Maps app, tabbed Finder, and the annoying notifications flashing in my face every two seconds if it means that my system will be able to perform well again. I want my system back.

Mac mini, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Oct 23, 2013 9:49 AM

277 replies

Oct 25, 2013 6:10 AM in response to Swift1113

I Migrated to Apple and OSX in 2008 because of Windows Vista and happy until now. Mavericks is SOOOOO Slow. Running Repair Disk permissions really helped but still it is slower than 10.8.5.

I'm reluctant to run the free OnyX app until that is updated to work with 10.9. Titanium software says they are working on a release to work with Mavericks. http://www.titanium.free.frsay they are working on it. toot soon, i hope.

I would expect a major OS Upgrade would be an improvement rather than going backwards. Tim, please address this before it gets out of control!

MacBook Pro 13-inch, Mid 2012

2.5 GHz Intel Core i5

4GB 1600MHz DDR3

Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB

OS X 10.9 (13A603)

Oct 25, 2013 8:25 AM in response to Swift1113

Macbook air 2011 i5 1.6 ghz 4gb 128gb

geekbench and novabench gave me almost the third what i expect 1400 for geekbench when it had gave me around 3800 on moutain lion, novabench gave me 221 , my old macbook air core2duo 2010 had 280!

this is is a disaster,

ihad some minors Error on disk, which was successufily repaired, still i suffering from sloweness

Oct 25, 2013 8:27 AM in response to John Galt

Macbook air 2011 i5 1.6 ghz 4gb 128gb

this is is a disaster,

ihad some minors Error on disk, which was successufily repaired, still i suffering fromsloweness

Oct 25, 2013 9:26 AM in response to Courtlandmcdonald

Courtlandmcdonald wrote:

I Migrated to Apple and OSX in 2008 because of Windows Vista and happy until now. Mavericks is SOOOOO Slow. Running Repair Disk permissions really helped but still it is slower than 10.8.5.

I'm reluctant to run the free OnyX app until that is updated to work with 10.9. Titanium software says they are working on a release to work with Mavericks. http://www.titanium.free.frsay they are working on it. toot soon, i hope.

I would expect a major OS Upgrade would be an improvement rather than going backwards. Tim, please address this before it gets out of control!

MacBook Pro 13-inch, Mid 2012

2.5 GHz Intel Core i5

4GB 1600MHz DDR3

Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB

OS X 10.9 (13A603)

First I would suggest openning activity monitor to see if there are any

runaway processes, memory hogging issues, or excessive disk or network

access.

I would also suggest booting into safe mode and see if the slowness

issue remains. If it works fine in safe mode, then you need to investigate

all third party apps/drivers and also, if you have any start up items you should

disable them to see if performance improves and if so, add back one at a time

until the offender is found.

Oct 25, 2013 9:40 AM in response to ElectroMac74

ElectroMac74 wrote:

Macbook air 2011 i5 1.6 ghz 4gb 128gb

geekbench and novabench gave me almost the third what i expect 1400 for geekbench when it had gave me around 3800 on moutain lion, novabench gave me 221 , my old macbook air core2duo 2010 had 280!

this is is a disaster,

ihad some minors Error on disk, which was successufily repaired, still i suffering fromsloweness

FWIW, I compared what is posted for Geekbench scores here

for 64bit multicore: http://browser.primatelabs.com/mac-benchmarks

to what get get running Geekbench with Mavericks. Results:

2011 MacMini Server, 2.0 GHz, i7 quad core-

Posted rating - 8501

My Mavericks install - 9501

Early 2011 Macbook Pro 13", 2.7 GHz, i7 dual core

Posted rating - 5567

My Mavericks install - 7382

I certainly feel that the machines are performing faster

including Windows 8.1 VMs using Parallels. Even Photoshop CS6

seems to be doing things a little quicker on these machines.

Follow what I suggested in my earlier post and see what results you get.

Oct 25, 2013 9:59 AM in response to woodmeister50

Macbook air 2011 i5 4gb 128gb

Thanks

i tried safe mode but it change nothing geekbench(32bits) still 700/1400 when it should be 1500/3500.

there is no errors on my SSD. Activity monitor show very low CPU, SSD, Mem use .

i kept novabench score of my old 2010 core2duo macbook air(mac os x 10.7.4) it gave the core2duo CPU score of 110 when giving me now 95 for my i5 1.6ghz!!!!!

i tried Handbrake conversion and it gave be around 40fps when it use to score 100-120fps on same file same setting.

John Galt

Level 10

146,570 points

Oct 25, 2013 10:02 AM in response to ElectroMac74

ElectroMac74 wrote:

Macbook air 2011 i5 1.6 ghz 4gb 128gb

geekbench and novabench gave me almost the third what i expect 1400 for geekbench when it had gave me around 3800 on moutain lion, ...

You should have had better results from Geekbench even with Mountain Lion, and Mavericks should perform better still. Be sure to select the 64 bit tests.

If you start a new Discussion and include the troubleshooting results I requested earlier, whatever is wrong with your Mac can be addressed.

Thanks!

Oct 25, 2013 10:19 AM in response to ElectroMac74

ElectroMac74 wrote:

Macbook air 2011 i5 4gb 128gb

Thanks

i tried safe mode but it change nothing geekbench(32bits) still 700/1400 when it should be 1500/3500......

Should be tested at 64 bit then compare results because Mavericks is

a fully 64bit OS.

Also, what have you found when checking Activity Monitor for

CPU, Memory Usage, etc.

Oct 25, 2013 10:34 AM in response to joaomalveiro

thanks anyway, may have to wait for a 10.9.1!

Oct 25, 2013 10:32 AM in response to John Galt

unfortunately , i do not have the 64bits geekebench ,

i tried everything repair disk repair permission, safe mode...

thanks anyway, may have to wait for a 10.9.1!

John Galt

Level 10

146,570 points

Oct 25, 2013 10:36 AM in response to ElectroMac74

ElectroMac74 wrote:

thanks anyway, may have to wait for a 10.9.1!

An OS X update, if and when Apple decides to release one, won't fix whatever is wrong with your Mac.

If you start a new Discussion and include the troubleshooting results I requested earlier, your concerns can be addressed. Thanks!

Oct 25, 2013 10:51 AM in response to John Galt

i open a new discussion with the EtreCheck details:

Mavericks too slow: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5483185

thanks

Oct 25, 2013 11:39 AM in response to John Galt

Hi John Galt,

There's my results: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5483475, what should i do now?

regards

Oct 25, 2013 12:40 PM in response to rommm

iMac running like a bag of nails tried every thing since down loading Mav but it doesn't seem to change anything a hammer is my next thought

Oct 25, 2013 1:01 PM in response to John Galt

Many thanks for your suggestions. I did an OS X Recovery; it only let me Verify (not Repair), but it found no errors. The only apps that start on booting are Apple Mail and iTunes. I am still seeing a considerable slowdown from 10.8. It takes longer to open apps, and within apps (like iPhoto and Photoshop for example) the delays are very noticable that never occured before.

I have a pretty clean system with no third party plug-ins other than in Safari.

OS X Mavericks - Awful Performance