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Finder extremely slow

I've noticed recently that Finder is increasingly slow in displaying files. Slow in this case is minutes - sometimes several minutes - for each folder in drilling down through directories. I'm not entirely convined that it is a Finder problem specifically, but that's sure where it's most noticeable so far.


I've sent a couple of days browsing through internet responses - to no avail thus far, as most are out-of-date, while others are too extreme (i.e. do a new, clean install).


Any advice would be greatly appreciated, even if I can get some direction for where to start looking.

iMac (27-inch Mid 2010), OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5)

Posted on Oct 25, 2013 9:06 AM

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9 replies

Oct 25, 2013 12:33 PM in response to Baby-Boomer-USofA

I finally noticed that the biggest delays in question were those selected by using the items (folders) in the Finder sidebar. I removed them from the sidebar, then re-added them, with noticeable improvements. I don't know if the Spotlight index has anything to do with Finder, but I'm currently re-building that index, just in case.


Thanks very much for your advice.

Nov 9, 2013 4:32 AM in response to dickfellows

I have spent 3 days trying to solve this problem across nearly a dozen Macs....problem is NOT your hardware, problem is a bug in Mavericks. After being told by tech support to do everything from resetting SMC to resetting NVRAM to forcing Spotlight to re-index, to turning "always" on in scrolling setting in settings as suggested here, trashing plist as suggested here, it turns out that nobody at Apple has responded to the THOUSANDS of posts relating to this problem yet is completely aware of the problem. The problem is a Mavericks glitch and they are well aware of the problem.


Here's a snippet from recent support chat...even the support tech is having the same issue.


"I am so sorry this is happening and do fully understand as my Finder is doing the same thing. I am hoping an update will be released soon that resolves this issue as I know first hand how annoying it can be!!"


Would be so nice if collectively tens of thousands of hours didn't have to be wasted by thousands of people experiencing a problem, trying to figure out a solution when their issue could be simply solved by a single post from Apple letting everyone know that they were aware of a particular issue and working on a fix. Communication with Apple is all too often 1-direction, users submit things but nowhere are users told by Apple "got it, we're aware of and working on this particular issue". Think of all the support expense, user frustration and wasted time this would save everyone!


I want my 3 days back.

Mar 16, 2014 8:12 AM in response to Baby-Boomer-USofA

I'm having an issue strictly with my finder. I followed your advice and trashed the Finder plist and ran the repair disk permissions, and rebooted.


With nothing running but a small calendar (BusyCal) and the finder, my folders still open very slowly when I click on the arrows next to them to expand.


This computer is 1.5 years old, and it's always had issues. I've used Macs since the mid-90's and have never had the issues I've had with this one. My IT folks are always wanting me to do a clean install, and I'm determined not to do that again because I'm tired of rebuilding my preferences, especially in Outlook.


Is there anything you can suggest? When I checked teh Activity monitor, I have plenty of disk and RAM space (4 GB of clear RAM and 227 GB of space (when no apps are running).


Thanks!

Finder extremely slow

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