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iMac mid 2010 graphics issues after installing Yosemite

I notice that after my Mac comes back up from sleep, graphics seem to be a bit slow.

Opening up the Downloads from the dock where the files Fan up seem jerky. Most impacted are the 2 games I have.

Playing Sonic racing and Castle of Illusions Mickey Mouse play slow and jerky. Lot of dropped FPS. Overall graphics are slow.

After I restart my Mac, everything is fine again. Never had this issue with Mavericks.

I tried "Reduce Transparency" Didn't help.

I even did a fresh re-install of Yosemite from scratch (booting up in recover mode, wipe out everything and download and install).

I don't have much software installed either. MS Office, Chrome, Google drive, PS, Lightroom. That's it.

Still the same problem. Mac wakes up from sleep and graphics are poor. Games run very jerky with loss of FPS.

I'm guessing Yosemite has some issues with ATI Radeon HD 5750. This is frustrating...

User uploaded file

iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Oct 21, 2014 7:02 AM

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157 replies

Oct 21, 2014 7:05 PM in response to kmdriver

I have the same computer, and I appear to have a huge problem with the graphics subsystem as well.


After my iMac comes back from sleep, odd rows of small blocks appear in random areas of the screen and flicker on and off. Sometimes the problem just gets progressively worse, the computer eventually freezes and a hardware reset is required. Upon reboot, a dialogue box comes up informing me that a graphics problem has happened and asks permission to send debug information to Apple. Of course I approve the request and hence, Apple knows about this bug. Other times the problem seems to just go away after a few minutes and a reboot isn't required.


I've read on several site that there's a problem with the Radeon 5000 series drivers in Yosemite. Hopefully someone is working on a fix quickly because my iMac is now totally unreliable.

Oct 22, 2014 1:25 AM in response to patscanlan

I am also seeing this problem on my mid-2010 iMac 27inch since installing Yosemite.

For reference, mine has the ATI HD5750 1GB Graphics Card.


The two games I play are EVE Online and Borderlands 2. Both of these show a dramatic slowdown in FPS if launched after the iMac has woken from sleep. The slowdown goes away after restarting. I have tried an SMC reset but this makes no difference. Can confirm that reducing transparency makes no difference. I have done some before/after comparisons of processes in Activity Monitor. If I make sure no other apps are running before and after sleep, and in both cases Activity monitor shows virtually no load on the system - so there is no evidence of some 'rogue process' running off with CPU cycles after wake from sleep. It's almost as if the GPU remains in low-power mode after a wake from sleep - but I'm not even sure if this model of iMac has a low-power mode.


Good to know that safe-boot fixes the problem - should give us something to start looking in to.

I'm also going to setup a separate user account and see if that makes a difference.

Oct 22, 2014 2:47 PM in response to kmdriver

Update: Partitioned my internal HDD and installed a fresh copy of the public version of 10.10, which I downloaded from the App Store. Setup my user and in my short usage time this morning, it showed no evidence of the graphics issue I experienced on my other internal drive. To me, this does indicate a software issue in the upgrade process I followed. Other users on here have reported this same issue going directly from 10.9.5 to the public release though, so not sure what that means for our models of iMacs.


Next step for me before Genius appt. would be to backup all of my data, wipe my primary SSD, and reinstall a fresh copy of 10.10 and migrate my data back. I will let you know what happens.

Oct 22, 2014 3:16 PM in response to kmdriver

Thanks for the update patscanlan. I called support and after trying a safe boot (shift-power button) the flickering did not happen. After regular boot it came back. Next step for me is to back up the data and bring it in for a Genius bar appointment or to do a fresh install of Yosemite, they suspect it's a software issue.

Oct 22, 2014 4:04 PM in response to patscanlan

Fortunately I don't have color patterns on my screen as some of you are experiencing. In my case I just notice jerkiness in certain things like opening up the Downloads from the dock where the files Fan up. And play the games I own. Lots of dropped FPS. Just slow. And this randomly happens when my Mac comes back up from sleep. This was the case last night and I just put it back to sleep before going to bed. Now today I come home from work and wake up my Mac and WHAT??!! it's smooth again. As if it came back from a restart. But I didn't restart it. I'm going to closely monitor this behavior. It seems this may be a software issue with the OS and random.

Oct 22, 2014 7:11 PM in response to Tizmanian

I really don't think this is RAM related. You can always shut down your iMac, take the RAM out, swap the chips around and put them back in. Also try resetting your PRAM.


I really think this is a software issue. Try installing 10.10 on an external drive and booting to it. If you do not experience the video issue while booted to the external, it is a software issue.

Oct 22, 2014 7:47 PM in response to patscanlan

Of course it is a software issue. I reinstalled Mavericks from time machine backup this morning and everything has been working fine (thanks God). I have never experienced these displays issues neither with Lion, Mountain Lion nor Mavericks, right 8 hours after Yosemite installation I got into these issues. I'm not gonna waste more time into this so I decided to keep Mavericks in my iMac until Apple release a fix for this. I'm keeping Yosemite in my one week old 13" MacBook Pro Retina which is working perfect with Yosemite.

iMac mid 2010 graphics issues after installing Yosemite

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