Yosemite OS UI animation lag

Hello,


I recently updated my 2013 15" retina Macbook to Yosemite and I experience incredibly large lag on the OS UI animations.

The animations stutter badly and sometime even freeze.


While all OS animations stutter, here are the worst ones (since I usually perform them very frequently):

* changing between workspaces (3 finger left right swipe)

* showing all workspace windows (3 finger up swipe)


Does anybody know how to fix this?

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013), OS X Yosemite (10.10)

Posted on Oct 27, 2014 5:32 PM

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Oct 29, 2014 1:46 PM in response to cdmihai

After I do a restart (without restarting open apps) I do notice an improvement. But then it gradually gets worse over time (~days) and over how many things I open and close. So it's clearly a bug on Apple's part on not cleaning up stuff.

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Nov 4, 2014 7:12 AM in response to cdmihai

Earlier versions of the beta didn't have that problem. I think it was beta 3 when it showed up (out of 6). I reported it a couple of times during beta testing but it was never fixed. This on a 2010 Mac Pro with Yosemite installed to an erased drive so any such problems cannot be contributed to installing over an older OS.


Where I see it most is opening folder windows. Instead of smoothly expanding to the open position, they stutter across the screen, showing multiple partly drawn rectangles up to the point where it stops, then cleans up what was supposed to be the genie effect. After doing any given folder once, and you then close it, that folder will open in the smooth animated style as it's supposed to.


It also affects some older apps I have. They draw very fast in Mavericks or older, but on the same hardware, these apps draw very slowly in Yosemite. Something they didn't do in the earlier beta releases.


Something wrong was done to the graphics drivers somewhere around beta 3 that needs to be fixed. Likely only affects some model Macs as it's not an issue that is being widely reported.

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Nov 4, 2014 10:50 AM in response to Kurt Lang

I have noticed that when I tell my mac to use the discrete nvidia card, the UI choppiness mostly goes away. But when I switch to the integrated card the UI starts lagging. But of course, this isn't a solution ...


I also noticed that with Yosemite, scrolling in apps also gets choppy sometimes (have not found a way to reproduce it).

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Nov 4, 2014 12:26 PM in response to cdmihai

No, you cannot solve this. It's the way Apple implement HiDPI support by taking a bigger image and then scaling it down and then scaling it up. All the resolutions you have are scaled modes. Except for the 'best for retina' all other resolutions involve non integer based interpolation... which causes performance issues (it even says so when you try to choose anything other than best for retina mode). So no... there is bugger all you can do. Just hope the next update (10.10.1) tries to address these issues. Turning off translucency from accessibility panel helps but not much.

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Nov 12, 2014 3:37 PM in response to cdmihai

The UI stutter and lag has been driving me crazy since upgrading to Yosemite, especially since I have a MPB 15" Retina and Mountain Lion had been super fast. After lots of searching I came across this article (below) which completely solved the issue for me. It includes deleting some windowserver preference lists and clearing the PRAM. Before these steps I was seeing 10fps with discrete graphics when using Mission Control. Now, it's back to 60fps and there's even no noticeable stutter when using the integrated graphics. Scrolling in Chrome, Safari, etc is also back to normal, as well as any other animations I noticed were crappy before. Hope it works for you too!


https://david.gyttja.com/2013/01/21/fix-lagging-display-performance-on-retina-ma cbook-pro

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Nov 13, 2014 12:18 AM in response to taggart.comet

Thanks for the link. I tried the steps (although in Yosemite I don't have com.apple.windowserver*.plist), the lag disappeared for a few hours and then came back! It drives me crazy too!...


My (temporary) solution is logging out and re-logging in once-twice a day, when the problem occurs..Grrrr

D.

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Nov 13, 2014 12:36 AM in response to cdmihai

(I posted in another forum): notice that if you go to Accessibility and click on Increase contrast for some weird reason the UI lag is gone..I don't know if comes back hours later, for me the UI with increased contrast enabled is ugly 😟


But this leads me that is a general software problem..


best!

D.

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Nov 21, 2014 7:17 AM in response to cdmihai

At startup, animation are smooth. Then after 30min to 24h, it suddenly becomes very laggy.


I notice that by showing the visualized in itunes, it get smoother (but not as good as at startup).


So Apple did TOTALLY SCREW UP something related to graphics. And they DON'T seem to CARE, as always. Even for those who paid 5000$ for an iMac retina....


I have 1 solution:

1. reboot several times a day.


<Edited by Host>

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Nov 19, 2014 5:14 PM in response to ds10320

Thanks for the contrast tip! I've been trying it for the better part of the day and it seems to have fixed all lag issues. The UI kinda looks funky now (gives it a retro look 🙂 ), but I can get used to it (with more issues like this and Mac OS will start sounding like Windows: "It's OK after you get used to its issues and workarounds").


I'll go ahead and report this as a bug for Yosemite. Everybody else should do the same.

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Nov 20, 2014 7:44 AM in response to cdmihai

Bumping because I'm having the same problem. I use workspace switching constantly and this is really annoying and only started after the last few updates to Mavericks. I tried updating up to Yosemite but the issue is still there. I'm also quite sure that no rogue process is eating up CPU or RAM. Very annoying.


Submitted a bug report. It says you need to be a Developer but just sign up as a dev, it's free. If Apple gets enough bug reports they'll fix this!

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Nov 20, 2014 7:52 AM in response to cdmihai

I only have this lag problem when I connect my Macbook to an external monitor. When not connected the UI is smooth. But when connected I see lots of slow lag and jitter and every time I switch from one application to another using a mouse click I see the menu bar reanimates all of the icons on it.

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Yosemite OS UI animation lag

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