Lag in Typing in Yosemite's Mail w/ External Apple Keyboard

To eliminate the idea that this is an older or slower machine issue, I am running a recently built $10K MacPro. 1 TB SSD. 64 GB Memory 1866 MHz DDR3. 2.7 GHz 12 Core.

I too have the same issue as everyone else. I have done a "start from scratch" installation as a last resort and once again, same issue. I have tried all paths. Running the 10.10.1, same issue. No clue what more to try so I think it is a "wait" but I'm open to any ideas should someone get one.

It occurred to me that the typing lag problem in Mail might be due to my Logitech K750 keyboard which uses a USB transceiver. So I dragged out an old wired Apple Keyboard to see if this fixed the problem. No luck. The lag is just as evident so the problem clearly is connected to the mail app.

I notice that when the lag occurs there is often a brief symbol of some sort that flashes, but it happens so fast that I can't read it.

Maybe when 10.10.2 is released this will be fixed.

I've noticed that the lag only happens when Mail is busy talking to the mail server, checking for new messages in various folders. You can see this for yourself by going to Window->Activity and watching all the background activity taking place. When it's quiescent, there's no keyboard lag (for me).

Upon the observation that the text entry delay happens during the moments when there is server activity, I temporarily disabled several of my (unimportant) mail accounts, thereby reducing the amount of server traffic significantly. The text entry delay seems to occur less frequently with less server access for me.

Are others seeing the same thing? (choose "Activity" from the Window menu to monitor server interaction).

Kirk out

From the Mac news world:

"Apple today seeded the first beta of OS X 10.10.2 Yosemite to developers, just three days after releasing OS X 10.10.1 to the public.

The new beta, build 14C68k, is available through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store and should be available in the Mac Dev Center soon. The beta also includes Safari 8.0.2 and an update to the Mail app (version 8.2)."

I have been suffering this behaviour and had started another thread to which nobody replied so I thought I was the only person experiencing it and that it would go on forever.

I am only using my MBP's built in keyboard. I have noticed a similar delay in Safari too but as I don't type that many long text blocks in Safari, it is less of a problem but I did remark that it was happening as I typed in the original thread:

Yosemite Mail 8.0 and Safari 8.0 text input slow

I have had other problems which are certainly related, often I type a space and it does not appear. This may occur a number of times and then I found that at the end of the paragraph, there would be about ten spaces after the last character. Another similar problem - which may be identical when I think about it - is that if I stop typing for a while, whilst I think, the insertion point seems to slip back a space. I have noticed it when I have tried to type a colon with a URL a couple of live below.

I try to type something like this:

And I end up with something like this

:

I had noticed that I get the SBBoD for a fraction of a second when the delay catches up which co-incided with some activity in one of the menus - as if a cmd-key shortcut had been used - the menu header flashed blue. I am not certain whether it was File or Edit but when I looked at what was under each one, I thought it must be Edit as there were a few text related items in there such as spelling and grammar. I disabled the grammar checking thinking it must be that but it hasn't made any difference.

My Mail CPU also seems a bit high, sometimes about 1.5GB and very often, if not almost always, has the highest CPU of any application.

So, in short, as well as finding some possible additional symptoms, I'm sorry that you all have the same problem but I'm glad I found you. It is driving me crazy too.

I should also have mentioned that I have Dockstar, a Mail plugin, installed but have tried disabling it and it made no difference. However, I just rebooted and on doing so, I got a Dockstar update notification saying that the new version was made compatible with Mail 8.2 so an update to Mail is probably imminent.

I just tried something new to fix the typing lag problem.

1. Open Mail
2. Window > Connection Doctor
3. Uncheck Log Connection Activity

I've tried creating a few new email messages and the typing lag is gone. Since the problem seems to be intermittent It's too early to declare this to be a fix, but it seems promising. It would help if others in this thread could try this and see if it works for them.

Mac Mini (Late 2012)

2.6 GHz Core i7

16 GB

Intel HS Graphics 4000

OS X 10.10.1

I can discount the Log Connection Activity theory, at least on my Mac, as it was not checked when I opened Connection Doctor.

Ah, bummer. Thanks for checking this. I guess we can just hope that 10,10.2 provides a fix. I'll just have to type slower, I guess.

Phil

I can't be sure exactly what I changed but it was in settings. One day some web post I read made me want to try settings. Someone said that it went away for them when they switched from classic layout to normal. For me that did not work. But I switched a lot of things on and off and at some point in my playing the horrible lag went totally away and mail started to act completely normal. It has been normal ever since. You're right that it must not be "highlight message" because I just tried putting it back on and it doesn't make it worse again.

But for whatever reason I had it from the time I upgraded to yosemite until that day and I haven't had it since. Maybe some setting didn't migrate properly from my upgrade from mavericks. I bet it is just some outlier bug and the reason more isn't heard about it is because it isn't happening to most people. Anyway, I'd try turning on and off lots of settings and seeing if you can't clear it up.

Same here. Crazy delays in Mail, 2013 MBP 10.10.1 with 16GB of RAM. Definitely not a hardware issue. Glad to see that dozens other are starting to complain. Checked background processes and problem persists with almost nothing going on and all other apps quit. Gotta be a .1 bug as I don't remember having it with 10.10.0 and I work in Apple's Mail App every day for hours. What an obvious, annoying bug! Kinda disappointing with the piles of money Apple has and they missed this one. I'm typing in TextEdit till they fix it. Makes Mail nearly unusable. They should fix the ghost messages in the draft box IMAP bug while they're at. That's been around for at least 2 OSes!

My issue is not with an external keyboard. Happens with the built in one.

Did a clean re-install of Yosemite and the problem has disappeared!

This isn't just a 10.10.1 bug. In fact, this thread started before 10.10.1 was even released to the public.

Interesting about the "clean install" reportedly helping/fixing the issue. I have done a "reinstall" of Yosemite (after booting from the Recovery partition) and it didn't fix the text entry delay in Mail.

"Marx" Would you please be so kind as to be specific about how you performed the "clean install" on your machine? Did you erase/repartition your drive in the process, reinstall and then migrate your data back from a backup? How long has it been since you performed this? Still working?

Also EVERYONE: please remember to provide feedback through the official Apple mechanisms. Posting a "me too" comment here is good but Apple isn't likely to be reading any of this.

Public Feedback:

https://www.apple.com/feedback/

Developer Bug Reporting:

https://developer.apple.com/bug-reporting/

Thanks,

Kirk out