bryan_0

Q: Macbook pro 13" runs extremely slow

my macbook pro runs extremely slow, takes more than 10minutes just to complete a simple task like close a page, everytime i click, the spinning wheel comes on stays for about 8 mins before any task is done, Pls help!!

about the mac:

2.4 GHz intel i5

4GB

late 2011

OS X 10.9.5

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9.2)

Posted on Nov 20, 2014 9:25 AM

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Q: Macbook pro 13" runs extremely slow

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  • by Kappy,

    Kappy Kappy Nov 20, 2014 9:24 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 10 (271,169 points)
    Desktops
    Nov 20, 2014 9:24 AM in response to bryan_0

    Things You Can Do To Resolve Slow Downs

     

    If your computer seems to be running slower here are some things you can do:

     

    Start with visits to:     OS X Maintenance - MacAttorney;

                                      The X Lab: The X-FAQs;

                                      The Safe Mac » Mac Performance Guide;

                                      The Safe Mac » The myth of the dirty Mac;

                                      Mac maintenance Quick Assist.

     

    Boot into Safe Mode then repair your hard drive and permissions:

     

    Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions Pre-Lion

     

    Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list.  In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive.  If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.

     

    Repair the Hard Drive - Lion/Mountain Lion/Mavericks

     

    Boot to the Recovery HD:

     

    Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the Utilites Menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD disk icon and click on the arrow button below.

     

    When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list.  In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive.  If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported, then click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu. Select Restart from the Apple menu.

     

    Restart your computer normally and see if this has helped any. Next do some maintenance:

     

    For situations Disk Utility cannot handle the best third-party utility is Disk Warrior;  DW only fixes problems with the disk directory, but most disk problems are caused by directory corruption; Disk Warrior 4.x is now Intel Mac compatible.

     

    Note: Alsoft ships DW on a bootable DVD that will startup Macs running Snow Leopard or earlier. It cannot start Macs that came with Lion or later pre-installed, however, DW will work on those models.

     

    Suggestions for OS X Maintenance

     

    OS X performs certain maintenance functions that are scheduled to occur on a daily, weekly, or monthly period. The maintenance scripts run in the early AM only if the computer is turned on 24/7 (no sleep.) If this isn't the case, then an excellent solution is to download and install a shareware utility such as Macaroni, JAW PseudoAnacron, or Anacron that will automate the maintenance activity regardless of whether the computer is turned off or asleep.  Dependence upon third-party utilities to run the periodic maintenance scripts was significantly reduced since Tiger.  These utilities have limited or no functionality with Snow Leopard or later and should not be installed.

     

    OS X automatically defragments files less than 20 MBs in size, so unless you have a disk full of very large files there's little need for defragmenting the hard drive.

     

    Under no circumstances should you install so-called maintenance software from MacPaw or ZeoBit (CleanMyMac/CleanMyDrive or Mac Keeper, respectively.) You do not need special software to maintain your computer.

     

    Helpful Links Regarding Malware Protection

     

    If you are having an immediate problem with ads popping up see The Safe Mac » Adware Removal Guide and AdwareMedic.

     

    Open Safari, select Preferences from the Safari menu. Click on Extensions icon in the toolbar. Disable all Extensions. If this stops your problem, then re-enable them one by one until the problem returns. Now remove that extension as it is causing the problem.

     

    The following comes from user stevejobsfan0123. I have made minor changes to adapt to this presentation.

     

    Fix Some Browser Pop-ups That Take Over Safari

     

    Common pop-ups include a message saying the government has seized your computer and you must pay to have it released (often called "Moneypak"), or a phony message saying that your computer has been infected, and you need to call a tech support number (sometimes claiming to be Apple) to get it resolved. First, understand that these pop-ups are not caused by a virus and your computer has not been affected. This "hijack" is limited to your web browser. Also understand that these messages are scams, so do not pay any money, call the listed number, or provide any personal information. This article will outline the solution to dismiss the pop-up.

     

    Quit Safari

     

    Usually, these pop-ups will not go away by either clicking "OK" or "Cancel." Furthermore, several menus in the menu bar may become disabled and show in gray, including the option to quit Safari. You will likely have to force quit Safari. To do this, press Command + option + esc, select Safari, and press Force Quit.

     

    Relaunch Safari

     

    If you relaunch Safari, the page will reopen. To prevent this from happening, hold down the 'Shift' key while opening Safari. This will prevent windows from the last time Safari was running from reopening.

     

    This will not work in all cases. The shift key must be held at the right time, and in some cases, even if done correctly, the window reappears. In these circumstances, after force quitting Safari, turn off Wi-Fi or disconnect Ethernet, depending on how you connect to the Internet. Then relaunch Safari normally. It will try to reload the malicious webpage, but without a connection, it won't be able to. Navigate away from that page by entering a different URL, i.e. www.apple.com, and trying to load it. Now you can reconnect to the Internet, and the page you entered will appear rather than the malicious one.

     

    An excellent link to read is Tom Reed's Mac Malware Guide.

    Also, visit The XLab FAQs and read Detecting and avoiding malware and spyware.

    See these Apple articles:

     

      Mac OS X Snow Leopard and malware detection

      OS X Lion- Protect your Mac from malware

      OS X Mountain Lion- Protect your Mac from malware

      OS X Mavericks- Protect your Mac from malware

      About file quarantine in OS X

     

    If you require anti-virus protection Thomas Reed recommends using ClamXAV. (Thank you to Thomas Reed for this recommendation.)

     

    From user Joe Bailey comes this equally useful advice:

     

    The facts are:

     

    1. There is no anti-malware software that can detect 100% of the malware out there.

    2. There is no anti-malware that can detect everything targeting the Mac.

    3. The very best way to prevent the most attacks is for you as the user to be aware that

         the most successful malware attacks rely on very sophisticated social engineering

         techniques preying on human avarice, ****, and fear.

    4. Internet popups saying the FBI, NSA, Microsoft, your ISP has detected malware on

        your computer is intended to entice you to install their malware thinking it is a

        protection against malware.

    5. Some of the anti-malware products on the market are worse than the malware

        from which they purport to protect you.

    6. Be cautious where you go on the internet.

    7. Only download anything from sites you know are safe.

    8. Avoid links you receive in email, always be suspicious even if you get something

        you think is from a friend, but you were not expecting.

    9. If there is any question in your mind, then assume it is malware.

     

    Troubleshooting Applications

     

    I recommend downloading a utility such as TinkerTool System, OnyX, Mavericks Cache Cleaner, or Cocktail that you can use for removing old log files and archives, clearing caches, etc. Corrupted cache, log, or temporary files can cause application or OS X crashes as well as kernel panics.

     

    If you have Snow Leopard or Leopard, then for similar repairs install the freeware utility Applejack.  If you cannot start up in OS X, you may be able to start in single-user mode from which you can run Applejack to do a whole set of repair and maintenance routines from the command line.  Note that AppleJack 1.5 is required for Leopard. AppleJack 1.6 is compatible with Snow Leopard. Applejack does not work with Lion and later.

     

    Basic Backup

     

    For some people Time Machine will be more than adequate. Time Machine is part of OS X. There are two components:

     

    1. A Time Machine preferences panel as part of System Preferences;

    2. A Time Machine application located in the Applications folder. It is

        used to manage backups and to restore backups. Time Machine

        requires a backup drive that is at least twice the capacity of the

        drive being backed up.

     

    Alternatively, get an external drive at least equal in size to the internal hard drive and make (and maintain) a bootable clone/backup. You can make a bootable clone using the Restore option of Disk Utility. You can also make and maintain clones with good backup software. My personal recommendations are (order is not significant):

     

      1. Carbon Copy Cloner

      2. Get Backup

      3. Deja Vu

      4. SuperDuper!

      5. Synk Pro

      6. Tri-Backup

     

    Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore.  Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files. For help with using Time Machine visit Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help with all things Time Machine.

     

    Referenced software can be found at MacUpdate.

     

    Additional Hints

     

    Be sure you have an adequate amount of RAM installed for the number of applications you run concurrently. Be sure you leave a minimum of 10% of the hard drive's capacity as free space.

     

    Add more RAM. If your computer has less than 2 GBs of RAM and you are using OS X Leopard or later, then you can do with more RAM. Snow Leopard and Lion work much better with 4 GBs of RAM than their system minimums. The more concurrent applications you tend to use the more RAM you should have.

     

    Always maintain at least 15 GBs or 10% of your hard drive's capacity as free space, whichever is greater. OS X is frequently accessing your hard drive, so providing adequate free space will keep things from slowing down.

     

    Check for applications that may be hogging the CPU:

     

    Pre-Mavericks

     

    Open Activity Monitor in the Utilities folder.  Select All Processes from the Processes dropdown menu.  Click twice on the CPU% column header to display in descending order.  If you find a process using a large amount of CPU time (>=70,) then select the process and click on the Quit icon in the toolbar.  Click on the Force Quit button to kill the process.  See if that helps.  Be sure to note the name of the runaway process so you can track down the cause of the problem.

     

    Mavericks and later

     

    Open Activity Monitor in the Utilities folder.  Select All Processes from the View menu.  Click on the CPU tab in the toolbar. Click twice on the CPU% column header to display in descending order.  If you find a process using a large amount of CPU time (>=70,) then select the process and click on the Quit icon in the toolbar.  Click on the Force Quit button to kill the process.  See if that helps.  Be sure to note the name of the runaway process so you can track down the cause of the problem.

     

    Often this problem occurs because of a corrupted cache or preferences file or an attempt to write to a corrupted log file.

  • by lllaass,

    lllaass lllaass Nov 20, 2014 9:26 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 10 (188,994 points)
    Desktops
    Nov 20, 2014 9:26 AM in response to bryan_0

    Run this and post the results

    EtreCheck

    More memory will help but I suspect you have other problems by the ten minute time

  • by bryan_0,

    bryan_0 bryan_0 Nov 20, 2014 9:33 AM in response to lllaass
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Nov 20, 2014 9:33 AM in response to lllaass

    Problem description:

    macbook runs really slow, takes time for any activity to be done, even simple tasks such as closing a browser takes 5mins with the spinning wheel appearing all the time.

     

    EtreCheck version: 2.0.11 (98)

    Report generated November 20, 2014 at 5:30:06 PM GMT

     

    Hardware Information: ℹ️

      MacBook Pro (13-inch, Late 2011) (Verified)

      MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro8,1

      1 2.4 GHz Intel Core i5 CPU: 2-core

      4 GB RAM Upgradeable

      BANK 0/DIMM0

      2 GB DDR3 1333 MHz ok

      BANK 1/DIMM0

      2 GB DDR3 1333 MHz ok

      Bluetooth: Old - Handoff/Airdrop2 not supported

      Wireless:  en1: 802.11 a/b/g/n

     

    Video Information: ℹ️

      Intel HD Graphics 3000 - VRAM: 384 MB

      Color LCD 1280 x 800

     

    System Software: ℹ️

      OS X 10.9.5 (13F34) - Uptime: 0:11:0

     

    Disk Information: ℹ️

      TOSHIBA MK5065GSXF disk0 : (500.11 GB)

      S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified

      EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB

      Macintosh HD (disk0s2) /  [Startup]: 499.25 GB (476.55 GB free)

      Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>  [Recovery]: 650 MB

     

      MATSHITADVD-R   UJ-8A8 

     

    USB Information: ℹ️

      Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)

      Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

      Apple Inc. BRCM2070 Hub

      Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

      Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver

     

    Thunderbolt Information: ℹ️

      Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus

     

    Gatekeeper: ℹ️

      Mac App Store and identified developers

     

    Kernel Extensions: ℹ️

      /Library/Application Support/Kaspersky Lab/KAV/Bases/Cache

      [loaded] com.kaspersky.kext.kimul.44 (44) Support

      [loaded] com.kaspersky.kext.mark.1.0.5 (1.0.5) Support

     

      /Library/Extensions

      [loaded] com.kaspersky.kext.klif (3.0.4a41) Support

      [loaded] com.kaspersky.nke (1.6.4a15) Support

     

    Launch Agents: ℹ️

      [running] com.kaspersky.kav.gui.plist Support

     

    Launch Daemons: ℹ️

      [running] com.kaspersky.kav.plist Support

      [loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist Support

     

    User Launch Agents: ℹ️

      [loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist Support

     

    User Login Items: ℹ️

      iTunesHelper ApplicationHidden (/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/MacOS/iTunesHelper.app)

     

    Internet Plug-ins: ℹ️

      Default Browser: Version: 537 - SDK 10.9

      QuickTime Plugin: Version: 7.7.3

      SharePointBrowserPlugin: Version: 14.4.5 - SDK 10.6 Support

     

    Safari Extensions: ℹ️

      vkbd

      URLAdvisor

      Virtual Keyboard

      URL Advisor

     

    3rd Party Preference Panes: ℹ️

      None

     

    Time Machine: ℹ️

      Time Machine not configured!

     

    Top Processes by CPU: ℹ️

          23% mds

          7% WindowServer

          3% mdworker

          1% fontd

          0% kav_agent

     

    Top Processes by Memory: ℹ️

      232 MB kav

      90 MB Google Chrome

      77 MB mds_stores

      60 MB ocspd

      52 MB Google Chrome Helper

     

    Virtual Memory Information: ℹ️

      1.47 GB Free RAM

      1.43 GB Active RAM

      450 MB Inactive RAM

      949 MB Wired RAM

      444 MB Page-ins

      0 B Page-outs

  • by bryan_0,

    bryan_0 bryan_0 Nov 20, 2014 9:34 AM in response to Kappy
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Nov 20, 2014 9:34 AM in response to Kappy

    still trying yours, thanks

  • by lllaass,

    lllaass lllaass Nov 20, 2014 9:41 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 10 (188,994 points)
    Desktops
    Nov 20, 2014 9:41 AM in response to bryan_0

    Remove kaspersky and see what happens.

  • by Mnkbsnss,

    Mnkbsnss Mnkbsnss Nov 20, 2014 9:44 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 1 (40 points)
    Nov 20, 2014 9:44 AM in response to bryan_0

    Hey! The same thing happened to me as soon as I updated my Mac Book Pro late 2011 to Yosemite. Since I had to do it for long and in order to save memory and processing speed I formatted the mac. For me it worked, now applications close in 2/3 seconds!

     

    Here you can find some useful tips: http://www.joshbenson.com/reformat-macbook-pro-to-make-brand-new-again/

     

    if you still have problems after formatting and you are too affectionate to your machine, I suggest you buy a new hard disk on amazon or ebay. If you wanna go for the big shot, go for SSD: http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-JetDrive-Upgrade-MacBook-Macbook/dp/B00JQXT5JO/r ef=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1416505405&sr=1-1&keywords=mac+book+pro+ssd

  • by The hatter,

    The hatter The hatter Nov 20, 2014 9:44 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 9 (60,935 points)
    Nov 20, 2014 9:44 AM in response to bryan_0

    I was going to suggest you upgrade from 2 x 2GB RAM to 2 x 4GB of memory, but you are not having page-outs, still, that would help.

     

    dual-core. Not much can be done about that.

     

    Kaspersky: even my Windows PC run poor(er) with it - try without.

    Google is another - both Google Chrome for Mac OS X, and Google Drive

     

    Safe Boot - twice, and the repair disk drive and boot volume both in Disk Utility from Recovery Mode - can help.

     

    Clone the system with CCC and boot off the clone. How does it feel? What about repairing the boot drive?

    Your boot drive may in the end need to be replaced - if so, strongly consider a 250GB SSD (you don't have much on your drive now).

    That means it would be relatively fast and easy to clone, erase while booted from another drive, and restore - might want to zero the drive first.

    Why? because there could be bad sector blocks.

  • by bryan_0,

    bryan_0 bryan_0 Nov 20, 2014 10:00 AM in response to lllaass
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Nov 20, 2014 10:00 AM in response to lllaass

    removed kaspersky but its still slow and lately the mouse has gone rogue, works by itself and opens apps and moves pages etc

  • by Linc Davis,

    Linc Davis Linc Davis Nov 20, 2014 11:06 AM in response to bryan_0
    Level 10 (207,983 points)
    Applications
    Nov 20, 2014 11:06 AM in response to bryan_0

    The startup drive is failing, or there is some other internal hardware fault.

    Back up all data on the drive immediately if you don't already have a current backup. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional—ask if you need guidance.

    Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store, or go to another authorized service provider.

    If privacy is a concern, erase the data partition(s) with the option to write zeros* (do this only if you have at least two complete, independent backups, and you know how to restore to an empty drive from any of them.) Don’t erase the recovery partition, if present.

    Keeping your confidential data secure during hardware repair

    Apple also recommends that you deauthorize a device in the iTunes Store before having it serviced.

    *An SSD doesn't need to be zeroed.