Super Slow Powerbook After Yosemite

You are making this very complicated when it's really very easy. The only reason for downgrading to Snow Leopard is if you must do a clean Erase and Install and have to replace the HDD or must repartition the disk. I've given you a procedure for reinstalling OS X without erasing the drive. Backup your files and follow the procedure. You won't lose anything. First things first: get the system working as it should.

If we back up a bit and look at the earlier part of this topic. You did a reinstall, posted a new EtreCheck report that looked fine. I'm not sure where we were going from there. You then stated you always had programs that showed up as non-responsive (red) in Activity Monitor. I suggested they could be incompatible and needed to be upgraded or replaced.

I don't know quite where to go from this point. You've repaired the hard drive and permissions, booted into Safe Mode then back. Maybe I'm missing something but I don't think so.

Well, it's surely a puzzle to me. I use computers from 2011 that work perfectly well with Yosemite. If you feel you want to downgrade, then you will need to do the following if your computer came with Snow Leopard pre-installed:

Clean Install of Snow Leopard

Be sure to make a backup first because the following procedure will erase

the drive and everything on it.

1. Boot the computer using the Snow Leopard Installer Disc or the Disc 1 that came

with your computer. Insert the disc into the optical drive and restart the computer.

After the chime press and hold down the "C" key. Release the key when you see

a small spinning gear appear below the dark gray Apple logo.

2. 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 the hard drive entry from the left side list (mfgr.'s ID and drive

size.) Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. Set the number of

partitions to one (1) from the Partitions drop down menu, click on Options button

and select GUID, click on OK, then set the format type to MacOS Extended

(Journaled, if supported), then click on the Apply button.

3. When the formatting has completed quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed

with the OS X installation and follow the directions included with the installer.

4. When the installation has completed your computer will Restart into the Setup

Assistant. After you finish Setup Assistant will complete the installation after which

you will be running a fresh install of OS X. You can now begin the update process

by opening Software Update and installing all recommended updates to bring your

installation current.

Download and install Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1. Go to the App Store and download Mountain Lion and upgrade unless you are happier sticking with Snow Leopard.

If your computers came with Lion or later pre-installed then do this instead of the above:

Install OS X Using Internet Recovery

Be sure you backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive because the following procedure will remove everything from the hard drive.

Boot to the Internet Recovery HD:

Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND-OPTION- R keys until a globe appears on the screen. Wait patiently - 15-20 minutes - until the Recovery main menu appears.

Partition and Format the hard drive:

1. Select Disk Utility from the main menu and click on the Continue button.
2. After DU loads select your newly installed hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed. Quit DU and return to the main menu.

Reinstall OS X: Select Reinstall OS X and click on the Install button. Be sure to select the correct drive to use if you have more than one.

Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.

This should restore the version of OS X originally pre-installed on the computer.

The steps I just posted are to downgrade to Mountain Lion or Snow Leopard. I do not believe you should reinstall Yosemite given the problems you seem to have. If you were to reinstall Yosemite then it should be a clean install where you first re-partition and erase the drive. This is the second method in the above from which you can reinstall Yosemite, but if you don't then it should install the OS X version that was pre-installed on the computer if that version was Lion or later.

You need to remove the malware, Genieo and OmniBar from your computer:

Helpful Links Regarding Malware Problems

If you are having an immediate problem with ads popping up see The Safe Mac » Adware Removal Guide, AdwareMedic, or Remove unwanted adware that displays pop-up ads and graphics on your Mac - Apple Support.

Mac OS X- Gray screen or prohibitory sign appears during startup

Improper removal of Genieo can lead to a problem similar to this. However, AdwareMedic takes special precautions to make sure this doesn't happen when removing Genieo, and in addition, this problem would not prevent you from being able to start up in recovery mode. I suspect you may have some kind of hardware issue. If you have an Apple Store near you, the best thing you could do would be to make an appointment at the Genius Bar and take the machine in for Apple's techs to look at.

Can anyone help me with similar slow load problems? Slowness mainly occurs when switching between open applications.

I have pasted my EtreCheck report below...

Problem description:

Very slow computer

EtreCheck version: 2.1.8 (121)

Report generated February 9, 2015 at 10:08:04 AM EST

Download EtreCheck from http://etresoft.com/etrecheck

Click the [Click for support] links for help with non-Apple products.

Click the [Click for details] links for more information about that line.

Hardware Information: ℹ️

MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2010) (Technical Specifications)

MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro6,2

1 2.4 GHz Intel Core i5 CPU: 2-core

4 GB RAM Upgradeable

BANK 0/DIMM0

2 GB DDR3 1067 MHz ok

BANK 1/DIMM0

2 GB DDR3 1067 MHz ok

Bluetooth: Old - Handoff/Airdrop2 not supported

Wireless: en1: 802.11 a/b/g/n

Battery Health: Normal - Cycle count 98

Video Information: ℹ️

Intel HD Graphics - VRAM: 288 MB

Color LCD 1440 x 900

NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M - VRAM: 256 MB

System Software: ℹ️

OS X 10.10.1 (14B25) - Time since boot: 3 days 2:17:51

Disk Information: ℹ️

Hitachi HTS545032B9SA02 disk0 : (320.07 GB)

EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB

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

Macintosh HD (disk1) / : 318.84 GB (133.73 GB free)

Encrypted AES-XTS Unlocked

Core Storage: disk0s2 319.21 GB Online

MATSHITADVD-R UJ-898

USB Information: ℹ️

Apple Inc. iPad

Apple Inc. BRCM2070 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad

Apple Internal Memory Card Reader

Apple Inc. Built-in iSight

Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver

Gatekeeper: ℹ️

Mac App Store and identified developers

Kernel Extensions: ℹ️

/Library/Extensions

[not loaded] com.equinux.VPNTracker6 (6.9.2) [Click for support]

[loaded] com.equinux.VPNTracker8 (8.0.0 - SDK 10.10) [Click for support]

/System/Library/Extensions

[loaded] com.Cycling74.driver.Soundflower (1.5.2) [Click for support]

[not loaded] com.jft.driver.PdaNetDrv (1.0.0d1) [Click for support]

Launch Agents: ℹ️

[not loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.adobe.CS5ServiceManager.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.oracle.java.Java-Updater.plist [Click for support]

Launch Daemons: ℹ️

[loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist [Click for support]

[not loaded] com.adobe.SwitchBoard.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.equinux.VPNTracker6.agent.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.equinux.VPNTracker8.agent.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.oracle.java.JavaUpdateHelper.plist [Click for support]

User Launch Agents: ℹ️

[loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.citrixonline.GoToMeeting.G2MUpdate.plist [Click for support]

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist [Click for support]

[running] com.microsoft.LaunchAgent.SyncServicesAgent.plist [Click for support]

[running] com.spotify.webhelper.plist [Click for support]

User Login Items: ℹ️

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

Dropbox Application (/Applications/Dropbox.app)

Alfred Application (/Applications/Alfred.app)

Internet Plug-ins: ℹ️

JavaAppletPlugin: Version: Java 8 Update 31 Check version

FlashPlayer-10.6: Version: 16.0.0.305 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

Default Browser: Version: 600 - SDK 10.10

Flash Player: Version: 16.0.0.305 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

NP_2020Player_WEB: Version: 5.0.91.0 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

AdobePDFViewer: Version: 9.5.5 [Click for support]

QuickTime Plugin: Version: 7.7.3

SharePointBrowserPlugin: Version: 14.4.7 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

Silverlight: Version: 5.1.10411.0 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

iPhotoPhotocast: Version: 7.0 - SDK 10.8

User internet Plug-ins: ℹ️

amex: Version: 1.1.0.11 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

WebEx64: Version: 1.0 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]

CitrixOnlineWebDeploymentPlugin: Version: 1.0.105 [Click for support]

Google Earth Web Plug-in: Version: 6.0 [Click for support]

3rd Party Preference Panes: ℹ️

Flash Player [Click for support]

Growl [Click for support]

Java [Click for support]

Time Machine: ℹ️

Mobile backups: OFF

Auto backup: NO - Auto backup turned off

Volumes being backed up:

Macintosh HD: Disk size: 318.84 GB Disk used: 185.11 GB

Destinations:

Nye-External-1 [Local]

Total size: 2.00 TB

Total number of backups: 41

Oldest backup: 2014-12-23 00:56:36 +0000

Last backup: 2015-01-23 18:31:48 +0000

Size of backup disk: Excellent

Backup size 2.00 TB > (Disk size 318.84 GB X 3)

Top Processes by CPU: ℹ️

12% mds

6% WindowServer

0% AppleSpell

0% Dropbox

0% SystemUIServer

Top Processes by Memory: ℹ️

275 MB iTunes

172 MB Mail

131 MB com.apple.WebKit.WebContent

107 MB mds_stores

99 MB Safari

Virtual Memory Information: ℹ️

63 MB Free RAM

1.38 GB Active RAM

1.33 GB Inactive RAM

840 MB Wired RAM

11.07 GB Page-ins

470 MB Page-outs

Diagnostics Information: ℹ️

Feb 9, 2015, 07:59:21 AM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/iTunes_2015-02-09-075921_[redacted].cpu_resourc e.diag [Click for details]

Feb 6, 2015, 02:38:50 PM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Microsoft Excel_2015-02-06-143850_[redacted].hang