El Capitan - Safari causing system freeze

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El Capitan - Safari causing system freeze

I have just recently updated to the final build of El Capitan coming from the GM release. Since then, I've been experiencing weird system freeze like everything freezes up except the mouse but can't click anything. It freezes around 5-7 seconds and then comes back normal. It is very irritating. Is anyone else experiencing this? I tried looking it over the internet and saw similar issues pointing out to Flash. Then I noticed closing Safari helps. I use it as my main browser and I don't want to switch to another just because of this issue so I uninstalled Flash but still to no avail. Everytime Safari comes up or when I begin to browse through sites, the random freeze occurs. I looked up Activity Monitor and noticed that a CPU Usage spike occurs everytime the freeze happens. I also noticed most processes with high CPU usage belonged to Safari. Now this makes me wonder whats causing this on the final build. This did not happen to me on the GM release. I have yet to do a clean install of El Capitan on my MB but resorted to open this up here first incase someone has found a fix for this. Please help.

OSX El Capitan 10.11 (15A284)

MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014)

2.6 GHz Intel Core i5

8 GB 1600 MHz DDR3

Safari Version 9.0 (11601.1.56)

MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014), OS X El Capitan (10.11)

Posted on Oct 7, 2015 12:01 AM

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Answer 1

CarlAVII

Community Specialist

Oct 7, 2015 6:15 PM in response to proudgeek

Howdy proudgeek,

I know how frustrating it can be when your browser of choice refuses to cooperate. Fortunately the article linked below details a number of additional steps that can help isolate and resolve the source of Safari's unresponsiveness.

If Safari is slow, stops responding, quits unexpectedly, or has other issues - Apple Support

Let us know if this helps!

Cheers!

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Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Oct 7, 2015 6:15 PM in response to proudgeek

When the system becomes unresponsive, note the exact time: hour, minute, second.

These instructions must be carried out as an administrator. If you have only one user account, you are the administrator.

Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.

The title of the Console window should be All Messages. If it isn't, select

SYSTEM LOG QUERIES ▹ All Messages

from the log list on the left. If you don't see that list, select

View ▹ Show Log List

from the menu bar at the top of the screen.

Each message in the log begins with the date and time when it was entered. Scroll back to the time you noted above.

Select the messages entered from then until the end of the episode, or until they start to repeat, whichever comes first.

Copy the messages to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.

The log contains a vast amount of information, almost all of it useless for solving any particular problem. When posting a log extract, be selective. A few dozen lines are almost always more than enough.

Please don't indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.

Please don't post screenshots of log messages—post the text.

Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.

When you post the log extract, you might see an error message on the web page: "You have included content in your post that is not permitted," or "The message contains invalid characters." That's a bug in the forum software. Please post the text on Pastebin, then post a link here to the page you created.

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Answer 3

proudgeek Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 7, 2015 6:22 PM in response to proudgeek

Hey guys ,

Thanks for helping me out. Turns out removing Flash helped. I just needed a reboot and everything started working smooth. I would definitely take your suggestions as I may have to install Flash again being necessary on some webpages I visit. Hopefully this time it wouldn't cause any problems. If it does, I'll definitely post it here.

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Answer 4

CarlAVII

Community Specialist

Oct 8, 2015 6:43 AM in response to proudgeek

proudgeek,

Glad to hear that you've got it sorted, and thanks for the update!

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Answer 5

proudgeek Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 8, 2015 7:39 AM in response to Linc Davis

Hi Linc,

After reinstalling Flash, the issue came back again. I didn't experience it though until I opened Youtube which most likely used Flash. I managed to capture it on video which can be viewed HERE. As you may notice on the video, I was clicking the whole time and nothing is responding. No spinwheel. Just pure freeze and then after a few seconds, UI just scrambles back to normal. Now it's acting up on random even though I've already closed the tab. I also got this log list from Console when a freeze occurred just as you suggested. I marked some lines which I can conclude to be irrelevant to this issue though correct me if I'm wrong. I'm thinking the only solution I have here is to remove Flash and wait for some update regarding this issue.

08/10/2015 9:27:03.078 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:03.078 : BTLE scanning started

08/10/2015 9:27:03.079 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:03.078 : Scanning mode Everyone

08/10/2015 9:27:03.079 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:03.079 : BTLE scanner Powered On

08/10/2015 9:27:03.118 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:03.117 : BTLE discovered device with hash <018f5599 4b230f00 0000>

08/10/2015 9:27:03.118 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:03.118 : BTLE scanning stopped

08/10/2015 9:27:18.121 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:18.120 : BTLE scanning started

08/10/2015 9:27:18.121 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:18.121 : Scanning mode Everyone

08/10/2015 9:27:18.122 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:18.121 : BTLE scanner Powered On

08/10/2015 9:27:18.147 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:18.146 : BTLE discovered device with hash <018f5599 4b230f00 0000>

08/10/2015 9:27:18.147 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:18.146 : BTLE scanning stopped

08/10/2015 9:27:21.343 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.342 : Bonjour discovery stopped

08/10/2015 9:27:21.344 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.343 : BTLE advertising stopped

08/10/2015 9:27:21.345 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.344 : Finder exited AirDrop

08/10/2015 9:27:21.345 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.345 : AirDrop server disabled

08/10/2015 9:27:21.345 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.345 : BTLE scanning started

08/10/2015 9:27:21.345 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.345 : Scanning mode Everyone

08/10/2015 9:27:21.346 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.346 : AirDrop server terminated

08/10/2015 9:27:21.346 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.346 : Bonjour advertise stopped

08/10/2015 9:27:21.347 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.346 : BTLE scanner Powered On

08/10/2015 9:27:21.755 PM sharingd[468]: 21:27:21.754 : Terminate AirDrop P2P link

08/10/2015 9:27:35.997 PM WindowServer[377]: disable_update_timeout: UI updates were forcibly disabled by application "Console" for over 1.00 seconds. Server has re-enabled them.

08/10/2015 9:27:36.010 PM WindowServer[377]: common_reenable_update: UI updates were finally reenabled by application "Console" after 1.04 seconds [0.96fps] (server forcibly re-enabled them after 1.03 seconds [1.00fps])

08/10/2015 9:27:51.000 PM kernel[0]: IO80211AWDLPeerManager::monitorAWDLState Disabling AWDL due to no services and no active sockets

08/10/2015 9:27:51.000 PM kernel[0]: ARPT: 11710.064067: AWDL Sync Enabled 0, data path state[1]

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Answer 6

proudgeek Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 8, 2015 7:40 AM in response to CarlAVII

Sadly, it's back again. Only if Flash is installed though. 😟

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Answer 7

proudgeek Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 8, 2015 8:02 AM in response to Linc Davis

Use this link instead: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dygyaSegW4

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Answer 8

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Oct 8, 2015 2:04 PM in response to proudgeek

From the Safari menu bar, select

Safari ▹ Preferences... ▹ Privacy ▹ Remove All Website Data...

and confirm. Close the window. Then select

 ▹ System Preferences… ▹ Flash Player ▹ Advanced ▹ Delete All...

In the sheet that opens, check the box marked

Delete All Site Data and Settings

then click Delete Data. Close the preference pane.

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Answer 9

Oct 12, 2015 5:06 AM in response to proudgeek

I am using the released version of El Capitan on a mac mini 2012, 16GB Ram, 500GB SSD.

After install, the system freezes on EVERY app launch, dialog box, menu click for 3-4 seconds.

I wiped the drive and did a restore back to previous OS, no problems. (Time Machine)

Re-applied the El Capitan and same issues.

When I say freeze, I mean I double-click on an app to launch (from finder or task bar) and app does nothing (no bounce in task bar) for 3-4 seconds.

Then it launches.

Very frustrating.

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Answer 10

CarlAVII

Community Specialist

Oct 14, 2015 8:06 AM in response to proudgeek

proudgeek,

Thank you for using the Apple Support Community. Due to the nature of your issue or question you may find more information by using another one of Apple's support resources - https://getsupport.apple.com/GetproductgroupList.action.

All my best

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Answer 11

ajoserc

Level 1

22 points

Oct 27, 2015 6:05 AM in response to proudgeek

I got the same problem since I installed El Capitan, I didn't install flash though and apparently it's the same issue as you described. I first thought it was my graphic card but after seeing there are many people with this issue Im still looking for a software solution. Any help will be welcome. Thanks.

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Answer 12

jonasgs1

Level 1

6 points

Nov 4, 2015 12:58 AM in response to proudgeek

I have the exact same problem as OP. It has only happened while on youtube, I think. I made a post about this too but I've had the same replies as you and none of that worked/they never replied with new responses, so..

I haven't tried uninstalling flash because I want to be able to use youtube. So is Apple going to fix this? I've seen a lot of people complaining about this issue, so they must be aware of it.

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Answer 13

Dec 8, 2015 11:32 PM in response to jonasgs1

issue is still present in 10.10.2. I have reported the bug to apple via the feedback tool several times. Very frustrating. Seems to be related to WIndowServer more than Safari.

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Answer 14

jonasgs1

Level 1

6 points

Dec 10, 2015 1:29 AM in response to proudgeek

So, the problem persists but I've been in contact with Apple Bug Reporter. You can follow the development via my post here: Closing tabs in Safari freezes Macbook

There is still no solution.

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Answer 15

Dec 11, 2015 11:06 AM in response to jonasgs1

So i finally found you. Same problem with my 2014 15 RMBP. I was posting on other forum till now about how Elcapitan was slowing macs. But i have mini freezes and others in that forum dont. I also notice this happens when i close a tab and after a 5-6 sec mini freeze system feels bit laggy until restart. Did all the Pram zaps and posting logs on forums no help. 10.11.2 didn't solve the problem either. So i m on chrome right now which seems to eat my battery very fast. Also removing all extensions including Adblock didnt help either.

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