HT201516: Mac OS X: How to troubleshoot a software issue

Learn about Mac OS X: How to troubleshoot a software issue
honeywl

Q: My iMac is often terribly slow. Multiple re-boots have no affect.

My iMac takes about 15 seconds to respond. Whenever I click on a topic I get the spinning circle.

iMac, iOS 8.1.2

Posted on Jan 1, 2016 8:55 AM

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Q: My iMac is often terribly slow. Multiple re-boots have no affect.

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  • by Barney-15E,

    Barney-15E Barney-15E Jan 1, 2016 9:00 AM in response to honeywl
    Level 8 (49,772 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 1, 2016 9:00 AM in response to honeywl

    That can be indicative of the hard drive failing, so backup now if you haven't.

     

    Are you running any Anti-virus software--that is another cause for what you see.

  • by pinkstones,

    pinkstones pinkstones Jan 1, 2016 9:30 AM in response to honeywl
    Level 5 (4,209 points)
    Safari
    Jan 1, 2016 9:30 AM in response to honeywl

    Please go to http://www.etresoft.com/etrecheck — download and run EtreCheck, copying the status report to paste here.  If there's something on your hard drive causing the slowness you're experiencing, we'll see it in your report and tell you where to go from there.

  • by Linc Davis,

    Linc Davis Linc Davis Jan 1, 2016 2:53 PM in response to honeywl
    Level 10 (207,926 points)
    Applications
    Jan 1, 2016 2:53 PM in response to honeywl

    If you don't already have a current backup of all data, do not download anything or make any other changes until you have backed up. Ask if you need guidance. If you do have a backup, please see below.

    When you see a beachball cursor or the slowness is especially bad, 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 one 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.

    If you have an account on Pastebin, please don't select Private from the Paste Exposure menu on the page, because then no one but you will be able to see it.

  • by franzkaiser,

    franzkaiser franzkaiser Jan 1, 2016 2:55 PM in response to honeywl
    Level 2 (294 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 1, 2016 2:55 PM in response to honeywl

    It may be that your Mac has some process running that is eating up resources. You should launch the Activity Monitor app (Applications > Utilities > Activity Monitor) to see what processes are running and at what level of demand. Also, for the last 6 or 7 years, I have used a tiny app called DiskSpy (developer is gone, but the app is still out there and works well). It creates an LED-style indicator in the menu bar that shows when the hard drive is active. If the system is indexing the drive, which can slow responses to your inputs, the indicator will show this activity.

  • by Daniel B. the G,

    Daniel B. the G Daniel B. the G Jan 1, 2016 2:55 PM in response to honeywl
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 1, 2016 2:55 PM in response to honeywl

    Can you post your specs such as RAM, HD or SSD size and available space, processor, etc.?