Ichinenjuu

Q: 13" Retina MacBook Pro - fans go crazy, computer slows down

This is a problem that began a few days ago. It started randomly when I started up the computer one day--there seemed to be no sign that this was going to happen beforehand. I started up the computer, and randomly, the fans rev to maximum RPM and the computer slows down to the point of becoming practically unusable. It's as if the computer is having a "seizure". Typically it doesn't last for more than a few minutes, but it keeps happening over and over again until I shut it down.

 

The computer doesn't actually freeze completely during this time--everything can still run and it can still shut down properly. It's just really, really, really slow.

 

I've tried almost every fix I could think of: I erased the hard drive and did a clean install of OS X, I did SMC reset and PRAM reset, I ran all the diagnostic tests, but everything showed "no issues found"...nothing has any effect. Every time I start up the computer, I still get this "fans revving/CPU slowing" problem. It's as if the computer is overheating except it's not actually getting hot.

 

What is going on?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X El Capitan (10.11.2), null

Posted on Mar 16, 2016 11:47 AM

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Q: 13" Retina MacBook Pro - fans go crazy, computer slows down

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  • by OGELTHORPE,

    OGELTHORPE OGELTHORPE Mar 16, 2016 11:47 AM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 9 (52,516 points)
    Mac OS X
    Mar 16, 2016 11:47 AM in response to Ichinenjuu

    Depending upon the specific model of you MBP, run an Apple Hardware Test ot Apple Diagnostics:

     

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201257

     

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202731

     

    That may offer a clue.

     

    Ciao.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 11:49 AM in response to OGELTHORPE
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 11:49 AM in response to OGELTHORPE

    Sorry I forgot to add that I've already run the Apple Diagnostics and hardware test--twice actually. It just showed "no trouble found" each time, even with the extended test.

     

    I should note that this "throttling" problem didn't actually happen during the testing.

  • by Carolyn Samit,

    Carolyn Samit Carolyn Samit Mar 16, 2016 11:52 AM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 10 (122,492 points)
    Apple Music
    Mar 16, 2016 11:52 AM in response to Ichinenjuu

    "I ran all the diagnostics tests" ..



    Might be an app that launches automatically when you startup your Mac which in turn is causing the fans to run high and slow the drive down.

     

    Open System Preferences > Users & Groups then select the Login Items tab. Remove all items then restart to test.

     

     

    And remove all items from /Library/StartupItems

  • by Pmintz25,

    Pmintz25 Pmintz25 Mar 16, 2016 11:55 AM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 4 (1,686 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 11:55 AM in response to Ichinenjuu

    Have you tried a Safe Boot?

     

    This will tell us if something third party is causing the issue.

     

    Usually when the fans are revving like this it is cause by a process that is eating up all of your computer's memory. The only way to check this is to open Activity Monitor and look for an activity (or activities) that are using up a lot of memory. Then quit the process.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 11:56 AM in response to Carolyn Samit
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 11:56 AM in response to Carolyn Samit

    I did a clean install, so there's nothing in Startup Items or Login Items. It can't be an app.

     

    I should also note that this time I started up the computer, it didn't happen right away. Took about 5 minutes for it to "seize".

     

    Haven't tried SafeBoot yet. I'll try that.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 12:01 PM in response to Pmintz25
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 12:01 PM in response to Pmintz25

    So I monitored the Activity monitor the next time this happened and nothing unusual showed up in either Memory or CPU. No unusual process took over all the memory or the CPU while it "seized". The computer just slowed down and the fans revved like crazy.

     

    I'm pretty tech-savvy so I'm only here because this to me seems an unsolvable issue. I appreciate the help, though. I'm trying absolutely everything I or people online can think of (I've been at this for a few days now).

  • by my ginger,

    my ginger my ginger Mar 16, 2016 12:02 PM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 4 (2,472 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 12:02 PM in response to Ichinenjuu

    Do you get a spinning beach ball when this happens? If you can have the activity monitor open to all process. It may give you a clue when this happens. As to weather it is related to an operation effecting memory cpu or hard drive.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 12:11 PM in response to my ginger
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 12:11 PM in response to my ginger

    I do get a spinning beach ball at first.


    And actually, although no unusual process showed up, I did notice something this next time it happened: the "System" percentage at the bottom spiked to 85% compared with the 0.36% I'm getting now idling with browsers open (and a max of 9% while actually using the browsers).

     

    Here's a screenshot that shows what happened:

     

    SEIZURE.png

  • by my ginger,

    my ginger my ginger Mar 16, 2016 12:50 PM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 4 (2,472 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 12:50 PM in response to Ichinenjuu

    Do you only get this thru CPU or is there also a momentary spike in memory as well?

  • by Linc Davis,

    Linc Davis Linc Davis Mar 16, 2016 12:51 PM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 10 (208,000 points)
    Applications
    Mar 16, 2016 12:51 PM in response to Ichinenjuu

    When you notice the fan activity, 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 Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 2:17 PM in response to my ginger
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 2:17 PM in response to my ginger

    No spike in memory, though "Kernel Task" shows up as a process with really high CPU usage percentages: 427% or 359% or something similar.

     

    I'll get back to you on the log.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 2:24 PM in response to Linc Davis
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 2:24 PM in response to Linc Davis

    Okay, here's what I got from the log. The spike happened at 2:20--it began and ended at 2:20; it was a short spike this time, but it happened: 732% kernel task and 87% system load.

     

    3/16/16 2:19:10.000 PM syslogd[41]: ASL Sender Statistics

    3/16/16 2:20:09.000 PM kernel[0]: **** [IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport][InterruptReadHandler] -- Received kIOReturnNotResponding error - retrying: 1

    3/16/16 2:20:10.000 PM kernel[0]: **** [IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport][ClearFeatureInterruptEndpointHalt] -- successfully posting another read for the mInt0InterruptPipe -- mInterruptPipeInOutstandingIOCount = 1 -- this = 0x6800

    3/16/16 2:20:36.015 PM Safari[406]: tcp_connection_tls_session_error_callback_imp 72 __tcp_connection_tls_session_callback_write_block_invoke.434 error 22

    3/16/16 2:20:46.000 PM kernel[0]: **** [IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport][InterruptReadHandler] -- Received kIOReturnNotResponding error - retrying: 1

    3/16/16 2:20:47.000 PM kernel[0]: **** [IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport][ClearFeatureInterruptEndpointHalt] -- successfully posting another read for the mInt0InterruptPipe -- mInterruptPipeInOutstandingIOCount = 1 -- this = 0x6800

    3/16/16 2:21:02.000 PM kernel[0]: **** [IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport][InterruptReadHandler] -- Received kIOReturnNotResponding error - retrying: 1

  • by my ginger,

    my ginger my ginger Mar 16, 2016 2:29 PM in response to Ichinenjuu
    Level 4 (2,472 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 2:29 PM in response to Ichinenjuu

    Kernel Task  is a combination of all the other tasks that run under root in the activity monitor. Since this could be because of one or maybe several root operations. Posting the log that Linc wants would be helpful.

  • by Ichinenjuu,

    Ichinenjuu Ichinenjuu Mar 16, 2016 2:29 PM in response to my ginger
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 16, 2016 2:29 PM in response to my ginger

    I just posted it, so see if there's anything there that's unusual. Clearly the word "error" is appearing, but not sure if that's related to what's happening.

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