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Level 2

201 points

Slow boot for macOS High Sierra 10.13.2

On a MacBook Pro I own that was new in 2013, I installed Mac OS 10.13 High Sierra some time after it came out. It took that machine from one that previously booted in about 10 seconds to one that took 90 seconds. That was so ugly that I reinstalled (from a clone), 10.12.6 Sierra and it was fast to boot again. I then waited until 10.13.2 came out and, since that machine is only used for testing things like this, I gave it a go again. I also turned on FileVault because my newest machine, a 2016 TouchBar MB Pro already has FileVault turned on so I wanted to compare something closer between performance of the 2013 machine with FileVault AND High Sierra while the 2016 machine has FileVault and (still) macOS 10.12.6 Sierra.

When I installed 10.13.2 on the 2013 machine and with FileVault enabled and with the drive having had the time required to encrypt all the files (took a couple of days), I now boot this older machine in about 60 seconds. That ***** compared to this newest machine still running Sierra that boots in no more than 20 seconds and that includes what FileVault needs to do to prepare the files for viewing.

I've read some posts here or there about slow boots with High Sierra but nothing that seems to really point out what is going on with High Sierra. Is it the APFS replacement of HFS+ that is causing the slowdown??? Does anyone know??? I hear all these possible fixes with resetting NVRAM and so forth but no consistent answers to what is going on.

One day I will bite the bullet and install High Sierra on my 2016 Mac but I sure wish I could learn more about what is causing the slower boots and whether there is something I can do about it.

Any thoughts??? thanks

Posted on Jan 10, 2018 2:38 PM

Best reply

Kappy

Level 10

361,753 points

Posted on Jan 10, 2018 2:45 PM

APFS is supposedly slower than HFS+. What I've read, but not what I have tested.

Possible Fixes for El Capitan or Later

You should try each, one at a time, then test to see if the problem is fixed before going on to the next.

Be sure to backup your files before proceeding if possible.

Shutdown the computer, wait 30 seconds, restart the computer.
Resetting your Mac’s PRAM and NVRAM
Reset the System Management Controller (SMC)
Start the computer in Safe Mode, then restart normally. This is slower than a standard startup.
Repair the disk by booting from the Recovery HD. Immediately after the chime hold down the Command and R keys until the Utility Menu appears. Choose Disk Utility and click on the Continue button. Select the indented (usually, Macintosh HD) volume entry from the side list. Click on the First Aid button in the toolbar. Wait for the Done button to appear. Quit Disk Utility and return to the Utility Menu. Restart the computer from the Apple Menu.
Create a New User Account Open Users & Groups preferences. Click on the lock icon and enter your Admin password when prompted. On the left under Current User click on the Add [+] button under Login Options. Setup a new Admin user account. Upon completion log out of your current account then log into the new account. If your problems cease, then consider switching to the new account and transferring your files to it - Transferring files from one User Account to another.
Download and install theOS X El Capitan 10.11.6 Combo Update or 10.12.6 Combo Update or macOS High Sierra 10.13.2 Combo Update as needed.
Reinstall OS X by booting from the Recovery HD using the Command and R keys. When the Utility Menu appears select Reinstall OS X then click on the Continue button.
Erase and Install OS X Restart the computer. Immediately after the chime hold down the CommandandRkeys until the Apple logo appears. When the Utility Menu appears:

Select Disk Utility from the Utility Menu and click on Continue button.

When Disk Utility loads select the drive (out-dented entry) from the Device list.

Click on the Erase icon in Disk Utility's toolbar. A panel will drop down.

Set the Format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.)

Click on the Apply button, then wait for the Done button to activate and click on it.

Quit Disk Utility and return to the Utility Menu.

Select Reinstall OS X and click on the Continue button.

Ways to help make a slow Mac faster

17 Reasons Why Your Mac Runs Slower Than it Should
Slow Mac Performance? This Article Solves It!
Fix slow start-ups in OS X | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews
How to fix slow shutdown and startup times. | MacTip.net
6 Easy Tips to Speed Up OS X Yosemite on Your Mac
OS X El Capitan- If your Mac runs slowly
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on Performance
Tips to Fix Issues that affect Mac Performance
Avoid using any third-party cleanup software. Usually, this software does more bad than good. You don't need it. All computers become slower over time even under normal use. Experienced users erase the hard drive and do a clean install from scratch from time to time; or whenever installing a major OS upgrade. Doing so means you must maintain regular and multiple backups.
If you have enabled iCloud Disk and are storing your Documents and Data in iCloud, then consider turning that off and signing out of iCloud. It can slow down the computer considerably. Please see the following from the user, fotomac: "The solution was to SIGN OUT of iCloud and my problem STOPPED! NO MORE SPINNING BEACHBALL! My computer's speed increased to what it should be and all my Apps now work!"
Add more RAM or cut back on the number of concurrently running applications and utilities. Remove unnecessary anti-malware software and any software that promises to clean your Mac. Check for runaway processes: Runaway applications can shorten battery runtime, affect performance, and increase heat and fan activity. Also, visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on dealing with The Spinning Beach Ball of Death.
The Ultimate Fix: Backup everything, erase the drive, reinstall OS X, and restore your data from the backup. Reinstall third-party software from original media/scratch.

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38 replies

Feb 8, 2018 7:00 PM in response to Robert Paris

Robert Paris wrote:

Hi, Better late than never. I input the above command (regarding TRIM) and the output you requested I post is simply,

TRIM Support: Yes

Does that tell you anything???

thanks

Yes, we are making progress.

One more question is this a user installed third party SSD or is the 2013 a OEM PCIe ?

Robert Paris Author

Level 2

201 points

Feb 8, 2018 8:11 PM in response to leroydouglas

100% "Stock" from Apple. I just checked it for more certainty and it is a "MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Early 2013)

And in the System Report, under Storage it says,

Device Name Apple SSID SD512E

Media Name Apple APFSMedia

Medium Type SSD

Protocol SATA

Internal Yes

Partition Map Type Unknown

And under PCI, it says there are no PCI devices on this computer.

So I can't speak to the PCIe you mentioned above. SATA instead??? But what I report here is right off the System Report. Also I wonder if that "unknown" Partition Map Type might matter????

I just watched that computer as it booted (slowly) and do recall, as I said above, this machine has File Vault turned on so that changes a somewhat the boot process. But my newest machine that also has File Vault turned on but is still back on 10.12 Sierra because of this slow boot issue boots in 15-20 seconds while this one running 10.13 takes at least three times as long.

On this 10.13 Mac we are talking about here, I watch and the progress bar moves across quite briskly to maybe 60% complete and the. it sits there FOREVER, well, maybe not forever but a long time.

Since no clock is available while that is going on but I could still use another device, my phone or other Mac, to determine exact times, say to within a second or so of when this long delay in progress occurs, might I not be able to go look at the System Log at those exact times and see if I can figure out some process that might be in a loop or something???

As I'm sure you know the System Log is not an easy read for someone like me (knows just enough UNIX to be dangerous) so that might be a silly idea but it sure looks like something happens that prompts it to go away for quite a while. Progress bar stops for maybe 40 seconds (I could nail down the times better if needed) and then at the end of that time, you see the screen flash a bit, and that's my clue that now it's gonna go and load. If that long delay was NOT there, the boot of this system would be fine.

My guess is most folks don't turn their machines off maybe ever so they don't care much about boot times. I'm just sort of old school and I turn hardware off when I go to bed or when I leave the house. Just an old habit. But I'm not very willing to put High Sierra on my NOW daily Mac (MacBook Pro, 15 inch, TouchBar, 2016) only to see the boot time go from say 20 seconds to at least 60 seconds if not more. Just doesn't seem like progress.

Your thoughts???

ozialien

Level 1

8 points

Feb 8, 2018 9:31 PM in response to Robert Paris

Slowdown happened on several computers upgraded to 10.13.2 the cause on all three is somehow SMC getting out of sync. So the procedure to recover is to:

1. Boot in reduced MHz

2. Put machine to sleep at reduced MHz

3. Wake up from sleep at reduced MHz

4. Shutdown

5. Left Shift-Ctrl-Alt Power Button for 10+ seconds

6. Reboot

CPU will throttle back up to GHz and stays that way.m

trim was enabled on the SSD before hand. <-- You can research this.

ozialien

Level 1

8 points

Feb 8, 2018 9:42 PM in response to Robert Paris

The slowdown happened on several computers upgraded to 10.13.2 the cause for me on all three was somehow SMC getting out of sync. So the procedure to recover in this case was: (Intel hardware tools revealed it went slow after the OS booted IO......kext )

1. Boot in reduced MHz

2. Put machine to sleep at reduced MHz

3. Wake up from sleep at reduced MHz ( Apparently some SMC value is toggled and stuck)

4. Shutdown

5. Left Shift-Ctrl-Alt Power Button for 10+ seconds

6. Reboot

CPU will throttle back up to GHz and stays that way.

eduardbb

Level 1

4 points

Feb 9, 2018 1:49 AM in response to Ali6154

Moving this folder speedup by 5s my boot time, but some things didn't work on boot like NVIDIA Drivers Manager panel. So I reverted the changes.

I've checked with etrecheck, and all launcher agents point to a valid executable.

I don't think is a good idea to remove LaunchAgents

Kappy

Level 10

361,753 points

Feb 9, 2018 10:22 AM in response to ozialien

I think you are badly misinformed. I cannot demote anyone. Only the moderators do that. It is not determined by anything I do but what you have done. In other words, just take responsibility instead of blaming someone or something else.

Csound1

Level 9

59,985 points

Feb 9, 2018 10:27 AM in response to ozialien

ozialien wrote:

It appears Kappy got me demoted from Level 5 to Level 1 also. So apparently this will be my last aid and assist on the Apple Communities.

In spite of the Glory of Kappy he is not able to demote you, you must have done it yourself.

Csound1

Level 9

59,985 points

Feb 9, 2018 10:30 AM in response to eduardbb

eduardbb wrote:

Moving this folder speedup by 5s my boot time, but some things didn't work on boot like NVIDIA Drivers Manager panel. So I reverted the changes.

I've checked with etrecheck, and all launcher agents point to a valid executable.

I don't think is a good idea to remove LaunchAgents

That depends entirely what is in it.

If you want to see how the machine runs without startup items starting it is simpler (and recommended) to perform a Safe Boot, which disables all 3rd party startup items.

Kappy

Level 10

361,753 points

Feb 9, 2018 10:40 AM in response to Csound1

Yes!!! I am the Lord of It All but the Master of None. 😁😁😁 In case you missed them there are two letters missing in the previous. I forgot an S and an H. You can put them where they make the most sense. 😀

Robert Paris Author

Level 2

201 points

Feb 9, 2018 11:14 AM in response to leroydouglas

I decided to put a couple of real boot times rather than just say "slow". So I booted my older MacBook Pro, the Early 2013 version, and from the moment the Apple appears on the screen, a little bit into the boot process, until the useable desktop is up and ready was between 53 and 56 seconds. (Although, very interesting, one boot where I was not yet timing how long it took, it clearly went FASTER, hmmmm). So that machine is running High Sierra 10.13.2 with FileVault ON. And the above mentioned times included how long it took me to enter the rather short password on that machine.

Contrast that with my newer, 2016 MacBook Pro Touch Bar which is still running Sierra 10.12.6, also with FileVault ON and again, including the amount of time it took me to enter a harder password (harder than on the older machine above), which took right around 24 seconds to boot.

So twice as long plus a few seconds.

I do know how to clone and I do so routinely on this new machine using SuperDuper. I clone often. In fact, when the older machine above was the "newer" machine, I did something once (long story) that absolutely killed the machine. I did something risky related to going down deep in a Library file related to VMWare Fusion and running Windows on that machine. I booted first from the clone and did the risky change on that clone and it worked perfectly. I then did it on the main drive, carefully and precisely as I had just done on the clone and killed the machine dead. Every character, everywhere on the machine, showed up as a "?" with a circle around it... oh my... But I reversed cloned for the first time ever has I had always been to chicken to try it before and ta da, it worked perfectly. I also reverse cloned that same, older machine above more recently when I was shocked to see how slow High Sierra was on booting so I reverse cloned back to Sierra (what I had on purpose on the clone) and the boot load times went right back down to where they had been before. Then I have since gone back up to High Sierra after Apple put out on more update to 10.13.2 to see if the boot times would get better but no. Still pretty slow.

I suppose some might tell me that 53-56 seconds is ok and just live with it. Or stop turning the machine off at night. But I'm just sort of surprised that the world isn't whining about slow boot times. A few are, but it's not a huge wave of complaints. And nor on either of these machines to I have what I would call any real risky software other than maybe running VMWare Fusion and Windows on that older machine?? I only have Windows on that older machine and other than that being the only place from which I can currently run Windows, that machine is otherwise totally my test machine. I run new OS's on that machine before putting them on my newer TouchBar MacBook Pro.

Regarding shutting off TRIM, I will likely not do that for the reasons you suggested. Even if that showed me some promise on that older machine, I doubt that I would want to try that on my 2016 machine.

I will likely just punt soon and accept that not all "progress' is in the forward direction. sigh...

thanks for all the input.

I still am going to do a boot on that older machine where I am going to try to time exactly when that progress bar stalls and sits for the longest time. And then if I can come close, within seconds, of what actual time the stall starts, I am going to go stare at the System Log and see if I can see anything that might suggest some process say getting into some loop or whatever??? I know, I've watched the System Log before and I am not close to smart enough to know what I'm really seeing. Some of you are UNIX experts. I, sadly, am not.

And I might also try a SAFE boot soon as I see others suggesting here. I will play a bit more but will soon want to go ahead and bring my new machine up to High Sierra as one can't stay on the older OS's for long, especially with the need for staying on top of the newest Security Updates now that we have these new hardware bugs (Meltdown and Specter) that folks are trying to patch like crazy.

thanks for all the help... bob

anc77

Level 1

51 points

Feb 26, 2018 8:54 AM in response to leroydouglas

Since switching to High Sierra on my "mid 2012" MacAir (with SSD) the boot has been either 32 seconds or one minute and 40 seconds. (Yes I've timed it many, many times and it is always one of those... give or take a couple of seconds.)

Try this. Instead of shutting down put the Mac to sleep for 15+ seconds. Then wake it up. Then do a "log out" (under Apple menu). Finally click the 'Shut Down" icon at bottom of screen.

After it shuts down wait a half minute or so and start up again and see if that speeds it up. I've tried it 3 times in a row and it works for me but that could be anecdotal.

Report back here if it works.

anc77

Level 1

51 points

Feb 26, 2018 8:56 AM in response to leroydouglas

Try this. Instead of shutting down put the Mac to sleep for 15+ seconds. Then wake it up. Then do a "log out" (under Apple menu). Finally click the 'Shut Down" icon at bottom of screen.

After it shuts down wait a half minute or so and start up again and see if that speeds it up. I've tried it 3 times in a row and it works for me but that could be anecdotal.

Report back here if it works.

anc77

Level 1

51 points

Feb 26, 2018 8:57 AM in response to leroydouglas

Try this. Instead of shutting down put the Mac to sleep for 15+ seconds. Then wake it up. Then do a "log out" (under Apple menu). Finally click the 'Shut Down" icon at bottom of screen.

After it shuts down wait a half minute or so and start up again and see if that speeds it up. I've tried it 3 times in a row and it works for me but that could be anecdotal.

Report back here if it works.