Files taking forever to appear on desktop (High Sierra)

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Files taking forever to appear on desktop (High Sierra)

Ever since I installed High Sierra on my iMac 5K it takes a long time, sometimes up to a minute, for a file that I drag to the desktop to actually make an appearance. Likewise, if I take a screenshot it takes forever for the image file to appear on my desktop.

Any theories why this is happening? I've had this computer for two years and with every other OS images would appear the instant I dropped them. Upgraded from Sierra to High Sierra a month ago and now I am plagued with this super long delay before I can access the files I drop.

Believe it or not this is having a very detrimental effect on my productivity- I use my desktop as a frequent buffer when I am working- and I finally just can't take it anymore.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

IMAC (RETINA 5K, 27-INCH, LATE 2015), macOS Sierra (10.12.3)

Posted on Jun 4, 2018 2:36 PM

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Answer 1

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Carolyn Samit

Level 10

165,615 points

Jun 4, 2018 2:39 PM in response to maplevshoney

Hi,

"Ever since I installed High Sierra"

A Safe Mode boot deletes some system caches that can help after updating or upgrading macOS.

To start up in safe mode:

Start or restart your Mac, then immediately press and hold the Shift key. The Apple logo appears on your display. If you don't see the Apple logo, learn what to do.
Release the Shift key when you see the login window. If your startup disk is encrypted with FileVault, you might be asked to log in twice: once to unlock the startup disk, and again to log in to the Finder.

To leave safe mode, restart your Mac without pressing any keys during startup.

Use safe mode to isolate issues with your Mac - Apple Support

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Answer 2

maplevshoney Author

Level 1

46 points

Jun 26, 2018 2:57 PM in response to Carolyn Samit

Hi, thank you for this suggestion, however it didn't fix my issue. I did note that while in Safe Mode a screenshot would immediately result in the image appearing on my desktop.

However, when I restarted normally and took a screenshot it took about 30 seconds for the image to appear. This never happened before I upgraded to High Sierra.

The Finder in general seems to have an issue with files appearing. When I do a render from Cinema 4D, After Effects, etc, sometimes the files don't actually appear in the folder I've rendered to for a minute or so. Sometimes the Finder will have trouble opening a folder in general and I'll get the spinning wheel for a long time.

Is there a way to fix this that doesn't require me to do a fresh OS install?

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Files taking forever to appear on desktop (High Sierra)

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