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I was getting problems a few weeks back. I was getting freezes co-inciding with processor spikes, Spent some time with support cleaning out old stuff but still didn't solve it. They thought possibility of malware.
I did a complete rebuild from bare disc, installed only apps I needed and switch to using only Safari (chome not on machine).
I'm still getting freezes and beachball and I can't work out why.
Disk report all OK (and it's a fusion disk so pretty fast).
Activity monitor is showing free memory (currently running at 5.5/8. Was running at about 6.5 earlier today.
CPU isn't showing big spikes - doesn't appear to even be getting to 50% (whereas before it was maxing out when it froze).
But the machine is still frequently becoming unresponsive.
Any thoughts?
From the brief and basic research I did for my similar issues, it was all down to available memory, or space on the hard disk, although when I checked my ssd it was showing about 65% free space. So I made sure all apps were closed and have tried to get Mrs Slack to clear all the crap off her desktop. I didn’t go down your route of a fresh install, or at least, haven’t yet. It seems to be running quicker now.
Possibly not much help, but I share your frustration to a degree.
Usually IME persistent beach balls are a sign of a failing drive. Have you tried the diagnostic tool I.e. before you boot into OSX.
Did the problem appear after a recent update?
In Activity Monitor is there a specific process I.e. High CPU percentage associated with the beachballing?
tried to get Mrs Slack to clear all the crap off her desktop
Hmm best of luck with that!
Usually IME persistent beach balls are a sign of a failing drive.
aye most likely candidate. back up immediately, try another drive.
Usually IME persistent beach balls are a sign of a failing drive. Have you tried the diagnostic tool I.e. before you boot into OSX.
Some older MacBooks had issues with the ribbon connector between the hard drive and the main board gradually breaking down, most obviously noted when you fitted an SSD and it simply wouldn't recognise the drive. I'm not saying that's your issue, but it's quite a common problem and can mimic the symptoms of a failing hard drive. I've changed the cable two or three times on my 2012 MBP now. Not sure how many models it affects, or if it's relevant here, but I thought I'd mention it just in case.
Happened to my 2010 MBP, new hard drive sorted it.
Its a 21" iMac with a fusion drive. Disk Utility not reporting any errors
In Activity Monitor is there a specific process I.e. High CPU percentage associated with the beachballing?
No, that's what's really odd - peak CPU load is not high (it WAS peaking at 100% and flatlining for a bit before I rebuilt it)
So.... took the iMac in to Apple. Their diagnostics immediately showed up the hard drive as failing. Just under £200 for a replacement installed.
Odd that SMART diagnostics didn’t show any problem to me. 5.5 year life is pretty good for an HD so not unhappy.
So, what everyone said it was, then? (-:
SMART isn't perfect. You'll maybe get SMART warnings on about 75% of dying disks.
I just dont get how the inbuilt OS diagnostics reported the SMART test as OK but the in store reported a SMART failure immediately. I thought SMART Data was generated by the drive so reporting of it shouldn’t have been different.
simons_nicolai-uk
Member
I just dont get how the inbuilt OS diagnostics reported the SMART test as OK but the in store reported a SMART failure immediately. I thought SMART Data was generated by the drive so reporting of it shouldn’t have been different.
It is but they might use some manufacturer specific software, sometimes they can get more info from the drive than SMART will output. I'm not sure what would get presented on SMART on a fusion drive if for example the solid state portion failed and the spinning rust didn't.
I got the impression from the tech, the diagnostic screen and the way they priced the repair the an Apple fusion drive is two completely separate drives with the magic done in their own soft/hard ware. Their diagnostics reported status of SSD and HD separately and the repair appeared to be replacement of a standard 5400RPM 1TB hard drive.
It could be. I remember some windows machines from a while back that used an SSD in front of a regular HDD to act as yet another cache, albeit a very big one. So in this case the Mac might have reported the drive that it could 'see', the SSD which was fine, but the problem was on the HDD behind it
That might make sense - they’ve not fixed the standard diagnostics to know about Fusion Drives. Seems a bit crap given their in store did it so quickly (literally Sub 30 seconds)
I've got a similar problem, but not that bad. It's a pure SSD though and SMART insists it's fine.
This is depressing.
My MacBook is doing this, a lot.
And it’s not been particularly pushed in its life (and only 4 years old).
To be honest, I mostly use it for watching dvds on... 😜
My iMac has this sometimes, particularly with the Photos app, whats the procedure to check the HD, I've got a 3Tb Fusion drive? I ran a First-Aid using Disk Utility, is that it? The drive itself is shown as two components in System Information...
Macintosh HD:
Available: 1.01 TB (1,012,032,503,808 bytes)
Capacity: 3.11 TB (3,114,534,961,152 bytes)
Mount Point: /
File System: Journaled HFS+
Writable: Yes
Ignore Ownership: No
BSD Name: disk3
Volume UUID: 857F23F5-65A9-3EEB-B7E5-FCC6AA43FED3
Logical Volume:
Revertible: No
Encrypted: No
LV UUID: B6DBE08F-D0F4-49CF-BA88-6EF7748E07AF
Logical Volume Group:
Name: Macintosh HD
Size: 3.12 TB (3,120,721,960,960 bytes)
Free Space: 131 KB (131,072 bytes)
LVG UUID: 30837CB7-A57C-4EC8-AF72-3427B1BC4477
Physical Volumes:
disk0s2:
Device Name: APPLE SSD SD0128F
Media Name: APPLE SSD SD0128F Media
Size: 120.99 GB (120,988,852,224 bytes)
Medium Type: SSD
Protocol: PCI
Internal: Yes
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
Status: Online
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified
PV UUID: 1D0322AE-F13D-4C85-9A40-D4D7F76D537C
disk1s2:
Device Name: APPLE HDD ST3000DM001
Media Name: APPLE HDD ST3000DM001 Media
Size: 3 TB (2,999,733,108,736 bytes)
Medium Type: Rotational
Protocol: SATA
Internal: Yes
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
Status: Online
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified
PV UUID: 036675FB-2502-42F5-BAE4-8CE54F86045D
metalheart
Subscriber
This is depressing.
My MacBook is doing this, a lot.
And it’s not been particularly pushed in its life (and only 4 years old).
To be honest, I mostly use it for watching dvds on… 😜
There's nothing to say it's a failing drive in your case, it can be caused by many things for example the search indexer crashing. Bring up Console and refresh the logs after it happens.