New iMac Getting SPOD

joeholl1979 · Feb 21, 2013, 08:02 PM

I've been loving my new iMac, and haven't looked back since switching from PC. However, over the last few days I've been getting the Spinning Pinwheel Of Death, seemingly at random times. It's REALLY annoying because the only way I know to resolve it is hard boot the computer.

Any help to permanently resolve this issue would be much appreciated!

GGJstudios · Feb 21, 2013, 08:03 PM

When you're getting beachballs, follow every step of the following instructions precisely. Do not skip any steps.

Launch Activity Monitor
Change "My Processes" at the top to "All Processes"
Click on the "% CPU" column heading once or twice, so the arrow points downward (highest values on top).
(If that column isn't visible, right-click on the column headings and check it, NOT "CPU Time")
Click on the System Memory tab at the bottom.
Take a screen shot of the entire Activity Monitor window, then scroll down to see the rest of the list, take another screen shot
Post your screenshots.

simsaladimbamba · Feb 21, 2013, 08:03 PM

Open Activity Monitor and go to the System Memory* tab and look for Page Outs and Swap used and report back.
Using Activity Monitor to show you CPU and RAM usage

* Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor

joeholl1979 · Feb 21, 2013, 08:15 PM

Whenever this happens, the computer is completely frozen, so I won't be able to do that...

pete78 · Feb 21, 2013, 08:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

I've been loving my new iMac, and haven't looked back since switching from PC. However, over the last few days I've been getting the Spinning Pinwheel Of Death, seemingly at random times. It's REALLY annoying because the only way I know to resolve it is hard boot the computer.

Any help to permanently resolve this issue would be much appreciated!

I would run disk utility to make sure your hard drive is okay. I had a similar symptom, and turned out to be a bad HD. Good luck.

TennisandMusic · Feb 21, 2013, 08:24 PM

This is actually one of the reasons I switched back from Mac to PC. OS X is simply incredibly slow, buggy, and just not performant.

Go look at the articles posted at macperformanceguide.com to get an idea. My Windows install blazes...

Good luck with your computer (no sarcasm).

joeholl1979 · Feb 21, 2013, 08:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pete78

I would run disk utility to make sure your hard drive is okay. I had a similar symptom, and turned out to be a bad HD. Good luck.

Ugh, that would suck...

Mike in Kansas · Feb 21, 2013, 08:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TennisandMusic

This is actually one of the reasons I switched back from Mac to PC. OS X is simply incredibly slow, buggy, and just not performant.

Go look at the articles posted at macperformanceguide.com to get an idea. My Windows install blazes...

Good luck with your computer (no sarcasm).

That's a riot!

simsaladimbamba · Feb 21, 2013, 08:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

Whenever this happens, the computer is completely frozen, so I won't be able to do that...

Then do the System Memory part afterwards.

J. Rab · Feb 21, 2013, 08:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TennisandMusic

This is actually one of the reasons I switched back from Mac to PC. OS X is simply incredibly slow, buggy, and just not performant.

Go look at the articles posted at macperformanceguide.com to get an idea. My Windows install blazes...

Good luck with your computer (no sarcasm).

My experience has been the complete opposite. I went without a reformat on my MBP for about three years -- and it started slowing down -- with windows I can't go more than a year without it bogging down. To each their own I spose.

joeholl1979 · Feb 21, 2013, 10:16 PM

It just did it again. I hard booted then took these screen shots.

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ssls6 · Feb 21, 2013, 10:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

It just did it again. I hard booted then took ]

1) open system pref's and put your hard drive in spotlight exclusions. This will wipe away your .DS_Store files.

2) Reboot and go into recovery. Repair your HD and then repair permissions

3) Reboot again and remove your hard drive from spotlight exclusions.

Now wait while your drive is reindexed. You can work on it but don't mess with spotlight until it is finished. This should help if mds is really going wild.

joeholl1979 · Feb 22, 2013, 01:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ssls6

1) open system pref's and put your hard drive in spotlight exclusions. This will wipe away your .DS_Store files.

2) Reboot and go into recovery. Repair your HD and then repair permissions

3) Reboot again and remove your hard drive from spotlight exclusions.

Now wait while your drive is reindexed. You can work on it but don't mess with spotlight until it is finished. This should help if mds is really going wild.

This didn't quite work, but it did make me realize that Spotlight was probably causing the issue. I reset the PRAM and now Spotlight is re-indexing my hard drive. So far, no Spinning Pinwheel.
Hopefully this will resolve the problem!

Giuly · 02:08 AM

mds = hard drive indexing for Spotlight. Look at the top right of the screen, there should be a dot in the loupe. Click it and it'll tell you when it's done. A full indexing only takes place when you attach a new volume.

Ah, you've figured that out already.

GGJstudios · Feb 22, 2013, 02:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ssls6

This will wipe away your .DS_Store files.

.DS_Store files are not part of the problem and deleting them only means the system will recreate them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

This didn't quite work, but it did make me realize that Spotlight was probably causing the issue. I reset the PRAM and now Spotlight is re-indexing my hard drive.

PRAM/NVRAM has nothing to do indexing issues. Resetting it will not help.

About NVRAM and PRAM

If a drive is constantly active or your CPU utilization is high (possibly with increased temps and fan speed) when you're not running any major apps, you can check to see if Spotlight is indexing by looking at the Menu Bar icon:

(not indexing)
(indexing) (pulsing dot)

When it's indexing, you may also see increased CPU and RAM usage by the mds and mdworker processes in Activity Monitor.

To re-index your drive:

Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes

If that fails to index, enter the following command in Terminal:

sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/your drive name"

ssls6 · Feb 22, 2013, 05:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GGJstudios

.DS_Store files are not part of the problem and deleting them only means the system will recreate them.

PRAM/NVRAM has nothing to do indexing issues. Resetting it will not help.

About NVRAM and PRAM

If a drive is constantly active or your CPU utilization is high (possibly with increased temps and fan speed) when you're not running any major apps, you can check to see if Spotlight is indexing by looking at the Menu Bar icon:

Image (not indexing)
Image (indexing) (pulsing dot)

When it's indexing, you may also see increased CPU and RAM usage by the mds and mdworker processes in Activity Monitor.

To re-index your drive:

Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes

If that fails to index, enter the following command in Terminal:

sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/your drive name"

How I told him to reindex his drives works perfectly well.

highlightshadow · Feb 22, 2013, 07:23 AM

Hmmm ... thinking this might be my issue ... seems like the dotted icon for spotlight is constantly popping up despite no real change day to day ...

Might do the procedure myself now

GGJstudios · Feb 22, 2013, 10:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ssls6

How I told him to reindex his drives works perfectly well.

I didn't say the part of the post which refers to reindexing doesn't work. In fact, that procedure is in the link I posted. I only addressed the fact that the .DS_Store files are not part of the problem.

joeholl1979 · Feb 22, 2013, 11:28 AM

It happened again this morning, so I ended up re-installing OSX in recovery. I did the re-indexing procedure last night and it didn't seem to help.

GGJstudios · Feb 22, 2013, 11:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

It happened again this morning, so I ended up re-installing OSX in recovery. I'll see if that helps, then I'll try re-indexing.

Just be aware that the initial indexing process could take several hours, so let it finish. After it's done, maintaining the index will be done in the background and you likely won't even notice it.

joeholl1979 · Feb 22, 2013, 12:01 PM

I went ahead and did the re-indexing procedure after the OSX recovery, just for good measure. I'm leaving it run while I go run errands.

joeholl1979 · Feb 22, 2013, 04:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

It happened again this morning, so I ended up re-installing OSX in recovery. I did the re-indexing procedure last night and it didn't seem to help.

So far, so good. I've been running games and surfing around for a few hours now and no SPOD!
I'm glad it seems as though this is fixed now. I was really starting to worry...

joeholl1979 · Feb 22, 2013, 10:59 PM

After I reinstalled OSX, it ran good for a while, then after I loaded back up my programs, it started SPOD'ing worse than before. I broke down and called Apple Support, since it's still within the first 90 days of my purchase. They helped me clean out the start-up programs, which solved the issue.

Upon starting them up one by one, I found out that CrashPlan's software was causing the issue!

It's a shame, because the software has worked well for backing up my iMac until I can cough up the dough for a Time Capsule.

I'm going to contact CrashPlan about it and see what they say.

RebornTheGame · Feb 23, 2013, 12:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

I'm going to contact CrashPlan about it and see what they say.

Let us know what they say. I was thinking of using CrashPlan to supplement my local TC backup, so it would be good to hear what they say.

Since OS-6 · Feb 23, 2013, 01:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by joeholl1979

After I reinstalled OSX, it ran good for a while, then after I loaded back up my programs, it started SPOD'ing worse than before. I broke down and called Apple Support, since it's still within the first 90 days of my purchase. They helped me clean out the start-up programs, which solved the issue.

Upon starting them up one by one, I found out that CrashPlan's software was causing the issue!

It's a shame, because the software has worked well for backing up my iMac until I can cough up the dough for a Time Capsule.

I'm going to contact CrashPlan about it and see what they say.

So refreshing to see some one

A) fight a problem, to the death

B) and win !!

Feb 21, 2013, 08:02 PM	#1
joeholl1979 macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	New iMac Getting SPOD I've been loving my new iMac, and haven't looked back since switching from PC. However, over the last few days I've been getting the Spinning Pinwheel Of Death, seemingly at random times. It's REALLY annoying because the only way I know to resolve it is hard boot the computer. Any help to permanently resolve this issue would be much appreciated! __________________ 27' iMac, 3.4GHz i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB Fusion HD
	0

Feb 21, 2013, 08:03 PM	#2
GGJstudios macrumors Westmere Join Date: May 2008	When you're getting beachballs, follow every step of the following instructions precisely. Do not skip any steps. Launch Activity Monitor Change "My Processes" at the top to "All Processes" Click on the "% CPU" column heading once or twice, so the arrow points downward (highest values on top). (If that column isn't visible, right-click on the column headings and check it, NOT "CPU Time") Click on the System Memory tab at the bottom. Take a screen shot of the entire Activity Monitor window, then scroll down to see the rest of the list, take another screen shot Post your screenshots.
	0

Feb 21, 2013, 08:03 PM	#3
simsaladimbamba macrumors Core Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: in front of it	Open Activity Monitor and go to the System Memory* tab and look for Page Outs and Swap used and report back. *Using Activity Monitor* to show you CPU and RAM usage** * Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor __________________ This is not
	0

Feb 21, 2013, 08:15 PM	#4
joeholl1979 Thread Starter macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	Whenever this happens, the computer is completely frozen, so I won't be able to do that... __________________ 27' iMac, 3.4GHz i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB Fusion HD
	0

Feb 22, 2013, 01:57 AM	#14
Giuly macrumors 68020 Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: That depends whether you ask for timezone, state of mind or GPS coordinates.	mds = hard drive indexing for Spotlight. Look at the top right of the screen, there should be a dot in the loupe. Click it and it'll tell you when it's done. A full indexing only takes place when you attach a new volume. Ah, you've figured that out already. Last edited by Giuly; Feb 22, 2013 at 02:08 AM.
	0

Feb 21, 2013, 08:24 PM	#6
TennisandMusic macrumors 65816 Join Date: Aug 2008	This is actually one of the reasons I switched back from Mac to PC. OS X is simply incredibly slow, buggy, and just not performant. Go look at the articles posted at macperformanceguide.com to get an idea. My Windows install blazes... Good luck with your computer (no sarcasm).
	0

Feb 21, 2013, 10:16 PM	#11
joeholl1979 Thread Starter macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	It just did it again. I hard booted then took these screen shots.
	0

Feb 22, 2013, 07:23 AM	#17
highlightshadow macrumors newbie Join Date: Oct 2012	Hmmm ... thinking this might be my issue ... seems like the dotted icon for spotlight is constantly popping up despite no real change day to day ... Might do the procedure myself now
	0

Feb 22, 2013, 11:28 AM	#19
joeholl1979 Thread Starter macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	It happened again this morning, so I ended up re-installing OSX in recovery. I did the re-indexing procedure last night and it didn't seem to help.
	0

Feb 22, 2013, 12:01 PM	#21
joeholl1979 Thread Starter macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	I went ahead and did the re-indexing procedure after the OSX recovery, just for good measure. I'm leaving it run while I go run errands. __________________ 27' iMac, 3.4GHz i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB Fusion HD
	0

Feb 22, 2013, 10:59 PM	#23
joeholl1979 Thread Starter macrumors member Join Date: Jan 2013	After I reinstalled OSX, it ran good for a while, then after I loaded back up my programs, it started SPOD'ing worse than before. I broke down and called Apple Support, since it's still within the first 90 days of my purchase. They helped me clean out the start-up programs, which solved the issue. Upon starting them up one by one, I found out that CrashPlan's software was causing the issue! It's a shame, because the software has worked well for backing up my iMac until I can cough up the dough for a Time Capsule. I'm going to contact CrashPlan about it and see what they say.
	0

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