Apple Releases OS X 10.11.5 El Capitan With Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements

[dylin]

A common theme going on at MR forums. If the poster is not experiencing an issue that others are reporting, it must be made up or a hardware issue.

Im not sure if you're saying that I'm telling anyone their issue is made up or just making a comment about posts in general on MR.
I mean as far as these problems go I know that there will be issues, but the ones stated always make me wonder if it's a hardware issue or a user error.

 

[Plentycashray]

Idk if it was suppose to fix this problem but everytime I use spotlight to search "iCloud" click it and get a preference error . I can manual go to iCloud thru preferences but not thru spotlight anyone can help ? I don't even use iCloud it's just annoying and I think it's a outlet leading to more problems

 

[dynamojoe]

I've downloaded the update but when it tries to restart, the finder doesn't quit all the way and the machine (1st Gen RMBP) just sits there. Downloading the combo updater does the same thing.

Anyone have any advice? I would like to avoid a clean reinstall if possible.

 

[bigchief]

Updated late 2013 MBP 15" to 10.11.5 and all is good.

 

[826684857]

Idk if it was suppose to fix this problem but everytime I use spotlight to search "iCloud" click it and get a preference error . I can manual go to iCloud thru preferences but not thru spotlight anyone can help ? I don't even use iCloud it's just annoying and I think it's a outlet leading to more problems

I can confirm the same result.

 

[east85]

I've downloaded the update but when it tries to restart, the finder doesn't quit all the way and the machine (1st Gen RMBP) just sits there. Downloading the combo updater does the same thing.

Anyone have any advice? I would like to avoid a clean reinstall if possible.

I would search terminal in spotlight

open it up

type

sudo killall Finder

and hit enter. then try again. this should restart finder, afterwards reattempt installation and see if the problem remains.

 

[steve333]

Do you still have this problem with 10.11.5? What Mac are you using?

Yep, I just downloaded the update and upon restart my Wi-Fi was on even though I have it set off.
It's driving me nuts

 

[name99]

I hope this fixes the issue where my iMac randomly looses it, freezes and restarts all by itself. A $3,000 machine shouldn't do this, especially in the middle of work.

This most likely represents a problem with the hard drive. Get an app like DriveDx that can tell you the SMART status in detail. Unfortunately Apple's SMART support is basically useless in terms of either the data it gives you or the analysis it provides. DriveDx costs around $30 or so but is worth it, IMHO.

If it IS the hard drive, the easiest solution is to buy an external SSD (drive should be around $300 for a 1TB drive, I recommend Samsung 850 EVO, a good USB3 enclosure [that supports UASP for extra speed] should cost you around $20, I recommend Inateck) and run your system off an external SSD.

Hard drives are still the suckiest, most likely to die, least likely to tell you, part of the system :-(
[doublepost=1463456449][/doublepost]I can't speak as to any other changes yet, but it is immediately obvious on older machines (this is a 2007 class machine) that Remote Desktop performance has been DRAMATICALLY improved. Running Remote Desktop to this machine used to use up about 100% of a CPU on that machine (around 50% for the remote desktop work, which I assume was mainly data compression, and around 50% is excess Window Server work). Now it's negligible, less than 20%.

You can even do insane things like watch a movie playing on the remote machine, and the playback is smooth and non-tearing. Damn! It's not EXACTLY the crisp performance of a Sandy Bridge or later machine (which uses h.264 encoding hardware built into the GPU of those chips) but it's as close as you can reasonably expect on a machine that is 9 years old!

 

[HiRez]

People that are experiencing beachballs or other issues, this is not always an OS issue, you could be having a hardware issue, possibly a hard drive or SSD issue, depending on what you have installed. Perhaps its time to do a verify or fix disk and see if anything pops up for repair.

No, not in my case. I have El Capitan running on 7 different machines (2013 "cylinder" Mac Pro, two different 2012 "aluminum" Mac Pros, 2014 Mac Mini, 2014 MacBook Pro, 2011 MacBook Air, and 2011 iMac). ALL of them have massive beach balling issues, NONE of them had these problems under Yosemite. That includes some that were upgraded from Yosemite and some that are fresh, clean installs after erasing the startup drive. It happens in all applications, including Finder, and the machines are in 3 different locations on 3 different networks, both wired and wireless.

 

[Truefan31]

I hope this fixes the issue where my iMac randomly looses it, freezes and restarts all by itself. A $3,000 machine shouldn't do this, especially in the middle of work.

Yeah my iMac does that too. Should've stayed on mavericks. Lemme know if it does fix it

 

[Truefan31]

This most likely represents a problem with the hard drive. Get an app like DriveDx that can tell you the SMART status in detail. Unfortunately Apple's SMART support is basically useless in terms of either the data it gives you or the analysis it provides. DriveDx costs around $30 or so but is worth it, IMHO.

If it IS the hard drive, the easiest solution is to buy an external SSD (drive should be around $300 for a 1TB drive, I recommend Samsung 850 EVO, a good USB3 enclosure [that supports UASP for extra speed] should cost you around $20, I recommend Inateck) and run your system off an external SSD.

Hard drives are still the suckiest, most likely to die, least likely to tell you, part of the system :-(
[doublepost=1463456449][/doublepost]I can't speak as to any other changes yet, but it is immediately obvious on older machines (this is a 2007 class machine) that Remote Desktop performance has been DRAMATICALLY improved. Running Remote Desktop to this machine used to use up about 100% of a CPU on that machine (around 50% for the remote desktop work, which I assume was mainly data compression, and around 50% is excess Window Server work). Now it's negligible, less than 20%.

You can even do insane things like watch a movie playing on the remote machine, and the playback is smooth and non-tearing. Damn! It's not EXACTLY the crisp performance of a Sandy Bridge or later machine (which uses h.264 encoding hardware built into the GPU of those chips) but it's as close as you can reasonably expect on a machine that is 9 years old!

I have a crucial mx100 512 GB ssd in a seagate thunderbolt adapter as my boot drive. No issues while on mavericks. I skipped Yosemite and though el Capitan would be ok. Now I get random restarts and freezes.

 

[whg]

For Old Times' sake... Safari seems snappier.

No kidding, but my 2012 rMBP 15" newer was that good before! 10.11.5 seems to be the best version of OS X I've seen so far.

 

[Te0SX]

What on earth are you guys doing to your system that causes issues ? Not with Yosemite or this current OS have I had any problems. Of course I don't fool around with things. Everything stock and all have worked well. Only downloaded app would be a weather app.

lol

Everything runs really smooth here.

 

[Donfor39]

No beachballs since yesterday.

Delighted my wee macbook if flying.

Think project save for Skylake 2017 should begin.

 

[orthorim]

No kidding, but my 2012 rMBP 15" newer was that good before! 10.11.5 seems to be the best version of OS X I've seen so far.

Stop it. I am trying to resist the temptation to install the upgrade before I go home and make a backup first.... which would inevitably end up bricking my machine...

 

[name99]

I have a crucial mx100 512 GB ssd in a seagate thunderbolt adapter as my boot drive. No issues while on mavericks. I skipped Yosemite and though el Capitan would be ok. Now I get random restarts and freezes.

How much power can Thunderbolt (and then your enclosure) deliver? A big problem with SSDs is that they use a LOT of power, especially when doing random writes, and this power grows over time as they age. The net results is that you can have a system that boots and appears to be fine, but will randomly crash at a point where it needs to page out aggressively or otherwise suddenly needs to perform a lot of somewhat random writes.

The AnandTech review of the crucial mx100 512 says that it needs just under 3.5 W for random writes, but it may not age well. So if your enclosure was specced to deliver exactly 3.5W, you may occasionally be overshooting.

If your enclosure provides an external power source and you didn't hook it up because it didn't seem to be necessary, now might be the time to do so...

 

[bekiil]

So, is the downloadable installer file from App store updated with this yet?

 

[Erdbeertorte]

Seems to be less stable than every developer beta of 10.11.5.

I had already two crashes of Opera Developer since the update from beta 4 and one crash of the System Preferences, while doing almost nothing and Opera Developer never crashed before in any beta of 10.11.5.

The message to send a crash report to Apple also does not show up anymore after an application crashed.

I did not see any improvement yet compared to 10.11.4 or 10.11.5 beta 1-4, it's even worse. Crashing apps happened very rarely before and the Mac was even much fuller with apps running in the background. I did a clean install a few days ago.

 

[mikeboss]

So, is the downloadable installer file from App store updated with this yet?

YES

 

[Truefan31]

How much power can Thunderbolt (and then your enclosure) deliver? A big problem with SSDs is that they use a LOT of power, especially when doing random writes, and this power grows over time as they age. The net results is that you can have a system that boots and appears to be fine, but will randomly crash at a point where it needs to page out aggressively or otherwise suddenly needs to perform a lot of somewhat random writes.

The AnandTech review of the crucial mx100 512 says that it needs just under 3.5 W for random writes, but it may not age well. So if your enclosure was specced to deliver exactly 3.5W, you may occasionally be overshooting.

If your enclosure provides an external power source and you didn't hook it up because it didn't seem to be necessary, now might be the time to do so...

I'm gonna try that. Ordered a Delock thunderbolt enclosure which is ac powered. If it fixes it I'm returning thevadapter.

 

[star-affinity]

Still does not fix the bluetooth woes I have with Apple peripherals (both old version and this latest ones).
Out of the sudden keyboard and trackpad will start acting weird, keyboard turns unresponsive and jittery as if I'm pressing other keys or no keys and trackpad just lags out constantly.
You can see the keyboard situation here:

Are you sure it's not hardware related? Does it work as expected with for example OS X 10.10.5 Yosemite?
[doublepost=1463471489][/doublepost]

For Old Times' sake... Safari seems snappier.

It actually should be this time since OS X 10.11.5 includes a build from the ”Safari Technology Preview” that has been out for testing for some time, and most who have tried it has claimed it's noticeable snappier.

 

[Texxy]

Finally updated from Yosemite. Waited this long for a decent release, everything running smoothly on my Late 2013 rMBP.

 

[star-affinity]

Seems to be less stable than every developer beta of 10.11.5.

I had already two crashes of Opera Developer since the update from beta 4 and one crash of the System Preferences, while doing almost nothing and Opera Developer never crashed before in any beta of 10.11.5.

The message to send a crash report to Apple also does not show up anymore after an application crashed.

I did not see any improvement yet compared to 10.11.4 or 10.11.5 beta 1-4, it's even worse. Crashing apps happened very rarely before and the Mac was even much fuller with apps running in the background. I did a clean install a few days ago.

A clean install a few days ago? I even upgraded the installation I have from a previous major OS X version and I don't see any apps crashing after the 10.11.5 update. Maybe you have bad RAM or something? Should't behave like that.
[doublepost=1463472135][/doublepost]

Have you tried Safari Technology Preview??? Found it very responsive "snappier" and has become my preferred browser.

The OS X 10.11.5 update actually includes Safari 9.1.1 which most likely is similar to the Safari Technology Preview that's been in testing for some time. I guess the Safari Tech. Preview soon will get a different version number.

 

[Steve121178]

Finally updated from Yosemite. Waited this long for a decent release, everything running smoothly on my Late 2013 rMBP.

It's been fine since 10.11.1 for me. Mind you, I always do a clean install which is why I never have the problems everyone else seem to report.

 

[star-affinity]

Finally updated from Yosemite. Waited this long for a decent release, everything running smoothly on my Late 2013 rMBP.

El Capitan has been working more than decently for me since it was released. But glad you did the jump and are happy with it.
[doublepost=1463472734][/doublepost]

It's been fine since 10.11.1 for me. Mind you, I always do a clean install which is why I never have the problems everyone else seem to report.

I rarely do a clean install and it has almost always worked fine for me anyway. :|