Early 2011 MBP issues (any suggestions?)

[ChrisTX]

So I have been having intermittent issues with my Mac for a while now, but usually not enough for me to worry. Now it has just gotten extremely worse as of late. It is extremely laggy at times, it has been overheating while performing such mundane tasks as browning the web, and it won't back up with time machine(or at least tries to, but takes FOREVER!). I've been able to deal with the sluggishness, but the overheating is what has me concerned. Any ideas or suggestions before I take it in to an Apple genius?

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Open Activity Monitor and select All Processes and then sort by CPU to show you the process(es) slowing down your Mac or speeding up your fan(s) or causing more heat and also 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​

Those Macs in their heat - a sine of over-heating? - a short story by Mister GGJstudios

 

[ChrisTX]

Open Activity Monitor and select All Processes and then sort by CPU to show you the process(es) slowing down your Mac or speeding up your fan(s) or causing more heat and also 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​

Those Macs in their heat - a sine of over-heating? - a short story by Mister GGJstudios

Thanks for the timely response, will do!

EDIT: No Page Outs or Swap Used, and The only processes using the most memory, and cpu is Safari, and Activity monitor. I did shut down my Mac completely, and reboot so I'm sure that helped a little. It's not overheating at the moment, but I'll make sure, and follow these steps again once it does! Thanks for the tips, this has helped a bunch!

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Thanks for the timely response, will do!

EDIT: No Page Outs or Swap Used, and The only processes using the most memory, and cpu is Safari, and Activity monitor. I did shut down my Mac completely, and reboot so I'm sure that helped a little. It's not overheating at the moment, but I'll make sure, and follow these steps again once it does! Thanks for the tips, this has helped a bunch!

Have you selected to SHOW ALL PROCESSES while checking for CPU activity? And what actual temperatures (Celsius or Kelvin or Fahrenheit) do you experience? If the Mac would overheat, it would not, as it would shut down before doing so in order to protect itself of overheating.
You can use this full software to check for temps.