Resolved Getting really slowed down by something called mdworker?

[hellothere231]

Hi, I'm on Mac OS X Lion, 10.7.5. My mac seems to be getting really slowed down by something called mdworker. It's taking up all of my ram. Yes, spotlight is indexing, but sometimes it randomly stops, and starts again. And, I mean really, really slow. Please help!

EDIT: Now something's taking up all of my CPU usage, and ram. It's not even mdworker, and nothing running is using that much power!

EDIT: I just force shutdown, and restarted, and it all seems okay.

 

[benwiggy]

You're right, mdworker is part of Spotlight. (md = metadata).

The best advice when Spotlight is thrashing away is to leave it alone and let it get on. Usually, it won't last long, and force-quitting it can get your index into trouble.

Some people will report all manner of constant problems with Spotlight, and some have had no issues since day 1. I've no idea what the difference between them and the root cause might be, though it's often the case that trouble with Spotlight begets more trouble with Spotlight.

 

[Fishrrman]

One of the first things I do after any installation of new system software is to DISABLE Spotlight and REMOVE all the indexes.

I don't want it near my Macs, for the reasons mentioned above...

 

[benwiggy]

One of the first things I do after any installation of new system software is to DISABLE Spotlight and REMOVE all the indexes.
I don't want it near my Macs, for the reasons mentioned above...

As said above, many people don't have problems with it. Some people go through a phase of having trouble with it, and then it clears up for some reason.
I've never had a problem with Spotlight on several Macs, and I consider it essential. I have several AppleScripts and Services that all rely on querying Spotlight metadata, and they are a major part of my workflow. Without it, I'd be scuppered.