I'm so sick of my computer. With every upgrade, my computer is running slower and slower. It takes roughly 7 minutes for a damn internet page to open up. I really had it. Ever since Mojave my computer started slowing down. Now that I'm on Monterey 12.6.7 it is slow as heck. I really can't afford a new computer and this is it for me. I have an old iMac 2015. I can't open 2 things at the same time. If I open Safari and then while the icon bounces I'm trying to view a document by pressing the space bar and it takes forever for either one to open.
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Slow Computer
- Thread starter jquest68
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I feel your pain. I had 2 iMacs: 2009 and 2013. Both got close to the state you’re describing. For a long time, I thought maybe it was something my kids downloaded on the machine that was causing it. Then I used a co-worker’s iMac at the office. Just as bad.
All I can tell you is to run as little as possible. Restart the machine frequently. Remove any apps from auto start and run only the apps you need at the moment. If your storage is at 80% or more, try to remove as much as needed to get below 80% so that the memory can be used for page files and memory swapping.
If you’re feeling particularly adventurous and have a very good backup of your files, you can try a clean install of 12.6.7 to see if that helps.
Finally, and I know you said a new computer is not in the cards, but have you considered getting a refurbished Mac Mini. Those can be had for about $500. That might be with saving for to avoid the aggravation you are experiencing.
Good luck!
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OP:
What kind of DRIVE is inside?
If it's a platter-based hard drive, it's going to be slow.
If it's a fusion drive, it may be slowing down, as well.
Some folks open up the iMac and change the internal drive, but this is not a job for the squeamish. It involves some risk in that it's quite easy to break something in the process.
Having said that, you can give the iMac a fairly nice speed boost by upgrading to an EXTERNAL USB3 SSD -- making it your EXTERNAL boot drive.
This is so simple I call it "child's play on the Mac".
What I'd suggest:
Get a Samsung t7 "shield" drive, either 512gb or 1tb (the 1tb seems to be on sale for a good price):
Download SuperDuper from this link:
SuperDuper is FREE to use for this purpose.
Connect the SSD to the iMac.
Open Disk Utility
Go to the "view" menu and choose "show ALL devices" (VERY important, DO NOT SKIP THIS)
Erase the SSD to APFS, GUID partition format.
Open SuperDuper. You can accept all the SD "defaults".
Put the internal drive as the "source".
Put the SSD as the "target".
Let SuperDuper "clone" the contents of the internal drive to the external.
Finally,
Go to the startup disk preference pane.
Click the lock and enter your password.
Now click the icon for the SSD.
REBOOT.
That's it -- iMac should now boot and run from the SSD.
Will be considerably faster !
PRINT OUT this reply for future reference.
Having written all this...
If you don't want to upgrade the old iMac, then it might be time to start shopping for a replacement.
I'd suggest an m2 Mini, or perhaps even an m2pro Mini...
What kind of DRIVE is inside?
If it's a platter-based hard drive, it's going to be slow.
If it's a fusion drive, it may be slowing down, as well.
Some folks open up the iMac and change the internal drive, but this is not a job for the squeamish. It involves some risk in that it's quite easy to break something in the process.
Having said that, you can give the iMac a fairly nice speed boost by upgrading to an EXTERNAL USB3 SSD -- making it your EXTERNAL boot drive.
This is so simple I call it "child's play on the Mac".
What I'd suggest:
Get a Samsung t7 "shield" drive, either 512gb or 1tb (the 1tb seems to be on sale for a good price):
SAMSUNG T7 Shield 1TB, up to 1050MB/s, USB 3.2 Gen2, Rugged, IP65 Rated, for Photographers, Content Creators and Gaming, Portable External Solid State Drive (MU-PE1T0S/AM, 2022), Black
Samsung T7 Shield Portable SSD delivers high performance on-the-go, not matter the terrain. It has an IP65 rating for water1 and dust2 resistance, with Dynamic Thermal Guard to manage heat control. Transfer huge files instantly. USB 3.2 Gen 2 and PCIe® NVMe achieve soaring sequential read/write ...
www.amazon.com
Download SuperDuper from this link:
SuperDuper is FREE to use for this purpose.
Connect the SSD to the iMac.
Open Disk Utility
Go to the "view" menu and choose "show ALL devices" (VERY important, DO NOT SKIP THIS)
Erase the SSD to APFS, GUID partition format.
Open SuperDuper. You can accept all the SD "defaults".
Put the internal drive as the "source".
Put the SSD as the "target".
Let SuperDuper "clone" the contents of the internal drive to the external.
Finally,
Go to the startup disk preference pane.
Click the lock and enter your password.
Now click the icon for the SSD.
REBOOT.
That's it -- iMac should now boot and run from the SSD.
Will be considerably faster !
PRINT OUT this reply for future reference.
Having written all this...
If you don't want to upgrade the old iMac, then it might be time to start shopping for a replacement.
I'd suggest an m2 Mini, or perhaps even an m2pro Mini...
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Have you tried doing a Time Machine backup then reformat and reinstall Monterey/Ventura from scratch?
Doing this may help indicate if there's an app or macOS setting that is slowing down your Mac.
If your are on a iMac 27" be aware that you can easily improve your RAM to 32GB or more.
If you are on a iMac 21.5" it will require you to unseal the display to reach the RAM.
Yes, it may be that your drive is the problem. I had a similar experience with my late 2013 iMac and switching to using an external SSD as the boot drive has made a HUUUUUGE difference.
As Fishrrman suggests, it's an easy and ineffective switch
I did that to my 2013 iMac the last year before as Apple didn't had anything to trade it in for.
Sure it made some difference with the Samsung SSD, and I had pretty ok 32 RAM on it too.
But still, it was sloooow and a mess to deal with - some shifts don't make it a new computer.
Mac Studio was BIG change, and well worth it for me.
So @jquest68 - now there are cheaper Mac Mini's etc. So don't waste a lot on that old servant.
The OP says it takes nearly 7 MINUTES for an internet page to open up........mine takes just a few seconds for most pages. I suspect something is wrong with his iMac besides just being old; like a failing internal drive maybe.
And yes a new Mac Studio should make a huge difference to a 2015 iMac...but since the OP says there's no money for one, it seems more appropriate to offer a suggestion for something that's affordable.
I had a 2013 iMac, if you read my post - OP have a 2015.
You might be right that there's something additional fault then age on OP's iMac, who knows?
Cleaning out an old Mac can always be a good thing to test, and not forget to have a few Time-Machine/Carbon Copy Cloner copies etc, of everything on the Mac
I didn't suggest OP to buy a Mac Studio, but rather a Mini.
Hey, you haven't got any coffee/espresso today or what? 😉
I also have a similar problem, but on a Macbook Pro early 2015. Mine was running fine until Monterey update 12.6.6. a few weeks ago. Since then I'm having regular problems with anything using the CPU (browsers, DAWs, etc). I had hoped the new 12.6.7 was going to solve the problem, but it doesn't seem to. Everything comes to a grinding halt, and I either have to close the lid for a few minutes, or shut down. This sort of solves the problem, but only for a few minutes. The computer can become unresponsive, in various situations, and I can see that the kernal_task is going mad, but (as mentioned), it doesn't seem to be connected to anything in particular (i.e. some app running in the background).
For others reading this thread, I really have looked at all possibilities/ My SSD is not full at all, I only changed it a few months ago after the original gave out. I don't have start up apps, and all the usual suggestions you read about on the useless 'help' sites. Restarting, or resetting the SMC or NVPRAM doesn't make any difference either. I also ran (the Apple thread favorite) Etrecheck, but it showed nothing of interest.
So, what's next, any suggestions?
p.s. I'm going to see if going back to an earlier version of Monterey via Time Machine might solve the problem (I didn't make any backup - on purpose - since 12.6.6.). However, I'm a school teacher, and I'm just waiting to finish my reports before doing this, as I might loose some important info (I've forgot to save elsewhere)
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I also have a similar problem, but on a Macbook Pro early 2015. Mine was running fine until Monterey update 12.6.6. a few weeks ago. Since then I'm having regular problems with anything using the CPU (browsers, DAWs, etc). I had hoped the new 12.6.7 was going to solve the problem, but it doesn't seem to. Everything comes to a grinding halt, and I either have to close the lid for a few minutes, or shut down. This sort of solves the problem, but only for a few minutes. The computer can become unresponsive, in various situations, and I can see that the kernal_task is going mad, but (as mentioned), it doesn't seem to be connected to anything in particular (i.e. some app running in the background).
For others reading this thread, I really have looked at all possibilities/ My SSD is not full at all, I only changed it a few months ago after the original gave out. I don't have start up apps, and all the usual suggestions you read about on the useless 'help' sites. Restarting, or resetting the SMC or NVPRAM doesn't make any difference either. I also ran (the Apple thread favorite) Etrecheck, but it showed nothing of interest.
So, what's next, any suggestions?
p.s. I'm going to see if going back to an earlier version of Monterey via Time Machine might solve the problem (I didn't make any backup - on purpose - since 12.6.6.). However, I'm a school teacher, and I'm just waiting to finish my reports before doing this, as I might loose some important info (I've forgot to save elsewhere)
By chance, what amount of RAM are you running?
Good point, 8GB.
Although this 'could' be part of the problem, I'm rather surprised that everything was running very well (read: perfect) until 3 weeks ago when the new 12.6.6. was released. However, I'm open to suggestions.
I should just give a few specs to help: Macbook Pro early 2015, SSD 480GB (I've used 127GB), RAM 8GB.
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I wouldn't think the 8 GB RAM would be the biggest bottleneck. 8 GB RAM on an Intel Mac isn't awesome but should still give you enough headroom for a couple of browser tabs, a music app, and some other stuff.
If you have a plate drive in your machine (or a Fusion Drive) that is 100% a performance hit and most likely a huge issue for you. Based on your comments that it is a 2015 iMac and you only have 8 GB RAM, I am guessing you have a lower end 21.5'' iMac and it definitely would have a slower drive in it.
A clean install of the OS would rule out any buggy software oddities but isn't going to make up for the fact that you have a slower drive. @Fishrrman offers some excellent advice for how you might improve your machine's performance at minimal cost to you.
If you have a plate drive in your machine (or a Fusion Drive) that is 100% a performance hit and most likely a huge issue for you. Based on your comments that it is a 2015 iMac and you only have 8 GB RAM, I am guessing you have a lower end 21.5'' iMac and it definitely would have a slower drive in it.
A clean install of the OS would rule out any buggy software oddities but isn't going to make up for the fact that you have a slower drive. @Fishrrman offers some excellent advice for how you might improve your machine's performance at minimal cost to you.
The more recent the OS build, the more hungry the demands for memory and the greater the pressure on that memory, especially as multiple applications and background services run concurrently.
It is of little surprise that during the past four years of post macOS-10.x builds, Mac products listed for sale have, increasingly, offered options for soldered, 32GB, 64GB or even 96GB RAM, in addition to the long-standing 16GB (with 8GB, still offered, becoming more scarce with line-ups). With 8GB, these performance limitations become more apparent. Heck, running High Sierra on 6GB can run into occasional bottlenecks!
2015 MBPs have only an AHCI SSD blade. Their issue was not about an iMac.
I concur. A clean install may not hurt. There may also be some unneeded services which can be deactivated. A handy tool like OnyX can assist with that.
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Now my Mac Studio is slowing down, since the new one came out. Apple must be doing something to slow machines down. They were caught doing it with iOS and they had to change. I really hope they stop slowing machines down. I spent all my savings on my Mac Studio and have nothing left.
They are not slowing machines down. Sheesh.
Nahh, my Mac Studio is a dragon on fire, that haven't changed since I got it, or since M2 came out.
You're hallucinating, if you even have one.
I have a 2015 also and have no such problems. If, you are still around give us an update or/and more info about your computer.
I was recently over at my folks' house and they showed me their 2013 iMac to see if I could figure out why it was "slow." It was not slow, it was absolutely on life-support. 7 minutes to load a website is right about what they're experiencing too. I downloaded smartctl and tested the 1tb HDD but no issues detected. An hour into tinkering with it it froze completely and rebooted itself.
CPU load was not high, nothing weird running in the background, plenty of ram. Either the HDD is failing in a way SMART can't detect, OS is somehow hosed, or maybe the CPU cooler has lost good contact over 10 years and it's running at a few hundred Mhz to avoid overheating?
If you have a USB stick laying around, I would be super curious how your machine acts if you booted up Ubuntu. If it's fast, the issue is either your HDD or OS install. If it's still terrible you'd be forced to open her up and find the hardware problem.
It seems as if with every update my computer gets slower and slower. I can't do 2 things at the same time. Let's say I open Safari and the icon is bouncing, then I try to open a folder at the same time it's like a battle about who opens first. I can open the Safari app and leave to make coffee and it'll still open slowly. Computer version (12.6.8)
Yeah that's gonna happen but you have something else going on. Others have mention ram and Onyx, how much ram do you have? have you tried Onyx?(link below) there's also
EtreCheck
www.etrecheck.com
👍
Yeah that's gonna happen but you have something else going on. Others have mention ram and Onyx, how much ram do you have? have you tried Onyx?(link below) there's also
I had a place put a ssd drive in. It's faster than the spinner but it doesn't burn rubber lol.EtreCheck
I did everything when I had my iMac: Onyx, CleanMyMac, reinstalling the OS, added addtional RAM, you name it. All except installing an SSD. Sounds like from what you are saying, even that wouldn’t have helped much. This was so frustrating that I almost gave up on Apple.
Hopefully whatever was constraining those iMacs has been remedied now with the Apple Silicon version. Otherwise, I could still not recommend one of these to anyone I know.
I looked back to see what puters they were and Apple was just changing their hardware for puters. Bummer, you had such problems with them.
The ssd had replaced a dying spinner and the difference was/is noticeable just not blazing fast like all the talk about them. This 2015 still does the job well and will hold onto it to see if the rumored iMac gets here by next year.
While on the surface, you seem to be quite convinced that you've identified software updates as the cause of your angst, my thoughts would still go first to a small set of possible hardware issues. Moving parts are by far and away the most common failures in any given electronic device. So first check the things that are easy:
- Are the ventilation fans running when the iMac is under heavy load? (They tend to be pretty loud under load, so you probably know if you've heard them spin up before.)
- If the fans simply never spin up, they might possibly have failed, which would cause your iMac to be constantly throttling due to overheating issues.
- If the fans do spin up: are they running quite loudly almost all the time? If so, you may have a simple dust buildup problem, which would likewise cause overheating and throttling.
While it may pinch a bit... there's not really any way to avoid spending at least a little bit of money to solve your problem. But interestingly enough, you shouldn't need to go so far as buying an entirely new Mac; that 2015 iMac should still be pretty peppy; I still have 2012 and 2010 Macs that are quite responsive and useable, and the only things I've done to them was... well, exactly what I'm about to recommend to you:
As Fishrrman noted earlier in this thread, booting that iMac from an SSD -- internal or external, whichever makes more sense for your scenario -- should be your next focus. (This of course necessitates installing a whole new clean copy of macOS on that SSD, along with whatever other software you need.) You will probably be pleasantly surprised at the performance improvement.
After that, maybe consider bumping up the RAM. I noticed in other posts that you only have 8GB; you should be able to get 32GB for somewhere less than $100. It won't help nearly as much as the transition from HDD to SSD, but it will help, particularly for your Adobe based workflows.
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