Serious beach-ball issues

Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
I have the low-end 13" pro, and I'm having serious problems. Just now I have Safari, iTunes, Mail, and Activity Monitor open. Monitor is showing 560MB of RAM free, my trash only has 300mb in it, and all I'm doing is messing around on Facebook and iTunes.

I've been getting beach balls every 2 minutes. For instance I'll click a link and the music stops while my Macbook freezes for 30 seconds. Even when I'm in the middle of typing it will do it.

I have no idea what's going on or what to do. Suggestions, please?
 
Joined
Jul 2, 2006
Messages
4,554
Reaction score
146
Points
63
Location
Crawley, England
Your Mac's Specs
20" Intel iMac 2.4 Ghz/3G Ram/320HD, Snow Leopard. PBook G4, 1.5Ghz/1.5 Ram/250 HD, Leopard 10.5.6.
Hmm. sometimes just rebooting can help here, but I would get my install disc and run Disk Utility to check and verify permissions, and also the HD while your at it.
If all comes back clear after you should be ok.
 
OP
W
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Someone please help me!

Okay, a few weeks ago I posted about how I was getting an abnormal amount of freezing and beach balls and such. It wasn't a huge deal and if I restarted it it would go away, even if I had to restart a lot.

Here is my current situation:
My Mac freezes after literally almost every click. And it's not little freezing. About 30 seconds at a time. It took me almost 15 minutes to get to this page and after typing the first letter I had to wait another 30 seconds. I have absolutely no idea what to do!

I had a suggestion to repair permissions in Disk Utility, which I've done. And nothing has changed. Before that, I also used Onyx to do the same thing, and that actually seems to have made it deteriorate to its current state of freezing every click.

My HD has 50GB free, my RAM is always fine because I keep restarting it, and my trash is empty; and I can't think of anything else that would be an easy fix.

Another thing was after I restarted once, Spotlight was indexing for like 40 minutes, and it had to index again when I restarted again. I heard something about dragging the com.apple.spotlight.plist thing to my desktop and restarting, which I've done, and that stopped that problem at least.

I also heard about some of these problems having to do with weird stuff running, so I checked my Activity Monitor and nothing looks out of the ordinary. Here's what it looks like right now:
(P.S. it took me another 15 minutes to take this screenshot and upload it.

Picture1.png



So there's everything I can think to tell about my problem. After this hour-long endeavor, I'm hoping someone will PLEASE help me if you can. I'm freaking out and I have 3 papers to write in the next 2 days, which won't happen if I can't click without freezing.
 

bobtomay

,
Retired Staff
Joined
Dec 22, 2006
Messages
26,561
Reaction score
677
Points
113
Location
Texas, where else?
Your Mac's Specs
15" MBP '06 2.33 C2D 4GB 10.7; 13" MBA '14 1.8 i7 8GB 10.11; 21" iMac '13 2.9 i5 8GB 10.11; 6S
have you followed the suggestion in the above post?
 

vansmith

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 19, 2008
Messages
19,924
Reaction score
559
Points
113
Location
Queensland
Your Mac's Specs
Mini (2014, 2018, 2020), MBA (2020), iPad Pro (2018), iPhone 13 Pro Max, Watch (S6)
Another thing was after I restarted once, Spotlight was indexing for like 40 minutes, and it had to index again when I restarted again. I heard something about dragging the com.apple.spotlight.plist thing to my desktop and restarting, which I've done, and that stopped that problem at least.
It is possible that mds (the process responsible for (re)building the index for Spotlight) is having a field day. At the top, where it says "My Processes", change that to "All Processes". What does mds appear to be doing?
 
OP
W
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
I'm going to try the install disc thing but my CD is at my house and I'm at college.

Also, thanks for the idea Spotlight thing, vansmith.

Here's an update: Now it won't turn on.

It has the gray screen with the apple symbol and stays there in limbo. Will Apple just do a little swap out for me?
 
Joined
Mar 31, 2008
Messages
385
Reaction score
2
Points
18
I'm going to try the install disc thing but my CD is at my house and I'm at college.

Also, thanks for the idea Spotlight thing, vansmith.

Here's an update: Now it won't turn on.

It has the gray screen with the apple symbol and stays there in limbo. Will Apple just do a little swap out for me?

If it is under warranty, there is a good chance.
 

cwa107


Retired Staff
Joined
Dec 20, 2006
Messages
27,042
Reaction score
812
Points
113
Location
Lake Mary, Florida
Your Mac's Specs
14" MacBook Pro M1 Pro, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD
Do you have a Boot Camp partition? If so, try excluding the Boot Camp partition from Spotlight.
 

vansmith

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 19, 2008
Messages
19,924
Reaction score
559
Points
113
Location
Queensland
Your Mac's Specs
Mini (2014, 2018, 2020), MBA (2020), iPad Pro (2018), iPhone 13 Pro Max, Watch (S6)
If you continually have beach ball issues and it won't boot properly, I'm led to believe that you may have a HD issue. Try running the Apple Hardware Test (instructions here) to see if there is an issue with your HD.

If you can, try to borrow an install CD to do this since you don't have yours. Better yet, bring it to the campus tech people to see if they can run it for you.
 
OP
W
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
I don't have a partition, but I do have a copy of XP and Parallels.

And I don't have any special warranty, just the standard one it came with, but I bought it in July so it's definitely still covered.

I'll check out that hardware test, thanks!
 

vansmith

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 19, 2008
Messages
19,924
Reaction score
559
Points
113
Location
Queensland
Your Mac's Specs
Mini (2014, 2018, 2020), MBA (2020), iPad Pro (2018), iPhone 13 Pro Max, Watch (S6)
I don't have a partition, but I do have a copy of XP and Parallels.

And I don't have any special warranty, just the standard one it came with, but I bought it in July so it's definitely still covered.

I'll check out that hardware test, thanks!
If you're not running the virtual machine, it will have no effect on the performance of your machine. Let us know what the AHT comes back with.
 
OP
W
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
I won't be able to do the AHT until Tuesday, end then it'll be the Apple provided one that apparently sucks? I can't use the internet to download the SMART Utility one, because it just... doesn't work. Dunno.

My biggest question is how do I go about getting Apple to replace it on warranty? I've never done that before... Do I just call their tech support and be like "So, funny story, my computer's completely fried and takes 20 minutes to turn on and freezes every time I click." Or do I have to go to a store, or... what?
 
OP
W
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
120
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Okay I have an appointment on Wednesday with the Genius bar. I think it's obvious that this is an HD failure, so assuming they replace it, will I be able to get any files from the old one?
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top