Reviving slow macbook pro in 3rd world tropics

[belizeguy]

Hello,
I have a mid 2012 pro thaat has gotten incredibly slow, when I type a command, the simplest thing can take 10 seconds.
For instance if I type my complete name into an email, the letters will begin to appear 5 seconds later one at at a time, hesitantly.
Other more complicated commands throw it right into distress mode,m the dreaded color wheel.
It have 4 macs btw, the latest 1 terabyte solid state drive 15" pro, but i still prefer older Iphoto for editing photos.
It has been suggested to me to install a new 1 terrabyte SSD, I was provided with a link to buy one and ship it here to Belize.
I have taken it to the local repair shop for a new hard drive, and they keep insisting that they tested mine and it is fine.
There are no certified Apple Techs or Genius bars here, just as well.
I talked to an Apple genius in the states and he told me my 5&1/2 year old computer is too ancient to be bother supplying parts for.
My question is, is it safe to assume that a new hard drive will solve my problem?
I can just order one, ($300) and insist that they not test mine a 3rd time but simply install new hard drive like they were instructed to do and paid for twice already.
Thanks in advance, photoguy stuck in 3rd world Belize!

 

[harryb2448]

G'day and welcome to the forums.

If the MBP_ has a platter driver, that explains things. Alas platters are just getting slower and slower as the whole computer and 'net world gets faster. Go for an SSD.

 

[belizeguy]

Had to google that, not a geek obviously. That's what i was hoping to hear, there is nothing else that could slow it down besides the hard drive I am hoping.
If it could be another issue i would love to hear about it now before I spend $300 and ship the item to Belize.
There are no mac proficient people here, the one place in the entire country that claims to service them has pulled a bait & switch on me 3 times.
The tech has a terrible communications problem, he goes into a trance, hears only what he would tell himself.
He imported 8,000 images into my iphoto album then denied he had anything to do with it!
Thanx!

 

[pm-r]

I've never come across a normally working hard drive that was anywhere near being that slow, assuming of course it wasn't jammed too full to be able to works properly.

Why not get an external drive and use a cloning backup all like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper! and then try running from the external drive and see if things don't improve???

That's assuming that you can get a drive (and cable) delivered to your Belize jungle area. ;D




- Patrick
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[belizeguy]

Sounds like good advice but it's over my head. I do have an external hard drive but don't know how to do any of that. If I were going to have a drive sent to find out, would it not make sense to just buy the SSD? Sounds like the drive is the only thing it could be. Caribbean sea salt air on this island is **** on electronics, especially the ones with moving parts. This is another good reason to go with SSD I was told. thanks btw for input! Hard drive sounds like the problem so far, I'm just waiting to see if it's possibly something else.

 

[belizeguy]

If someone tells me what to display here i can do that? Thanks!

Macintosh HD:

Available: 281.86 GB (281,857,798,144 bytes)
Capacity: 499.25 GB (499,248,103,424 bytes)
Mount Point: /

File System: Journaled HFS+
Writable: Yes
Ignore Ownership: No
BSD Name: disk0s2
Volume UUID: 8A2BD959-275C-3216-B5CB-299521A34F22
Physical Drive:
Media Name: APPLE HDD HTS545050A7E362 Media
Medium Type: Rotational
Protocol: SATA
Internal: Yes
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Verified

 

[pm-r]

Sounds like good advice but it's over my head. I do have an external hard drive but don't know how to do any of that.

Well, you should at least be able to StartUp your Mac using Safe Boot Mode and if it behaves properly and at a normal speed, that would tell you that you have some software problems.

To use it, Startup your Mac and press and hold the shift key immediately you hear the startup chime sound.

You can stop pressing the shift key when you see the small grey spinning gear.

Then login using your admin username when asked and give it a try.

Some things like printers etc. probably won't work. But see if your typing etc is any faster.

To get back to "normal", just Restart normally.




- Patrick
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