Spinning Rainbow

[05Escalade]

This is a 2010 Model MacBook Pro 2.4 Core 2 Duo
I've been having issues with the spinning rainbow. Initially it seemed like only when using the Internet but it will just freeze sometimes regardless of what I'm doing. Nothing works. I have to manually power it down by holding the off button.

Boot it back up it usually seems to work ok for 1-2 minutes and then will freeze again.

I did the apple hardware test and it said everything was ok.

Figuring it was a software issue I erased the hard drive and reinstalled OSX to find out it's doing the same thing?

Any ideas or help? Could this be a hard drive failure or maybe a virus? When I wiped the drive I only did "erase" I didn't overwrite with zeros or anything. Could that be an issue?

 

[harryb2448]

G'day and welcome to the forums.

Well it is showing its age, like all of us. For starters how full is the hard drive? How much memory is installed in the machine? In 2010 reuirements were much less than now, the 'net has got so much quicker and demand for graphics has increased. What operating system is it running?

All vital questions. There are no viruses for Macs so I trust you are not running any antivirus software which are real resource hogs. Also no Mackeeper or any other insidious 'cleaning' programs?

The computer can be speeded up but it all costs money. More memory, and an Solid State Drive for starters maybe? We all have to decide if we upgrade our machines, or update to newer models. Five years is considered a good run from any computer, Mac or PC. Of course they will run longer than this, but they do start to lag.

 

[05Escalade]

Hard drive is 250Gb and it had 70GB on it. Computer has 4GB of ram currently. I've had it for 6.5 years now so I can't really complain. It has been absolutely maintenance free aside from one power cord.

I do not have any anti-virus or and Mac cleaners on it. Just figured if there was some way I could revive this one it might be worth a couple more years. But maybe it's time to upgrade? I was just curious as to why it was doing what it was doing.

I thought for sure after clearing the hard drive and reinstalling OSX I'd be good to go. But that's not the case. It does the same exact thing. Which leads me to believe it is an issue with the hardware? Would that be a correct assumption?

 

[chscag]

Probably a failing hard drive. At least that's what the symptoms you describe indicate. You can replace the hard drive yourself and while you're at it, can add some more memory. That won't cost you much and you may get a few more years out of your MacBook Pro.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

This is a 2010 Model MacBook Pro 2.4 Core 2 Duo
I've been having issues with the spinning rainbow.

Check out:

Macintosh OS X Beachballs!
http://www.macattorney.com/rbb.html