2010 iMac running VERY slow - advice needed

[rediffusion]

Hi,

My 2010 iMac has recently got excruciatingly slow and it t moves at a snails pace. As far as I can remember this happened for no apparent reason (I didn’t update the system software). I have run disk utility and it hasn’t found any problems.

Can anybody recommend the best way to deal with this? I use TimeMachine so everything is backed up.

Many thanks in advance,

Rich

 

[Apple fanboy]

Hi,

My 2010 iMac has recently got excruciatingly slow and it t moves at a snails pace. As far as I can remember this happened for no apparent reason (I didn’t update the system software). I have run disk utility and it hasn’t found any problems.

Can anybody recommend the best way to deal with this? I use TimeMachine so everything is backed up.

Many thanks in advance,

Rich

How much free space on your hard drive? Might be the issue.

 

[kschendel]

Check Activity Monitor (in Utilities) to see if anything obvious jumps out that is using up lots of CPU or memory.

 

[redheeler]

Does your iMac still have original the mechanical hard drive? It's likely that this is the cause of your problem.

I recommend installing an SSD, you'll be surprised how much quicker your older iMac feels afterward.

 

[Buxley]

This happened to a Mac I was using. Turns out the hard drive was going bad. On the "Console" app, check to see if you've been getting disk errors.

 

[rediffusion]

Thanks everybody for your replies...

How much free space on your hard drive? Might be the issue.

About 22GB of a 1TB hard drive

Check Activity Monitor (in Utilities) to see if anything obvious jumps out that is using up lots of CPU or memory.

Does your iMac still have original the mechanical hard drive? It's likely that this is the cause of your problem.

I recommend installing an SSD, you'll be surprised how much quicker your older iMac feels afterward.

Is that something I could do myself? I have upgraded the memory in the past.

This happened to a Mac I was using. Turns out the hard drive was going bad. On the "Console" app, check to see if you've been getting disk errors.

Where do I look in the Console app?
This is what I see...

Once again, many thanks to you all!

 

[redheeler]

Is that something I could do myself? I have upgraded the memory in the past.

It's harder than upgrading the memory, but something I have done successfully 3 times. You can have an Apple authorized repair shop do it for you if you're not confident enough to do it yourself - but there are kits and step-by-step instructions available online.

OWC sells a full kit that includes the temperature sensor necessary to stop the fan from running excessively after replacing the original failing hard drive. Then all you'll need is a standard SATA SSD and standard 2.5" to 3.5" bracket.

 

[rediffusion]

It's harder than upgrading the memory, but something I have done successfully 3 times. You can have an Apple authorized repair shop do it for you if you're not confident enough to do it yourself - but there are kits and step-by-step instructions available online.

OWC sells a full kit that includes the temperature sensor necessary to stop the fan from running excessively after replacing the original failing hard drive. Then all you'll need is a standard SATA SSD and standard 2.5" to 3.5" bracket.

Thanks!
Is there a particular brand/model of SATA SSD I should get?

 

[redheeler]

Thanks!
Is there a particular brand/model of SATA SSD I should get?

Just realized I linked the wrong kit above. Here is the right one: https://www.amazon.com/OWC-Digital-Thermal-Upgrade-2009-2010/dp/B01LZV3YNJ/

No particular brand is required, as long as it's a standard 2.5" SATA. I chose Samsung 850 EVO SSDs.

 

[rediffusion]

Just realized I linked the wrong kit above. Here is the right one: https://www.amazon.com/OWC-Digital-Thermal-Upgrade-2009-2010/dp/B01LZV3YNJ/

No particular brand is required, as long as it's a standard 2.5" SATA. I chose Samsung 850 EVO SSDs.

I notice that if I buy an SSD from Amazon they also offer to send somebody to install it for $118 extra. Do you think this is a good deal rather than buying the kit and dealing with the hassle of installing myself?

[doublepost=1505434567][/doublepost]So here's the total – almost $500. Is it worth spending that much on a 2010 iMac? I can't really afford to buy a new one at the moment but I use the iMac to store all my music and important files. I have a 15" 2017 MBP but it only has a 256GB hard drive – not enough for all my files.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I notice that if I buy an SSD from Amazon they also offer to send somebody to install it for $118 extra. Do you think this is a good deal rather than buying the kit and dealing with the hassle of installing myself?

[doublepost=1505434567][/doublepost]So here's the total – almost $500. Is it worth spending that much on a 2010 iMac? I can't really afford to buy a new one at the moment but I use the iMac to store all my music and important files. I have a 15" 2017 MBP but it only has a 256GB hard drive – not enough for all my files.

Stick with using authorized Apple repair service. Amazon's person may not Apple authorized and that could pose big problems, should he or she damage your iMac attempting to do something that is above their pay grade.

 

[trusso]

Thanks everybody for your replies...
About 22GB of a 1TB hard drive

I know many are quick to recommend an upgrade to SSD, and it certainly wouldn't hurt, but if you're not getting any disk errors, than I'd say the most likely cause is the small amount of free disk space on your drive relative to your 1TB capacity. Try off-loading another ~50GB onto an external drive and see if that helps.

 

[kschendel]

The Samsung is a fine unit, but you're paying a premium for it and there's almost no point in a sata 2 iMac. I'd look for a cheaper unit. In addition, if you only have 22 Gb out of 1 Tb free, that's not going to fly ... you either need to clean up quite a bit, or install a larger unit -- and now you're looking at e.g. $540 for a 2 Tb Mushkin, which is the price leader. I don't know I would put that kind of money into a 2010. You don't have any real good options for moving data to an external drive, either (no USB3). Are there files that you very rarely reference that can be moved to an external drive? SSD's generally don't do well if they are more than about 3/4 full (very rough guideline).

Does the slowness persist over a reboot? you have some significant uptimes in your screenshots.

Before opening up the machine to replace disks, I think you should install SMART Utility or some equivalent to see what it has to say about the disk drive. The errors you show in console have to do with some sort of obsolete junk in keychain utiity, and I'd be surprised if it had anything to do with the slowdown. I don't see any obvious disk errors in the snippet you posted.

 

[macs4nw]

Does your iMac still have original the mechanical hard drive? It's likely that this is the cause of your problem.

I recommend installing an SSD, you'll be surprised how much quicker your older iMac feels afterward.

So true on both counts. Of all the friends/relatives who come to me (ha) for advice or troubleshooting on their Macs, the vast majority of sloooow performance issues is a dying HDD.

And SSDs no longer are as prohibitively expensive as they were say 5yrs ago.

 

[rediffusion]

Stick with using authorized Apple repair service. Amazon's person may not Apple authorized and that could pose big problems, should he or she damage your iMac attempting to do something that is above their pay grade.

I know many are quick to recommend an upgrade to SSD, and it certainly wouldn't hurt, but if you're not getting any disk errors, than I'd say the most likely cause is the small amount of free disk space on your drive relative to your 1TB capacity. Try off-loading another ~50GB onto an external drive and see if that helps.

The Samsung is a fine unit, but you're paying a premium for it and there's almost no point in a sata 2 iMac. I'd look for a cheaper unit. In addition, if you only have 22 Gb out of 1 Tb free, that's not going to fly ... you either need to clean up quite a bit, or install a larger unit -- and now you're looking at e.g. $540 for a 2 Tb Mushkin, which is the price leader. I don't know I would put that kind of money into a 2010. You don't have any real good options for moving data to an external drive, either (no USB3). Are there files that you very rarely reference that can be moved to an external drive? SSD's generally don't do well if they are more than about 3/4 full (very rough guideline).

Does the slowness persist over a reboot? you have some significant uptimes in your screenshots.

Before opening up the machine to replace disks, I think you should install SMART Utility or some equivalent to see what it has to say about the disk drive. The errors you show in console have to do with some sort of obsolete junk in keychain utiity, and I'd be surprised if it had anything to do with the slowdown. I don't see any obvious disk errors in the snippet you posted.

Thanks for all the replies.
Yes, the slowness does persist after a reboot. Here is more of the Console report if you wouldn't mind taking a look:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pfufptqk4axlc4d/ConsoleInfo.txt
(I'm no expert so it means very little to me)

I will try the SMART utility and see what that shows. I also have a lot of files I could get rid of. I will try and free up some space. I think part of the problem is every time I've bought a new Mac I have just transferred everything over. I am sure there's loads of artifacts from many, many years ago that I don't need.

Anyway, thank you all for your help. I'll try freeing up some space first and see if that helps to start with. If that doesn't help I'll then think about a SSD drive.

 

[nambuccaheadsau]

Suggest you aim for 50-100GB free space. The old rule of thumb was 15% free space for a platter drive to work anywhere near capacity, however with such a large drive no that much needed. If not a lot of joy invest in iDefrag to free up some additional space.

 

[kschendel]

I don't see any obvious disk drive errors, so if the drive is the cause, it's not telling the kernel about it. You have a lot going on but the only large bursts are those
CSSM Exception: -2147413737 CSSMERR_DL_DATASTORE_DOESNOT_EXIST
messages and they seem to come from various programs. There's a hint that it might have something to do with Microsoft certificates (or missing ones) in the keychain, but you'd have to google to see if you can figure out how to make the issue go away. I'm not sure that there is enough of it to explain constant ongoing slowness.

Does the slowdown happen right away or is it related to running a specific app? If you temporarily turn off any startup items you have, unplug the network / turn off wifi and reboot, is it still slow? A "yes" to that would suggest that maybe it really is a hard drive going bad.