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Sluggish system after new drive installation

R

Richsilver

macrumors newbie
Original poster
May 11, 2018
8
2
Thailand
I got my iMac back from the shop (we don't have Apple shops here in Thailand, but it is an authorized service center) with a new WD Black 1 TB drive installed, and I used the Migration Assistant to restore the computer to its previous state.

Everything restored just fine, however, the computer now seems quite sluggish. It seems to take a long time to boot and to load apps. I'm wondering if this has to do with the fusion drive not being properly configured or perhaps in conflict with the cache on the WD drive.

Here is a capture from the Disk Utility. Is this OK or do I need to do some configuring?


 
Looks like you have an SSD, and a hard drive.
I suspect it is not configured as a fusion drive.
One way to quickly find out: Open your Terminal, and run the command
Code: 
diskutil cs list
That will tell you if you have a corestorage logical volume group (the logical volume is both devices combined into one logical volume - a "fusion" drive.)
 
Thanks DeltaMac for your prompt reply. Here's what I get from Terminal (slowly!).

CoreStorage logical volume groups (1 found)
|
+-- Logical Volume Group 8F773972-BB0E-4257-9728-62E76BD092B9
=========================================================
Name: Macintosh HD
Status: Offline
Size: 120988852224 B (121.0 GB)
Free Space: -none-
|
+-< Physical Volume 5F1CFEC0-5939-47E8-9020-E9F9E8F29258
| ----------------------------------------------------
| Index: 0
| Disk: disk0s2
| Status: Checking
| Size: 120988852224 B (121.0 GB)
|
+-< Physical Volume 538F7BA9-8054-454F-8F8E-8F2EED931C0D
----------------------------------------------------
(No properties)
 
Kinda curious that you don't see a 1TB drive?

OK, now a slightly different terminal command
Code: 
diskutil list
 
OK. Here it is:

Richards-iMac:~ richard$ diskutil list
/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme *121.3 GB disk0
1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1
2: Apple_CoreStorage Macintosh HD 121.0 GB disk0s2
3: Apple_Boot Boot OS X 134.2 MB disk0s3

/dev/disk1 (internal, physical):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk1
1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk1s1
2: Apple_HFS iMac Boot 999.3 GB disk1s2
3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk1s3

/dev/disk2 (external, physical):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: FDisk_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk2
1: Apple_HFS Time Machine Seagate 1.0 TB disk2s1

/dev/disk3 (disk image):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme +201.8 MB disk3
1: Apple_HFS MightyText 3.91.2 201.7 MB disk3s1

Richards-iMac:~ richard$
 
Just what I expected.
You have an SSD, and you have a hard drive. (and the two are not combined into the logical volume group that you would get after creating a fusion drive)
You appear to be booted to the hard drive, which easily explains why your system seems so slow and sluggish.
Search for "create a fusion drive". Something will come up to help you get your drives configured properly.
Be sure you have a good backup on an external drive before you begin (but from what you said, I think you have that already!) The combining process would wipe both the SSD and the WD hard drive.
 
Yes, that's what I expected as well. Thanks very much for your help. I will hold my breath and try to ceate the Fusion Drive. I hope the cache on the new WD drive does not interefere, however.
 
I strongly agree with Brian in reply 8 above.

DON'T attempt to re-fuse the drives.

Let the 128gb SSD -remain- as a "standalone SSD".

Put the OS, apps, and basic accounts onto the SSD, but otherwise keep it "lean and clean".

Put large libraries (movies, music, pictures) on the HDD -- they don't require the speed of the SSD.

Your iMac is running "slow" because (right now) it's booting and running with the HDD as the startup drive.

Change this to the SSD, and it will start flying.
 
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Isn't that exactly what a Fusion Drive is intended to do automatically: the operating system and frequently used apps reside on the SSD while the data resides on the HDD. It's been my experience that the software does a pretty good job managing the alocation and there would be little or no benefit to doing it manually.
 
Richsilver said:
Isn't that exactly what a Fusion Drive is intended to do automatically: the operating system and frequently used apps reside on the SSD while the data resides on the HDD. It's been my experience that the software does a pretty good job managing the alocation and there would be little or no benefit to doing it manually.
Click to expand...
It is indeed. The Fusion Drive is the set&forget option to do that. You might squeeze more performance out of your system with separate drives, but the convenience combined with really good performance of a Fusion Drive cannot be overlooked. Note though that if you attempt to re-fuse your two drives all data will be lost. You need to have a separate backup for those.
 
Richsilver said:
Isn't that exactly what a Fusion Drive is intended to do automatically: the operating system and frequently used apps reside on the SSD while the data resides on the HDD. It's been my experience that the software does a pretty good job managing the alocation and there would be little or no benefit to doing it manually.
Click to expand...

I agree with you here it’s the easiest option and works well, I would refuse the drives myself because I am lazy.
 
Samuelsan wrote:
"I would refuse the drives myself because I am lazy."

I don't get this.

Considering the position of the OP now (with UNfused SSD and HDD), it would be more "work" for him to "re-fuse" the drives (backup, use terminal, restore), than to just keep using them as standalone drives.

He should move the OS to the SSD, however, along with accounts and apps. The OS will FLY when set up this way.

Why is it so hard to "manage" two drives on the desktop instead of one?
Analogy:
In your bedroom, do you have a dresser?
Does it have only one drawer?
If it has more than one, do you use the others?
If so, how do you know which stuff goes into which drawer?

"This is childish", you'll reply.
Well, ok. Even a kid knows where things go in his dresser drawers.

It's no more complicated to keep certain files on certain drives.
You'll remember "where things are supposed to go, and where things are"...
 
I did, in fact, re-fuse, following Apple's instructions. It was really much simpler than I imagined. The whole process -- re-fusing, High Sierra install and Time Machine backup restore. -- took under 3 hours. The computer is now fast and responsive once again. Thanks to all for your help!
 
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Richsilver said:
I did, in fact, re-fuse, following Apple's instructions. It was really much simpler than I imagined. The whole process -- re-fusing, High Sierra install and Time Machine backup restore. -- took under 3 hours. The computer is now fast and responsive once again. Thanks to all for your help!
Click to expand...
Glad it worked out for you. Enjoy your machine!
 
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