MacBook Pro is very slow.. but bootcamp works fine

[CharleyNapalm]

Hey folks, just looking for some help here!

I have an early 2011 MBP, 512GB SSD, 16go RAM. I replaced the battery a couple months ago and the MacBook is now very slow when on MacOS Sierra. When I run Windows 7 on Bootcamp, the computer works perfectly fine just like if it was brand new.

On MacOS Sierra, it is just impossible to do a simple task. Whenever I press a letter on the keyboard, it takes 5-10 seconds to appear on the screen. When I move the mouse around, it looks like a 2 FPS old video game.

Another weird thing, sometimes I'm able to be on MacOS Sierra for 2 hours and everything works just fine. At some point for no apparent reason, everything becomes very laggy. On bootcamp, it is always 100% stable.

I tried so far:
- Reset PRAM
- Reset SMC
- Reinstall MacOS Sierra from scratch
- Reinstall El Captain from scratch

No success so far. Wondering why Windows 7 is working perfectly but having so much trouble with the mac portion...

Thank you for your help.

Charles

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello and welcome.

-Did you purchase and install a genuine Apple OEM battery, or a third-party unit?
-The issue started after the battery replacement, correct?
-Did the MBP come with the SSD and 16 GB RAM, or did you upgrade them yourself?
-Do you have any third-party utilities such as MacKeeper/CleanMyMac, or an antivirus app installed?

C

 

[honestone]

In addition to what Cory asked, what version of Sierra do you have? V10.12.3 came out on Tuesday. If you need it, you can get the Combo Updater from here:

https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1905?locale=en_US

Also, have you ever done any disk cleanup/maintenance/repairs?

And, how much free space is on the Mac partition?

Finally, are you making backups of your Mac partition to an external device?

 

[CharleyNapalm]

The computer was running very slow and I tried to unplug the power cord for 5 secs and plug it again (guessing that the problem is my battery)... the CPU load went from 98% to 3% and now everything is working fine again...



Just looking if there is something I could do to prevent this.



Thank you for you help.

 

[honestone]

Thanks for the information. Actually, your EtreCheck report (I have EtreCheck also) shows that you have V 10.12.2 of Sierra, which is not the latest version. You can download the Combo Updater via the link I provided, launch it, and it will upgrade Sierra to the latest version, V10.12.3. However, sounds like that might not fix your issue.

Regarding Sierra, how exactly did you do the re-installation? If you could describe that process in detail, that would be helpful. Also, if you use any third party software, are such products compatible with Sierra? If not, you might need to download and install updates for such products, or in the case of Onyx (mentioned below), download a specific version for use with Sierra.

I suspect Cory will "chime in" about you using a third party battery with your MacBook Pro machine, but that seems to be a typical problem with any Mac laptop for which one can replace the battery. Also, I see where you have a Samsung 850 EVO SSD. I actually have 4 Samsung SSDs myself: a Samsung 840 Pro 256 gig SSD inside my Mac Mini (installed it myself), a Samsung 840 EVO 252 gig SSD inside my mid 2013 13" MacBook Air, and (recent additions) two Samsung 850 Pro 512 gig SSDs each inside its own nice and slim Orico external enclosure. As I suspect you'll agree, Samsung makes the best SSDs out there.

However, besides your battery issues, I wonder if it would be better for you to do a clean, "virgin" installation of Sierra. That would involve first using Disk Utility to Erase and Format your Mac partition (I believe you can do that; I have always used Disk Utility to Erase and Format the entire drive (again SSDs in my case)), then do a clean, "virgin" installation of Sierra, and then use Migration Assistant to "migrate"/copy needed stuff from a backup. However, as you can see, you'll need to make a backup first. In fact, backups are just about a necessity.

Also, you really should start doing daily disk cleanup, and periodic disk cleanup/maintenance/repairs. While SSDs have less mechanical parts than a standard HDD, it's still both beneficial and necessary to do disk-related maintenance "stuff". There are both free and commercial products you can use to assist with those tasks. Myself, I use the excellent freeware program Onyx (been around a long, long time, is a solid performer, and has had numerous stellar reviews), and the commercial product TechTool Pro (another excellent mainstay in the Mac "world").

As for backups, you basically have 2 choices: Time Machine (comes free with the Mac OS) or a backup/cloning program like either SuperDuper! (costs $27.95) or Carbon Copy Cloner (costs $39.95). Either of those products makes a bootable backup/clone of your system, and it's just like having a second machine. I use SuperDuper! myself to back up both of my Macs to both of my external Samsung 850 Pro 512 gig SSDs, and it works flawlessly. In fact, I have at times used SuperDuper! to recover from issues that cause me problems. For myself, it is easier to recover from a disaster with such a backup. The difference between those two programs is that Carbon Copy Cloner also backs up the (hidden) Recovery HD partition, whereas SuperDuper! does not. However, for myself, using SuperDuper! is not a detriment, as 1) the Recovery HD partition can be easily re-created (gets created anyway on a clean installation of the Mac OS, or there are other methods to re-create it), and 2) I have the much better eDrive partition created by TechTool Pro which contains way more tools than Disk Utility. As it is, I have Disk Utility on the (bootable) backup anyway.

In any event, let us know the exact steps you went through with re-installing Sierra.