My Mac Has Become Eratic

[AngryMacUser]

I need a fix for my mac book pro. Short of smashing with a sledge hammer I refuse to give up on my mac and replace it. Paying 2k for a computer should me a longer life. Using it has become eratic and it simultaneously shuts down. What files do I need to clear out and delete. I'm convinced it is software related. I had screen caps saved to my desk top and removing those temporarily helped but I need a permanent fix. The problem began with the mac shutting down and rebooting on it's own. It now still does that but the touch pad has become difficult and painful to use as the Mac has begun to ignore user input. I tried to remove some apps that have became defunct and nothing seems to permanently work. I think there is a dirty file jamming things up and it needs to be removed. Because of lack of control of the curser and windows logging in here is difficult and painful and challenging. Cache Files? Old crypto coin wallets? Macports and XCode? How do I find these and fully remove them? Thank you.

 

[honestone]

OK, ok, need some more information.

1. What exact MacBook Pro model do you have?

2. What exact Mac OS are you running?

3. This is extremely critical: are you making backups to an external device? If (hopefully) so, what software are you using for that task?

4. What third party applications do you have/use?

5. How much free space is on your internal drive?

6. It looks like you have done "some" disk cleanup, but definitely more needs to be done. And you really need to perform disk cleanup/maintenance/repairs, from a software perspective, on a frequent basis. There are some excellent products available (both free and commercial) that can help you with such tasks. (Do you happen to have a more robust disk cleanup/maintenance/repair program, like Tech Tool Pro or Disk Warrior?)

I always equate maintaining a Mac to maintaining a vehicle. If one neglects maintenance on a car, they are asking for trouble (and even with reliable ones like cars form either Toyota or Honda).

If you want to try and do some more disk cleanup on your own, first look inside your downloads folder. Maybe you have more than one copy of a program, and especially if you have more than one update for a program. When you download an update to a program, how many prior versions do you keep? I keep only one, and it makes things easier and smoother. Also, I have very little "stuff" in my downloads folder. I manage downloads by having two other folders entitled "Useful Software" for all my third party "stuff", and "Upgrades", for OS-related stuff, within my Documents folder.

Also, when you remove/delete an application by dragging it to the trash, that does not get rid of all the "associated" stuff with the application. There is a nifty, free application called AppCleaner that helps tremendously with that.

And then there is the issue of deleted EMails. Just because you delete an EMail, it is (for the most part) not permanently removed. I use Outlook 2016 as my EMail client, and there are 2 simple ways to have deleted EMails permanently removed (I use either method numerous times each day). I don't know, though, what such procedures are for other EMail clients, especially Apple's Mail program, which most folks here use.

So, if you can answer those questions above in a succinct manner, we can better help you. But it is going to take some time and effort on your part (along with maybe needing to spend some money).