Macbook pro is incredibly slow

[tejayd]

My mothers macbook pro A1278 2010 (2011 early edition i5 2.3ghz)
Became incredibly slow over a few weeks. Like 4-5 minutes just to load.

She brought it to the apple store. They couldnt get it to boot past the log in. So they told her they wiped the operating system and reinstalled it. And they ran hardware tests and nothing came up. And it still wouldn't boot past log in. The guy told her that he thinks she needs a new logic board. And it's not worth fixing.

I told her I would look at it. I dont know anything about macs. But it booted when I tried it. And all her stuff was still on it. I went to utilities and ran a check on the hard drive. And it said there was an error and I had to reset and (command R) to get to disk utility and repair it. I ran "first aid" for all the sections and the error didnt pop up.

I then erased the Macintosh HD partition (just in case) and formatted it (to whatever I was supposed too, forgot the name). Reinstalled Sierra OS. It said it would take 5 minutes. But took over an hour. Then it restarted and is now on the apple screen "installing: about 16 minutes". It going down. But like 1 minute ever 10-15 minutes. I'm hoping/assuming that is going to work.

Since it took like an hour and is still super slow im assuming it wasn't anything to do with the operating system that was on it before.

Also I had to reset the time and date to verify the OS download. The battery has been dead for years. I just ordered her another. Not sure if that helps. I didnt check temps. But it definitely doesn't seem hot. Just slightly warm are coming out the back. Fans are quiet.

The apple guy was probably right and it is the logic board (I'll replace that if I have to). If the hard drive was wiped like the guy said I wouldnt be so skeptical. And then getting the hdd error.

Anyone have any other ideas? Or would it be common for a logic board to make a pc slow?

Sorry for the really long post.

 

[blipbertmon]

Hardware doesn't fault by 'slowing down'. Some resource is being exhausted by some process(es). Systems 'fall off a cliff' and become effectively unusable when too many things start up or otherwise collectively exhaust memory or CPU ability. Often, only two 'heavyweight' apps can render a 4GB Mac miserably slow. From a terminal, any of 'ps', 'top', or 'htop' _IF_ they can be started, can display what's running, and how much CPU and memory each process is using. Either iterating through everything running using cmd-tab, and quitting each App in turn until the Mac regains consciousness, or use 'kill' from the command line, which requires that you have set up the machine to enable root. Sometimes Spotlight's indexing service is the culprit. Sometimes an app with a memory leak corners everything. Obviously killing that app would remedy the problem. Running out of space on the disk can also cause problems as the system struggles to assemble contiguous segments of storage from whatever fragments are left scattered about the drive. Any of these things can leave a Mac apparently dead and unusable, but if it was able to get on it's feet at all, the hardware is most likely OK. Finally, go back to whatever release of OSX was last working, or most preferably, the OS that the Mac was originally shipped with. I don't run anything past Mountain Lion on My MBP.

 

[psoohoo]

i would replace the HD with an SSD, I assume the drive is the original mechanical one. Failing drives is usually the biggest reason for slowness, aside from age anyway. Its a fairly cheap upgrade these days to extend the life of the machine

Also consider upgrading to 8Gb, if it does not have it already.

 

[Dave8671]

Yes even though apple states that Macbooks can run a new version of OSX does not mean it will run smooth. I have a macbookpro5.5 mid 09 model and it cannot run Sierra its not on the list of models that will support it.

I am not sure how I would get lion on my system had snow leopard I think and I still have the discs.

 

[tejayd]

Thanks for the responses. This one says it can run Sierra. That's what was working on it before. And it was the only option it gave me to reinstall. I ordered an ssd and battery for it last night. Figured it can't hurt to have the ssd anyway.


So now I have it running. Everything wiped and a fresh instal of Sierra. I see the cpu has very high system usage 85%. It's from "kernel usage". Now it at least isnt slowed down so much that it's hard to even click or load like before. I'm thinking I'll wait for the new battery and try to diagnose better after I have that. Unless anyone has a better idea what that could be. The hard drive was only using like 1/5 of the space before. Even less now.


She only uses it for like candy crush and searching the web. That's the main reason I'm hoping to get this one back running. She will go and spend 2k on another just to have a "macbook".

 

[Dave8671]

The new ones are not so user friendly with the T2 chips. If you did what you did with your with a 2018 T2 chip. It would not boot again.

I just installed elementary os Loki on my macbook pro mid 09 4gb . I was expecting it to not function. It does work and I am in the process of testing various parts.

 

[BadAsAl]

If you have an external USB hard drive enclosure you can put the SSD in there and try booting to that.
Plug it into a USB port, hold Option after you hear the chime and then you should see the SSD as a yellow symbol. Choose that and it should boot.
If it runs normally and no high CPU usage then the culprit is likely the hard drive cable. Cheap and easy to replace, and a very common failure on MacBooks.

 

[tejayd]

Thanks for your suggestions. I figured it out the next day. Just didnt post it. The very high cpu usage was obviously a red flag. I ended up stumbling upon info on "PRAM" and reset that and now it's good as new. It must have been an odd scenario. Apple support, the people at the apple store and a post I put on an apple forum and no one suggested that. I was shocked when it actually solved the problem so easy. The battery even started to hold a charge after also. It was pretty shot though so I still replaced it.