3: Low Disk SpaceĪnytime any computer is running very low on disk space, the computer will slow down dramatically, and Macs are no different. Let it run, install the updates, and reboot. Solution: Keeping system software up to date is one of the best things you can do as part of a Mac maintenance routine. How to Know: After a minute or so you’ll get a Software Update notification Whether the Mac is newer and updates through the App Store, or older and goes through Software Update, either of these processes can cause a temporary slowdown to the system while they launch in the background, query for available updates, and Solution: Wait for Spotlight to finish indexing, it usually doesn’t take too long. You can also look in Activity Monitor for the “ mds” or “ mdworker” processes, both of which are related to Spotlight. If you pull down the menu to see an indexing status bar, you know it’s running. How to Know: It’s easy to check if Spotlight is what’s causing the slowdowns though, just click on the Spotlight menu in the upper right corner. Typically Macs with SSD’s won’t feel the slowdown quite so much, but for Mac models still using spinning hard disk drives, it can feel very slow.

This is typically worse after reboots between major file system changes when the index is rebuilt, a major system update, or when another hard drive full of stuff is connected to the Mac. Spotlight is the search engine built into OS X, and anytime it indexes drive data it can slow down a Mac.

2012 mac mini very slow