OSX 10.13 best diagnostic tool?

[BernardLanguillier]

Hi team,

I am experiencing a sudden major slow down of my 2013 Mac Pro.

The OSx diagnostic tool I ran on startup didn’t reveal any issue.

What would be the recommendation for another diagnostic tool?

Thank you.

Cheers,
Bernard

[Christopher Sanderson]

I find that 90% of problems are cured by Disk Warrior

I then go to TechTool Pro which has more hardware-related diagnostics - which if it finds something, generally means replace or repair-shop

[digitaldog]

Diskwarrior is awesome. But will not work on boot drives formatted as APFS [/font][/size] .
You can try this as well if you're not uncomfortable in Single User mode:

Restart the computer holding down both the Command key and the S key.
2. After lots of text appears on the screen, type "fsck -y" (no quotes) and hit return.
3. The system will write some messages on the screen. If it says that the volume was fixed or changed, redo step #2.
4. When you get the message that the system is OK, you can either type "halt" to shut it down completely, or "reboot" to start it back up again.

[BernardLanguillier]

Thanks a lot Chris and Andrew, much appreciated.

In the meantime I have installed Norton and it found 6 issues and corrected them.

I have also increased disk space on boot drive from 60 to 135GB.

It seems to be working much better now... but not sure why.

Cheers,
Bernard

[davidgp]

Thanks a lot Chris and Andrew, much appreciated.

In the meantime I have installed Norton and it found 6 issues and corrected them.

I have also increased disk space on boot drive from 60 to 135GB.

It seems to be working much better now... but not sure why.

Cheers,
Bernard

Hi Bernard,

SSD have a very big performance impact when they are over 75% to 80% filled and higher: https://www.howtogeek.com/165542/why-solid-state-drives-slow-down-as-you-fill-them-up/ . Maybe that was your problem.

Regards,

David

[BernardLanguillier]

Hi Bernard,

SSD have a very big performance impact when they are over 75% to 80% filled and higher: https://www.howtogeek.com/165542/why-solid-state-drives-slow-down-as-you-fill-them-up/ . Maybe that was your problem.

Thanks David, yes, possibly. But I don't think there was a major change of SSD disk usage recently.

Cheers,
Bernard

[kers]

I had some bad experience with Norton and techtool pro in the past.
Since years i use Onyx.
https://www.titanium-software.fr/en/index.html

It is free and cleans with the tool macos provides.
Never had any problem

[sandymc]

I have also increased disk space on boot drive from 60 to 135GB.

It seems to be working much better now... but not sure why.

Cheers,
Bernard

By default, macOS uses space on the boot drive for cache space. Run short of cache, and efficiency everywhere decreases dramatically. Generally, you should have at least much free space on your boot drive as you have ram. Twice as much would be better.

Sandy

[farbschlurf]

+1 for Onyx

[BernardLanguillier]

By default, macOS uses space on the boot drive for cache space. Run short of cache, and efficiency everywhere decreases dramatically. Generally, you should have at least much free space on your boot drive as you have ram. Twice as much would be better.

Thanks Sandy.

Makes sense, I have 128GB ram on this machine. Looks like I may to invest in an OWC replacement SSD...

Cheers,
Bernard

[Chris Kern]

Looks like I may to invest in an OWC replacement SSD...

I installed a 2TB Aura Pro X drive from OWC a little over a week ago and I'm quite pleased with it.  It runs quite cool (be sure to order the separate miniature heat sink) and, while I haven't tried to benchmark it, the performance seems somewhat zippier than the 1TB original equipment Apple flash drive it replaced.  Installation is trivial: it takes five minutes and the only tool needed is a small Torx screwdriver (a Torx 8, if memory serves).  OWC will buy back your old Apple or OWC drive if you don't want to keep it and attach it externally.

[BernardLanguillier]

I installed a 2TB Aura Pro X drive from OWC a little over a week ago and I'm quite pleased with it.  It runs quite cool (be sure to order the separate miniature heat sink) and, while I haven't tried to benchmark it, the performance seems somewhat zippier than the 1TB original equipment Apple flash drive it replaced.  Installation is trivial: it takes five minutes and the only tool needed is a small Torx screwdriver (a Torx 8, if memory serves).  OWC will buy back your old Apple or OWC drive if you don't want to keep it and attach it externally.

Thanks, I have ordered one 2TB kit last night.

Cheers,
Bernard

[BernardLanguillier]

Thanks, I have ordered one 2TB kit last night.

And have installed it last night without major issue. The physical part is very easy.

I got recognized, the vanished and I had to boot the mac in internet recovery mode to launch Disk Utility to format it.

Things have been smooth since then except for a small issue with my Pegasus Thunderbolt disappearing completely until I rebooted it... strange but probably some consequence of the restore process on the new disk.

I must say that the performance improvement is rather impressive. It has cut down the launch time of C1 Pro by a factor of 3 or 4.

Cheers,
Bernard