IPhoto '08... beach ball spinning too much!!

Can someone tell me if having over 20,000 photos, and several hundred short digital movies in my iPhoto '08 can cause it to work really slow? I have 3 gigs of RAM, and I recently rebuilt my thumbnails, but I get that spinning beach ball so much when using iPhoto, and it's very frustrating!!
I posted in another forum about my bluetooth keyboard working really slow too (lagging as I type). Are these two things related? I'm doubting that they are.
Should I move some photos off of my hard drive to an EHD to slim it down, or are there other ways to speed it back up? I have about 70 gigs left on a 250 gig HD.
Thanks in advance for any advice. I mainly use my iMac for photos so it's frustrating to have it working so slow, and even crashing at times. I do plan to thin out the photos that I no longer want, but that will take awhile in my very busy schedule.
Deb

Maybe a long shot but close iPhoto, delete the iPhoto preference file, com.apple.iPhoto.plist, that resides in your User/Library/Preferences folder, launch iPhoto and see if that helps.
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto (iPhoto.Library for iPhoto 5 and earlier) database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've created an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger or later), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. It's compatible with iPhoto 6 and 7 libraries and Tiger and Leopard. Just put the application in the Dock and click on it whenever you want to backup the dB file. iPhoto does not have to be closed to run the application, just idle. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.
Note: There's now an Automator backup application for iPhoto 5 that will work with Tiger or Leopard.

Similar Messages

"Save Project as" -- Beach Ball spinning for a long time????

Hi,
I wanted to make some changes to an Encore project I am working on.
I opened up the Original Project, Deleted the timeline and then replaced it with another encoded timeline.
I then re-linked my chapters and presed File ---- Save Project As ---- renamed it and pressed OK.
I still wanted to keep the original just in case I needed it again.
As soon as I pressed save (for the Save project as), the dialog box came up and on the top of that it says "Save Project as" , but it has been five minutes since I did the "Save as" and I got the Colored Beach Ball spinning in Encore.
Is this supposed to happen. Is it trying to save it? Or did Encore Freeze? How long do I wait until I Force quit?
Thanks
Encore 5.1

For Save As, Encore copies everything in its folder structure, which includes transcodes of assets while in Encore (using AME or encore). It usually shows its progress, however.
I prefer to "save as" before I start making changes. Encore is just too likely to get confused.
But the way you are doing it, inside Encore is the right way, and it should work.
If you see disk activity, I'd keep waiting.
Force quit can result in problems and you don't have a save as backup yet.

Since i updated latest version 6.0.2, it keeps getting stuck and goes really slow and the coloured beach ball spins for ages, so all i can do is force-quit - how can i install the version before this version again?

On a Mac Book pro - running 10.6.8
Firefox was fine until the last couple of updates that happened without my consent (?).
Suddenly there were weird errors and crashes of Flash
and slow loading pages. Now it's gone into rubbish mode where
the beach ball spins at the slightest fast type or double-click and then all i can do is force quit.
It's as if it can't cope with anything anymore.
How do i uninstall and keep my bookmarks etc and re-install an earlier version of it as it was before it got updated?
Thanks

Hey Thanks for the link thing!
So i had tried it in safe mode, and thought that it was still in SMode but then realized that that stopped once i had closed it and reopened in aft/eve/ last night and started up again today, also. So i just tried it again in safe mode and it seems to not be doing it...but then it's so random anyway. But if i'm in safe mode like this there is no toolbar but i guess that's cool if that is what is making it sluggy and beach ball-y. But how do i stay in safe mode all the time? And if it is only in safe mode then does that mean i can't have the 3 addons i use - (java, QT, Flash- all the other vid things like divx etc are 'disabled' ) I thought those add ons were necessary to play/read things on the net?? Forgive my ignorance in this matter. But saying that, when it was going wrong, and i was clicking on audio links sometimes in the 'blank white page scenario' a popup would come and tell me that i would need ' QuickTime to play this track' and i would click 'continue' and it would link me to Apple to get QT...but i already have QT installed in my MBPro so i thought that was a bit weird...! when i just tried it now in safe mode it went straight to the audio link white page with player in the middle and played the track. But then as i said, it was a bit random before so i don't know if this was just a time when it worked...
Anyway, what do you think about my questions on operating in safe mode...should i have to do that?! i'll stay in Safemode until i hear back from you and see how well it performs.
Thanks for your help.

Imac will not boot up, chimes with apple logo and beach ball spin??

imac will not boot up, chimes with apple logo and beach ball spin?? after installing adobe flash and up graded apple softeware

If your iMac came with or is running Lion, startup holding either the Command-R keys or the Option key and select the recovery partition and then use Disk Utility to repair the Macintosh HD.
see > OS X Lion: About Lion Recovery
If your running Snow Leopard or earlier OS X, pop in your Install DVD and startup holding either the Option or C key, then open and use Disk Utility to repair the Macintosh HD.
see > Mac OS X - Using Disk Utility to Repair a Disk

What is the best way to manage my iPhoto, which is taking up too much space on my MacBook Pro?

What is the best way to manage my iPhoto, which is taking up too much space on my MacBook Pro?
Specifically, I'd like to keep some of my favorite pictures on the laptop while moving the rest to an external hard drive. Is there a way to tag just a few pictures inside an event/album as "favorite", while storing the rest in an EHD, but still keep them connected to the same event/album? I'd like to have just the favorite pictures on the laptop, but when I have the EHD connected, be able to view all my pictures in the same place, and not have to browse through separate hard drives. Ideally, whether or not a picture is designated as "favorite" will determine where it resides.
Is this at all possible?
I have only 7 GB left on my HD and I'm desperately needing a solution!
Thanks!

You need two libraries to do this. One on the external with all your Photos. One on the internal with a subset - your favourites. You do it this way to make backing up easier - that is, back up the library with everything, so you're only backing up one.
Make sure the drive is formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
Now you have two full versions of the Library.
3. On the Internal library, trash the Events/albums/photos you don't want there
Now you have a full copy of the Library on the External and a smaller subset on the Internal
Some Notes:
As a general rule: when deleting photos do them in batches of about 100 at a time. iPhoto can baulk at trashing large numbers at one go.
You can choose which Library to open: Hold down the option (or alt) key key and launch iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library'
You can keep the Library on the external updated with new imports using iPhoto Library Manager

SL Upgrade - Standard Account Beach Ball Spinning on Right Menu Bar?

Just upgraded to SL from Leopard 10.5.8. Install went smoothly, went through typical verification of software, etc. Most things look good; I know the forums are flooded with folks having a terrible time, but the only buggy thing so far I've noticed is in one of my two standard accounts. My iMac is a family computer and I have 5 user accounts (1 admin, 2 standard (my wife and I), and 2 limited (one for each of my children). For my standard account only I've noticed that when I try and hover over the Time Machine, Bluetooth, Sound Level, or Time information icons on the right hand side of the top menu bar, I get the spinning beach ball no matter how long I hover. This anomaly happens ONLY in my account, not my wife's standard or the limited or admin accounts.
Here are the things I've done so far in hopes of repairing:
1) Repaired Permissions
2) Gone into System Preferences and looked at sound, bluetooth, etc. preferences to see whether the option is for checked for appearing in the menu bar. Strange thing is, even though I can see them in the menu bar, the System Preferences option is unchecked. I've checked and unchecked in various combinations and restarted each time - no luck.
3) Created a new account - no problems.
Does anyone have any advice on sovling this? Is there a preference file I can delete to fix this. Should I simply create a new account and use it? If so, how would I get all my documents and files from the old account associated with the new account? Not to much worried about my standard docs, but really concernced about getting my Aperture 2 library moved over to my new accounts. Is it as simple as dragging the folders from one user account to the other? The above problem I've described is an annoyance, not a show stopper. I don't want to create more problems trying to fix it.
Thank you.

Okay, that's fine I'll just use the account I just created. However, how do I associate this account with my other files under the corrupt "USER" directory? Can I just copy over the folders from there? If I do that, won't I be bringing the problem(s) from the old account over?
Again, I'm not really worried about my document files, I can always create new folders and bring them over one at a time. The Aperture 2 library is what I'm concerned about. I can ask over on the Aperture forum though.
Thanks for your help!

Beach Ball spinning

Lately the Beach ball is spinning pretty often while surfing in Safari. This has never happened before. Now, 1 out of every 3 clicks bring on the spinning beach ball. Nothing has changed much. Does anyone know what the problem could be? I monitor the CPU and Memory usage but the beach ball comes on even if the CPU is only being used 60% and memory always below 70%.
Any ideas?
Thanks already
herschel

well it may be a bit of a stretch-- but sometimes corrupt fonts can cause strange issues so if you open fontbook in your applications folder you will see duplicate fonts with a little black circle you can highlight those fonts and choose 'edit' then resolve duplicates.... also press control+A to highlight all fonts, then chooce 'file' validate fonts-- just to make sure there are no problem fonts--
I have only experienced this type of slowdown personally due to a large favicon cache which is why I suggested onyx... If it isn't a font issue, then you may want to try deleting the com.apple.Safari.plist file (or moving it out of the preferences folder). There is also a Safari folder in Users/~your name/Library and you may try renaming it and starting safari to see if it is something in that folder.

Macbook pro mid 2009 - beach ball spinning after one hour

Hi,
I have a problem with my macbook pro mid 2009. After one hour of working the beach ball starts spinning and you cannot work anylonger.
You have to force shut down the macbook pro and restart it. The same problem appears once I wanna do a back-up on my time capsule, but then I receive at least a report after restart:
Anonymous UUID: 6C0F7701-54AC-38FB-15CB-5F03089AE0B1
Sun Oct 19 16:03:17 2014
*** Panic Report ***
panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff80045c4594): "launchd died\nState at Last Exception:\n\n"@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-2782.1.97/bsd/kern/kern_exit.c:361
Backtrace (CPU 0), Frame : Return Address
0xffffff8104e2be50 : 0xffffff800413a811
0xffffff8104e2bed0 : 0xffffff80045c4594
0xffffff8104e2bf40 : 0xffffff80045c425c
0xffffff8104e2bf50 : 0xffffff800464dcb2
0xffffff8104e2bfb0 : 0xffffff800423ac46
BSD process name corresponding to current thread: launchd
Mac OS version:
14A389
Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 14.0.0: Fri Sep 19 00:26:44 PDT 2014; root:xnu-2782.1.97~2/RELEASE_X86_64
Kernel UUID: 89E10306-BC78-3A3B-955C-7C4922577E61
Kernel slide: 0x0000000003e00000
Kernel text base: 0xffffff8004000000
__HIB text base: 0xffffff8003f00000
System model name: MacBookPro5,5 (Mac-F2268AC8)
System uptime in nanoseconds: 4582866593344
last loaded kext at 248803063924: com.apple.filesystems.msdosfs            1.10 (addr 0xffffff7f8676d000, size 69632)
last unloaded kext at 907747435669: com.apple.driver.AppleMultitouchDriver            260.30 (addr 0xffffff7f86079000, size 94208)
loaded kexts:
com.apple.filesystems.afpfs            11.0
com.apple.nke.asp-tcp            8.0.0
com.apple.driver.AudioAUUC            1.70
com.apple.driver.AppleHWSensor            1.9.5d0
com.apple.driver.AGPM            100.14.37
com.apple.filesystems.autofs            3.0
com.apple.driver.AppleOSXWatchdog            1
com.apple.iokit.IOBluetoothSerialManager            4.3.0f10
com.apple.driver.AppleMikeyHIDDriver            124
com.apple.driver.AppleHDA            266.5
com.apple.driver.AppleMikeyDriver            266.5
com.apple.GeForceTesla            10.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleUpstreamUserClient            3.6.1
com.apple.driver.AppleSMCLMU            2.0.4d1
com.apple.driver.AppleBacklight            170.4.12
com.apple.driver.AppleMCCSControl            1.2.10
com.apple.iokit.BroadcomBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport            4.3.0f10
com.apple.iokit.IOUserEthernet            1.0.1
com.apple.Dont_Steal_Mac_OS_X            7.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleHWAccess            1
com.apple.driver.AppleHV            1
com.apple.driver.ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin            1.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleLPC            1.7.3
com.apple.driver.SMCMotionSensor            3.0.4d1
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBTCButtons            240.2
com.apple.driver.AppleIRController            327.5
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBTCKeyboard            240.2
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBCardReader            3.5.0
com.apple.AppleFSCompression.AppleFSCompressionTypeDataless            1.0.0d1
com.apple.AppleFSCompression.AppleFSCompressionTypeZlib            1.0.0d1
com.apple.BootCache            35
com.apple.driver.XsanFilter            404
com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIBlockStorage            2.6.5
com.apple.driver.AirPort.Brcm4331            800.20.24
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBHub            705.4.1
com.apple.driver.AppleSmartBatteryManager            161.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleAHCIPort            3.0.7
com.apple.driver.AppleFWOHCI            5.5.2
com.apple.nvenet            2.0.22
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBEHCI            705.4.14
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBOHCI            656.4.1
com.apple.driver.AppleRTC            2.0
com.apple.driver.AppleHPET            1.8
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIButtons            3.1
com.apple.driver.AppleSMBIOS            2.1
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIEC            3.1
com.apple.driver.AppleAPIC            1.7
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelCPUPowerManagementClient            218.0.0
com.apple.nke.applicationfirewall            161
com.apple.security.quarantine            3
com.apple.security.TMSafetyNet            8
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement            218.0.0
com.apple.security.SecureRemotePassword            1.0
com.apple.AppleGraphicsDeviceControl            3.7.21
com.apple.kext.triggers            1.0
com.apple.iokit.IOSerialFamily            11
com.apple.driver.DspFuncLib            266.5
com.apple.kext.OSvKernDSPLib            1.15
com.apple.iokit.IOAudioFamily            200.6
com.apple.vecLib.kext            1.2.0
com.apple.nvidia.classic.NVDANV50HalTesla            10.0.0
com.apple.nvidia.classic.NVDAResmanTesla            10.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleHDAController            266.5
com.apple.iokit.IOHDAFamily            266.5
com.apple.driver.AppleBacklightExpert            1.1.0
com.apple.driver.AppleSMBusController            1.0.13d1
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBUserClient            705.4.0
com.apple.iokit.IOBluetoothHostControllerUSBTransport            4.3.0f10
com.apple.iokit.IOFireWireIP            2.2.6
com.apple.iokit.IOSurface            97
com.apple.iokit.IOBluetoothFamily            4.3.0f10
com.apple.driver.IOPlatformPluginLegacy            1.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleSMBusPCI            1.0.12d1
com.apple.driver.IOPlatformPluginFamily            5.8.0d49
com.apple.iokit.IONDRVSupport            2.4.1
com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily            2.4.1
com.apple.driver.AppleSMC            3.1.9
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBMultitouch            245.2
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBHIDDriver            705.4.0
com.apple.iokit.IOSCSIBlockCommandsDevice            3.7.0
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBMassStorageClass            3.7.0
com.apple.iokit.IOSCSIArchitectureModelFamily            3.7.0
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBMergeNub            705.4.0
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBComposite            705.4.9
com.apple.driver.AppleEFINVRAM            2.0
com.apple.iokit.IO80211Family            700.52
com.apple.driver.AppleEFIRuntime            2.0
com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIFamily            2.7.0
com.apple.iokit.IOFireWireFamily            4.5.6
com.apple.iokit.IONetworkingFamily            3.2
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBFamily            705.4.14
com.apple.driver.NVSMU            2.2.9
com.apple.iokit.IOHIDFamily            2.0.0
com.apple.iokit.IOSMBusFamily            1.1
com.apple.security.sandbox            300.0
com.apple.kext.AppleMatch            1.0.0d1
com.apple.driver.AppleKeyStore            2
com.apple.driver.AppleMobileFileIntegrity            1.0.5
com.apple.driver.AppleCredentialManager            1.0
com.apple.driver.DiskImages            389.1
com.apple.iokit.IOStorageFamily            2.0
com.apple.iokit.IOReportFamily            31
com.apple.driver.AppleFDEKeyStore            28.30
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIPlatform            3.1
com.apple.iokit.IOPCIFamily            2.9
com.apple.iokit.IOACPIFamily            1.4
com.apple.kec.corecrypto            1.0
com.apple.kec.Libm            1
com.apple.kec.pthread            1
Model: MacBookPro5,5, BootROM MBP55.00AC.B03, 2 processors, Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.26 GHz, 8 GB, SMC 1.47f2
Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 9400M, NVIDIA GeForce 9400M, PCI, 256 MB
Memory Module: BANK 0/DIMM0, 4 GB, DDR3, 1067 MHz, 0x029E, 0x434D5341344758334D314131303636433720
Memory Module: BANK 1/DIMM0, 4 GB, DDR3, 1067 MHz, 0x029E, 0x434D5341344758334D314131303636433720
AirPort: spairport_wireless_card_type_airport_extreme (0x14E4, 0x8D), Broadcom BCM43xx 1.0 (5.106.98.100.24)
Bluetooth: Version 4.3.0f10 14890, 3 services, 27 devices, 1 incoming serial ports
Network Service: AirPort, AirPort, en1
Serial ATA Device: WDC WD5000BPVT-00HXZT1, 500.11 GB
Serial ATA Device: M4-CT128M4SSD2, 128.04 GB
USB Device: Internal Memory Card Reader
USB Device: Built-in iSight
USB Device: BRCM2046 Hub
USB Device: Bluetooth USB Host Controller
USB Device: Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad
USB Device: IR Receiver
Thunderbolt Bus:
Can somebody help me, what's wrong with my macbook? I already changed the ram, but it didn't help...
Best regards,
Sebastian

Hi,
I just found the problem. I just have to update the firmware of my SSD:
Crucial M4 and RealSSD C400 SSDs 5184 hours power-on time BSOD issue
Crucial M4 and RealSSD C400 SSDs with firmware earlier than 70H / 07M could become unresponsive after 5184 hours of Power-on time. The drive will recover after a power cycle, however, this failure will repeat once per hour after reaching this point. Update firmware to version 70H / 07M or later.
My SSD has now 5690hours...

New - Macbook Pro - Running slow, beach ball spinning all the time

I've had my Macbook pro about 3 weeks and the beach ball is constantly spinning and I'm constantly having to force quit programs. Between Mail, Safari, and Aperture. Any ideas?
Robin

ONE POSSIBLE SOLUTION:
I've recently had the beach ball appearing every 30 seconds or so and then the Mac totally freezes.
After trying all the suggestions online, the solution that fixed my problem was to reset the SMU. It basically forces the fan to maximum power and cools your mac down. The problems I had were being caused by an overheating Mac, even though it looked like a system software issue!
The reset the SMU:
Shut your Mac down.
Unplug the power cable from the back of the mac and any other devices (keyboard, etc).
Leave the mac for at least 10 seconds.
Hold down the power button on the back of the mac.
Keep holding down the power button and re-attach the power cable.
Once the power cable is in place, release the power button.
Now press the power button again to start-up your mac. (You can plug your devices back in now).
You should now hear the fan at maximum levels (it's very noisy!).
If you have the same problem that I had, your mac should start to cool and your mac should start operating preperly again (it may take a few minutes).
If this works, you'll then need to download FAN CONTROL FOR MAC.
It's a control panel that better regulates the temperature of your mac than the standard settings.

Spinning beach ball spins me crazy

Hi all,
I have this problem.( Macbook Pro 4 GB, 2.5 ghz) As I´m writing this the notorious beach ball appears and the computer actually writes on its own!!
It all began when I downloaded Yosemite and parallel desktop plus Windows 7 because I needed to run a program that was not compatible with Mac. Except from Yosemite,this are now deleted.
Its sooooo frustrating. I have done the usual stuff.
1. Cleaned my desktop.
2 Used Ccleaner to free up some space.
3. Cleared my cache
4. Used Disk Utility to repair disk permissions
5. Run Clamxav ( Nothing unusual)
6 Rebooted the computer several times
7. Checked the harddrive health ( Again, nothing unusual)
I´ve also noticed that sleep mode is no longer active when I close the screen. I can still hear the harddrive is active as if it was in use.
Facebook suddenly turned into portuguese language and im from Denmark!!!
A screeen saver is now active and I have never activated nor used a screen saver before!!! ( Since september 2012)
Before Yosemite it ran smoothly and there has never been any problems until now.
Im looking forward to any suggestions

If you did not set that hint, then the computer has been tampered with by someone else.
If you know or suspect that a hostile intruder has either had physical access to it, or has been able to log in remotely, then there are some steps you should take to make sure that the computer is safe to use.
First, depending on the circumstances, computer tampering may be a crime, a civil wrong, or both. If there's any chance that the matter will be the subject of legal action, then you should do nothing at all without consulting a lawyer or the police. The computer would be the principal evidence in such a case, and you don't want to contaminate that evidence.
Running any kind of "anti-virus" software is pointless. If I broke into a system and wanted to leave a back door, I could do it in a way that would be undetectable by those means—and I don't pretend to any special skill as a hacker. You have to assume that any intruder can do the same. Commercial keylogging software—which has legitimate as well as illegitimate uses—won't be recognized as malware, because it's not malware.
The only way you can be sure that the computer is not compromised is to erase at least the startup volume and restore it to something like the status quo ante. The easiest approach is to recover the entire system from a backup that predates the attack. Obviously, that's only practical if you know when the attack took place, and it was recent, and you have such a backup. You will lose all changes to data, such as email, that were made after the time of the snapshot. Some of those changes can be restored from a later backup.
If you don't know when the attack happened, or if it was too long ago for a complete rollback to be feasible, then you should erase and install OS X. If you don't already have at least two complete, independent backups of all data, then you must make them first. One backup is not enough to be safe.
When you restart after the installation, you'll be prompted to go through the initial setup process for a new computer. That’s when you transfer the data from a backup in Setup Assistant.
Select only users in the Setup Assistant dialog—not Applications, Other files and folders, or Computer & Network Settings. Don't transfer the Guest account, if it was enabled.
Reinstall third-party software from original media or fresh downloads—not from a backup, which may be contaminated.
Unless you were the target of an improbably sophisticated attack, this procedure will leave you with a clean system. If you have reason to think that you were the target of a sophisticated attack, then you need expert help.
That being done, change all Internet passwords and check all financial accounts for unauthorized transactions. Do this after the system has been secured, not before.

Rainbow beach ball spins when opening up movie

Hey everyone,
Every time I try to open up a movie, quicktime opens, I see the window, but then the spinning rainbow beach ball just sits there and spins forever, until I force quit quicktime... Quicktime used to work fine a few days ago...
Any ideas how to fix this?
Thank you.

please help

IMac (early 2008) crashing/freezing/beach ball appearing too often

Hi - I'm new to the support community but am in need of advice/help for my iMac that is crashing with blue and/or white screens or freezing with unresponsive mouse/keyboard and a spinning beach ball.
It's been doing this for about 6 months, and 4 months ago I sent it to an Authorised Apple repair centre. They upgraded the HDD to 1Tb as disk space was just about used up and beefed the emory up from 4Gb to 6Gb. However, within the week, it was doing it again - and the repair centre dont want to help anymore (seperate issue) - hence the plea for help as, no suprise, its frustrasting me beyond belief - I'm now almost at the point of giving up the mac way of life
The iMac is a 24" Early 2008 machine (2.8 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo) running Mavericks at 10.9.1 (albeit the issues were there last summer before the upgrade). The machine wont run a hardware test with holding down the D or Alt D on boot up - it used to do this fine before the Mavericks upgrade
Appreciate anyone's steer/advice - my technical knowledge is quite low (hence going for the mac in the first place)
Ta in advance to any replies

This procedure is a diagnostic test. It changes nothing, for better or worse, and therefore will not, in itself, solve your problem.
If you don't already have a current backup, back up all data before doing anything else. The backup is necessary on general principle, not because of anything in the test procedure. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.
Below are instructions to run a UNIX shell script, a type of program. All it does is to gather information about the state of your computer. That information goes nowhere unless you choose to share it on this page. However, you should be cautious about running a program at the instance of a stranger on a public message board. If you have doubts, search this site for other discussions in which this procedure has been followed without any report of ill effects. If you can't satisfy yourself that the instructions are safe, don't follow them.
Here's a summary of what you need to do: Copy a line of text from this web page into the window of another application. Wait about a minute. Then paste some other text, which will have been copied automatically, back into a reply on this page. The sequence is: copy, paste, wait, paste again. Details follow.
You may have started the computer in "safe" mode. Preferably, these steps should be taken in “normal” mode. If the system is now in safe mode and works well enough in normal mode to run the test, restart as usual. If you can only test in safe mode, do that.
If you have more than one user, and the one affected by the problem is not an administrator, then please run the test twice: once while logged in as the affected user, and once as an administrator. The results may be different. The user that is created automatically on a new computer when you start it for the first time is an administrator. If you can't log in as an administrator, test as the affected user. Most personal Macs have only one user, and in that case this paragraph doesn’t apply.
The script is a single long line, all of which must be selected. You can accomplish this easily by triple-clicking anywhere in the line. The whole line will highlight, though you may not see all of it in your browser, and you can then copy it. If you try to select the line by dragging across the part you can see, you won't get all of it.
Triple-click anywhere in the line of text below on this page to select it:
clear; shopt -s extglob; Fb='%s\n\t(%s)\n'; Fm='\n%s:\n\n%s\n'; Fs='\n%s: %s\n'; Fu='user %s%%, system %s%%'; PB="/usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c Print"; A () { [[ a -eq 0 ]]; }; R () { o=; [[ r -eq 0 ]]; }; Pm () { [[ "$o" ]] && o=`sed 's/^ */ /' <<< "$o"` && printf "$Fm" "$1" "$o"; }; Pc () { o=`egrep -v '^[[:blank:]]*($|#)' "$2"`; Pm "$1"; }; Pp () { o=`$PB "$2" | awk -F'= ' \/$3'/{print $2}'`; Pm "$1"; }; Ps () { o="${o##+( )}"; [[ ! "$o" =~ ^0?$ ]] && printf "$Fs" "$1" "$o"; }; id | grep -qw '80(admin)'; a=$?; A && sudo true; r=$?; t=`date +%s`; clear; { A || echo $'No admin access\n'; A && ! R && echo $'No root access\n'; system_profiler SPSoftwareDataType | sed '8!d;s/^ *//'; o=`system_profiler SPDiagnosticsDataType | sed '5,6!d'`; [[ "$o" =~ Pass ]] || Pm "POST"; o=`pmset -g therm | sed 's/^.*CP/CP/'`; egrep -q 'No th|pms' <<< "$o" && o=; Pm "Thermal conditions"; o=`pmset -g sysload | grep -v :`; grep -q '= [^GO]' <<< "$o" || o=; Pm "System load advisory"; o=`nvram boot-args | awk '{$1=""; print}'`; Ps "boot-args"; d=(/ ""); D=(System User); for i in 0 1; do o=`cd ${d[$i]}L*/L*/Dia* && ls !(*.diag) | tail | awk -F_ '{$NF=a[split($NF,a,".")]; print}'`; Pm "${D[$i]} diagnostics"; done; o=`syslog -F bsd -k Sender kernel -k Message CReq 'GPU |hfs: Ru|I/O e|n Cause: -|NVDA\(|pagin|SATA W|ssert|timed? ?o' | tail -n25 | awk '/:/{$4=""; $5=""; print}'`; Pm "Kernel messages"; o=`df -m / | awk 'NR==2 {print $4}'`; o=$((o<5120?o:0)); Ps "Free space (MiB)"; o=$(($(vm_stat | awk '/eo/{sub("\\.",""); print $2}')/256)); o=$((o>=1024?o:0)); Ps "Pageouts (MiB)"; s=( `sar -u 1 10 | sed '$!d'` ); [[ s[4] -lt 85 ]] && o=`printf "$Fu" ${s[1]} ${s[3]}` || o=; Ps "Total CPU usage" && { s=(`ps acrx -o comm,ruid,%cpu | sed '2!d'`); o=${s[2]}%; Ps "CPU usage by process \"$s\" with UID ${s[1]}"; }; s=(`top -R -l1 -n1 -o prt -stats command,uid,prt | sed '$!d'`); s[2]=${s[2]%[+-]}; o=$((s[2]>=25000?s[2]:0)); Ps "Mach ports used by process \"$s\" with UID ${s[1]}"; o=`kextstat -kl | grep -v com\\.apple | cut -c53- | cut -d\< -f1`; Pm "Loaded extrinsic kernel extensions"; R && o=`sudo launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.(apple|openssh|vix\.cron)|org\.(amav|apac|calendarse|cups|dove|isc|ntp|post[fg]|x)/{print $3}'`; Pm "Extrinsic system jobs"; o=`launchctl list | sed 1d | awk '!/0x|com\.apple|org\.(x|openbsd)|\.[0-9]+$/{print $3}'`; Pm "Extrinsic agents"; for d in {/,}L*/{La,Priv,Sta}*; do o=`ls -A "$d" | egrep -v '^(\.DS_Store$|com\.apple\.)'`; Pm "$d"; done; o=`find -L /S*/L*/E* {/,}L*/{A*d,Compon,Ex,In,Keyb,Mail,P*P,Qu,Scripti,Servi,Spo}* -type d -name Contents -prune | while read d; do ID=$($PB\ :CFBundleIdentifier "$d/Info.plist") || ID="No bundle ID"; egrep -qv "^com\.apple\.[^x]|Accusys|ArcMSR|ATTO|HDPro|HighPoint|driver\.stex|hp-fax|\.hpio|JMicron|microsoft\.MDI|print|SoftRAID" <<< $ID && printf "$Fb" "${d%/Contents}" "$ID"; done`; Pm "Extrinsic loadable bundles"; o=`find /u*/{,*/}lib -type f -exec sh -c 'file -b "$1" | grep -qw shared && ! codesign -v "$1"' {} {} \; -print`; Pm "Unsigned shared libraries"; o=`launchctl getenv DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES`; Pm "Inserted libraries"; o=`find {,/u*/lo*}/e*/periodic -type f -mtime -10d`; Pm "Modified periodic scripts"; o=`scutil --proxy | grep Prox`; Pm "Proxies"; o=`scutil --dns | awk '/r\[0\] /{if ($NF !~ /^1(0|72\.(1[6-9]|2[0-9]|3[0-1])|92\.168)\./) print $NF; exit}'`; Ps "DNS"; R && o=`sudo profiles -P | grep :`; Pm "Profiles"; for f in fstab sysctl.conf crontab launchd.conf; do Pc $f /etc/$f; done; Pc "hosts" <(grep -v 'host *$' /etc/hosts); Pc "User launchd" ~/.launchd; R && Pc "Root crontab" <(sudo crontab -l); Pc "User crontab" <(crontab -l); R && o=`sudo defaults read com.apple.loginwindow LoginHook`; Pm "Login hook"; Pp "Global login items" /L*/P*/loginw* Path; Pp "User login items" L*/P*/*loginit* Name; Pp "Safari extensions" L*/Saf*/*/E*.plist Bundle | sed 's/\..*$//;s/-[1-9]$//'; o=`find ~ $TMPDIR.. $ -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 $ | wc -l`; Ps "Restricted user files"; cd; o=`system_profiler SPFontsDataType | egrep "Valid: N|Duplicate: Y" | wc -l`; Ps "Font problems"; o=`find L*/{Con,Pref}* -type f ! -size 0 -name *.plist ! -exec sh -c 'plutil -s "$1" >&-' {} {} \; -print`; Pm "Bad plists"; d=(Desktop L*/Keyc*); n=(20 7); for i in 0 1; do o=`find "${d[$i]}" -type f -maxdepth 1 | wc -l`; o=$((o<=n[$i]?0:o)); Ps "${d[$i]##*/} files"; done; o=$((`date +%s`-t)); Ps "Elapsed time (s)"; } 2>/dev/null | pbcopy; exit 2>&-
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.
Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
When you launch Terminal, a text window will open with a line already in it, ending either in a dollar sign ($) or a percent sign (%). If you get the percent sign, enter “sh” and press return. You should then get a new line ending in a dollar sign.
Click anywhere in the Terminal window and paste (command-V). The text you pasted should vanish immediately. If it doesn't, press the return key.
If you're logged in as an administrator, you'll be prompted for your login password. Nothing will be displayed when you type it. You will not see the usual dots in place of typed characters. Make sure caps lock is off. Type carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you make three failed attempts to enter the password, the test will run anyway, but it will produce less information. In most cases, the difference is not important.
If you're not logged in as an administrator, you won't be prompted for your password. The test will still run. It just won't do anything that requires administrator rights.
The test may take up to a few minutes to run, depending on how many files you have and the speed of the computer. A computer that's abnormally slow may take longer to run the test. There is no indication of progress until it's done. Wait for the line "[Process completed]" to appear in the Terminal window. If you don't see that line within half an hour or so, the test probably won't complete in a reasonable time. In that case, close the Terminal window and report your results. No harm will be done.
When the test is complete, quit Terminal. The results will have been copied to the Clipboard automatically. They are not shown in the Terminal window. Please don't copy anything from there. All you have to do is start a reply to this comment and then paste by pressing command-V again.
If any private information, such as your name or email address, appears in the results, anonymize it before posting. Usually that won't be necessary.
When you post the results, you might see the message, "You have included content in your post that is not permitted." That's because the forum software falsely identifies something in the post as a violation of the terms of use. If that happens, please post the results on Pastebin, then post a link here to the page you created.
Note: This is a public forum, and others may give you advice based on the results of the test. They speak only for themselves, and I don't necessarily agree with them.
Copyright © 2014 Linc Davis. As the sole author of this work, I reserve all rights to it except as provided in the Terms of Use of Apple Support Communities ("ASC"). Readers of ASC may copy it for their own personal use. Neither the whole nor any part may be redistributed.

LOTS of beach balls spinning !?..

hi Guys
i installed M.Lion as soon as it became available & even though i am pleased with it in general, fact is i have seen a BIG increase of spinning beach balls on my iMac's screen lately...
this usually happens when launching an app, when i return to the computer after a couple of minutes away even though it hasn't gone asleep or trying to open one of my external drives ( FW800 or USB drives take the same time..)...
trying to determine what is causing this & while a total newb on the subject, i opened Activity Monitor to see if something unusual would pop out
one thing did & i was wondering if anyone can tell me this is normal or...?
at the time i was downsizing a video file using Handbrake & every other value looked kind of normal as far as i could tell except for this one from - i believe.. - my APC ups software PowerChute
does that value mean it's using up 97.6% of the total processor useage ? isn't that MASSIVE ? i mean EVERY other use was 0.something except for the fisrt 4.8 value of Activity Monitor itslef in the first place...
any ideas how i should go about solving this ?
my machine is a 27'' iMac i7, 2.8GHz w/ 16GB RAM, now running M.Lion, purchased on 15/06/2010 running Snow Leopard, model identifier 11,1 with every update done
- 2 X NewerTech Guardian Maximus FW800 enclosures ( 2 X Western Digital 3TB drives in each.. ) one has my music, the other my video
- 2 X Western Digital My Book 2TB USB drives set up in Raid 1 with Disk Utility as Time Machine back-up
- 1 Cambridge Audio DacMagic connected optical out from iMac, then via RCA's to amp a couple of meters away
thanks in advance for any suggestions

well...
talk about complicating things unnecessarily !...LOL...
i opened a drawer where i keep all sorts of odds & ends & guess what ? yup, the original APC PowerChute install disk was there, laughing at me - bugger....
so i inserted it, clicked open & it does come with an ''uninstall_pcpe.command'' + some info, etc...
read everything just to make sure my iMac wouldn't go into space or something, double clicked on that command, Terminal opened, asked Y or no to remove it, then my password, pressed OK & BOOOM !! done, it's gone...uff !
i'll check out how the iMac behaves in the next few days see if the beach balls were it's fault or if it's just because it's summertime & will report back
in case this might be useful to somebody else :
& it looks like it might be the solution, the 97.04%User ( bottom left corner.. ) being Handbrake doing it's thing - i think !? :
thanks Thomas for pointing me in thre right direction ;-)

IPhoto'09= Beach balls, slooow, AWFUL!

I've only got 16,000 photos in iPhoto. Ever since iPhoto'09 it's slow to open, slow to quit, slow to do anything!! And, I get "beach balls" all the time. It used to run so smoothly. What the heck is going on??

You might try rebuilding the library and select only the last option:
Click to view full size
It will speed up iPhoto's launch.

Single Project Won't Load - Eternal Beach Ball - File too large?

I had just finished putting in the last still image in a project in iMovie last night when all of a sudden, my whole computer crashed. Another friend had been working on the same project on my machine and had mentioned that occasionally iMovie would randomly glitch but she didn't mention any crashes.
Now when I try to get to that particular project, I get the beach ball and it never goes away. I eventually force-quit the program.
I've cleared preferences files (which allowed me to load videos again, at first it was just sitting in this suspended state of "loading" but would never do anything) and deleted old movies and projects. This is the ONLY project that won't open.
I have 42.16GB available on my HD so I don't think space is an issue. (I could be wrong.) Again, I had just finished the project when everything went wrong.
I have searched the forums for answers and nothing seems to really match my issue. I've tried their suggestions anyway but nothing seems to be helping. (The deleting of preference files did solve the issue of nothing loading, however.)
I tried to copy the project file onto a disc so that I could maybe switch machines but that proved ineffective.
Help?

In searching other forums, I've seen a plethora of ideas but no real common thread. Someone said that trashing things before a movie is done will corrupt it. I don't believe I initially trashed anythinng necessary for the movie but now I have. Is all hope now lost?

IPhoto '08... beach ball spinning too much!!

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