Question about attached storage affecting iMac performance.

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Geektastic

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#164453 10-Feb-2015 11:17

I have a relatively new iMac (about 15 months old) at the top spec, with 3Ghz i7, 32Gb Ram etc etc.

Plugged into that are several USB 3 drives.

Sometimes, I can hear one of those drives spinning up and whilst it does so, I get the old beachball.

This lasts perhaps 5 seconds during which I can do nothing with the Mac.

It happens at times unrelated to the use of the drives - for example, today I opened a pdf attachement in an email and tried to scroll down. Suddenly - whir whir and beachball.

Anyone know why?

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#1234014 10-Feb-2015 11:25

Probably spotlight indexing in the bacground

Geektastic

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#1234016 10-Feb-2015 11:27

RunningMan: Probably spotlight indexing in the bacground

Aside from applications, Spotlight is disabled in favour of Alfred.

MikeB4

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#1234017 10-Feb-2015 11:29

Yosemite?

I am getting the spinning beach ball so often these days, I am considering replacing my iMac. I have disconnected my external HDD's but the ball still spins. I hate that ball with a passion.

MikeB4

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#1234021 10-Feb-2015 11:40

Have you tried a permissions reset for the HDD's and a PRAM reset?

tdgeek

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#1234022 10-Feb-2015 11:41

The only beachball I get is if I right click a file on my WDTV attached hard drive.

I do recall some form of PDF issue, and email rings a bell. In Yosemite.

Just checked, seems to be slow pdf viewing,in general, assume its not an email pdf issue but a pdf issue. Although I don't have it.Weird, the oft spoken wifi issues, this pdf issue, why doesnt everyone have it or not have it? Both issues must be

IF Yosemite AND IF Wifi, AND IF ??? THEN bug!

MikeB4

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#1234024 10-Feb-2015 11:43

tdgeek: The only beachball I get is if I right click a file on my WDTV attached hard drive.

I do recall some form of PDF issue, and email rings a bell. In Yosemite.

Just checked, seems to be slow pdf viewing,in general, assume its not an email pdf issue but a pdf issue. Although I don't have it.Weird, the oft spoken wifi issues, this pdf issue, why doesnt everyone have it or not have it? Both issues must be

IF Yosemite AND IF Wifi, AND IF ??? THEN bug!

dammit I was trying to forget the Yosemite Wifi bugs aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhh you have brought them back to mind like a Vietnam flashback :p

tdgeek

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#1234027 10-Feb-2015 11:47

KiwiNZ:
tdgeek: The only beachball I get is if I right click a file on my WDTV attached hard drive.

I do recall some form of PDF issue, and email rings a bell. In Yosemite.

Just checked, seems to be slow pdf viewing,in general, assume its not an email pdf issue but a pdf issue. Although I don't have it.Weird, the oft spoken wifi issues, this pdf issue, why doesnt everyone have it or not have it? Both issues must be

IF Yosemite AND IF Wifi, AND IF ??? THEN bug!

dammit I was trying to forget the Yosemite Wifi bugs aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhh you have brought them back to mind like a Vietnam flashback :p

I must be blessed, the only bug I have is what I mentioned, and in iOS8.0 or.1, iMessage wouldn't change portrait/landscape all the time, thats fixed.

Id hold off changing the iMac, they will fix this stuff, there is s lot of banter online. BUT, as I am seemingly bug free-ish, easy for me to say.

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Geektastic

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#1234028 10-Feb-2015 11:48

I know. That and iOS are too buggy.

I have an iPhone 6+ and it has heaps of issues - worst being that Safari will usually quit if you rotate to landscape view or that in landscape the touch screen for things like page links etc just does not work until you rotate back to portrait.

I could not bear to go back to Windows though.

MikeB4

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#1234030 10-Feb-2015 11:49

tdgeek:
KiwiNZ:
tdgeek: The only beachball I get is if I right click a file on my WDTV attached hard drive.

I do recall some form of PDF issue, and email rings a bell. In Yosemite.

Just checked, seems to be slow pdf viewing,in general, assume its not an email pdf issue but a pdf issue. Although I don't have it.Weird, the oft spoken wifi issues, this pdf issue, why doesnt everyone have it or not have it? Both issues must be

IF Yosemite AND IF Wifi, AND IF ??? THEN bug!

dammit I was trying to forget the Yosemite Wifi bugs aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhh you have brought them back to mind like a Vietnam flashback :p

I must be blessed, the only bug I have is what I mentioned, and in iOS8.0 or.1, iMessage wouldn't change portrait/landscape all the time, thats fixed.

Id hold off changing the iMac, they will fix this stuff, there is s lot of banter online. BUT, as I am seemingly bug free-ish, easy for me to say.

My iMac is getting on its a 2011, its HDD has issues and I am not keeping anything vital on the HDD.

MikeB4

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#1234031 10-Feb-2015 11:50

I have found doing a PRAM reset and permissions reset improves things a lot

clicknz

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#1234047 10-Feb-2015 12:19

Geektastic: I know. That and iOS are too buggy.

I have an iPhone 6+ and it has heaps of issues - worst being that Safari will usually quit if you rotate to landscape view or that in landscape the touch screen for things like page links etc just does not work until you rotate back to portrait.

I could not bear to go back to Windows though.

Am running Yosemite on an older iMac & a newish MBPro without any major issues that I'm aware of (altho' I did have the early WiFi problems). With external drives attached I do get odd spin-ups on idle drives that are frustrating and this is the only OS (that I can remember) that doesn't like being put to sleep with HDD's attached - I get an error message 'eject disk before removing' when I wake my MBPro, and the disk remounts itself. Didn't use to behave like this, so I'm assuming Yosemite handles attached drives differently. Definitely something odd there.

WRT Geektastic's iOS bugs - I've only spotted a couple of very minor ones on an iPhone 6. I guess the way the 6plus handles web pages is a little different due to screen size... but is this a known issue with other 6+ owners? Done a restart lately? Or a hard reboot (home & sleep/wake button held in)?

Cheers,
Mike

Photographer/Videographer clickmedia.nz

tdgeek

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#1234051 10-Feb-2015 12:28

Geektastic: I know. That and iOS are too buggy.

I have an iPhone 6+ and it has heaps of issues - worst being that Safari will usually quit if you rotate to landscape view or that in landscape the touch screen for things like page links etc just does not work until you rotate back to portrait.

I could not bear to go back to Windows though.

The rotation issue, I thought that was just iMessage, and was in 8.0 or 8.1, I assume you are on latest iOS?

Geektastic

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#1234211 10-Feb-2015 15:38

Yes latest os.

tdgeek

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#1234223 10-Feb-2015 15:52

Geektastic: Yes latest os.

PRAM and disk permissions as was mentioned?

To digress, I am on other forums, Yahoo iPad, iPhone, Mac, many are biased, Windows crud etc. I've had the odd lively exchange. Not too lively. When some rant about Windows, I laugh to myself at disk permissions, PRAM, Onyx. All OS need the odd TLC even holy Apple!

BTR

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#1234258 10-Feb-2015 17:01

Have you disabled power nap? Also what brand and model of external HD. Most entry level Seagate and WD drives have eco drives which spin down when not in use and its not until your saving or opening a file that they spin back up.

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