2019 Mac desktop running extremely slow after startup

I would not be upset if you added a bit of RAM even though the report shows your Mac was not starved for RAM at the time of the test.

The report shows your Mac clearly shipped with Apple's Fusion drive, but the report also suggests that the two component parts of Fusion, a small factory SSD and a much larger mechanical HDD, are not speaking to each other. In other words, the storage system has"split."

A mech-only drive config was never offered in that iMac model.

Before doing anything else, see this Apple article and use the test at the start to see if the two componets have lost their software connection:

How to fix a split Fusion Drive - Apple Support

If the test shows you are "split," fixing it per the article (an at-home thing) may make your day a whole lot better. Back up everything first.

Your current drive scores:

Performance:

System Load: 1.62 (1 min ago) 1.41 (5 min ago) 0.98 (15 min ago)

Nominal I/O usage: 3.58 MB/s

File system: 20.78 seconds

Write speed: 617 MB/s

Read speed: 1465 MB/s

are are the low-end range of expected Fusion performance in your model. EtreCheck reports I have for that Fusion drive config in late Intel iMacs are Writes at 600-900 Mb/sec and Reads for 1400 up to 2000 MB/sec. A file system score of 21 seconds shows it is healthy per Etrecheck's Help menu.

So before you start throwing parts and money at this...there are implications ot consider:

Internal drive upgrade implications:

— The factory SSD can be replaced with a large one that can do up to 2700MB/sec both ways, but its slot is on the "wrong" side of the logic board. Accessing it requires almost a complete gutting of a computer that Apple did not design for us mere mortals to access. If you cannot do the work, expect 2-3 hours of pro labor and US$70-90/hour. Some Apple Authorized Service Providers will not work on sealed-case iMacs.

— Changing the 1 TB internal mech hard drive to SSD will be a LOSS of performance. An SSD on the main bay drive bus (SATA-6) is constrained by the bus rating to 500-600MB/sec both ways.

External drive implications:

— The cheapest external option ( USB3 enclosure with an SATA-6 SSD) with be even slower, about 400MB/sec both ways). Big downgrade.

— More expensive Thunderbolt drives can do a 2700MB sec and would give a big performance boost.

But there is an issue: Recent price increases for fast solid-state storage skyrocketed last year. A litlle mid-speed 1TB external I bought from OWC last March for US$100 is now over US$250 !!

and it's not even the fastest option!

Compared to that, fixing a split Fusion drive, something you do, the cost differential is huge.

I would vist the Adobe forums to see if thi is expected or a problem:

Creative Cloud Libraries Synchronizer 51.88 % (Adobe Inc.)

And I have to ask. These entries are new to me:

Diagnostics Information (past 60 days):

2026-01-05 13:44:06 rmdinspect Crash (2 times)

Executable: /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/RemoteManagement.framework/rmdinspect

2026-01-05 13:44:06 managedsettingsdiagnoticstool Crash (2 times)

Executable: /System/Library/Frameworks/ManagedSettings.framework/managedsettingsdiagnoticstool

Is this a company-owned computer, or was it at one time? If so, that adds a new set of implications and problems.

Adobe recommends 16 GB of RAM for their major applications – so given that you are running Adobe applications, an upgrade from 8 GB of RAM to 16 – 32 GB of RAM (total) might be in order.

Although your internal drive is a Fusion Drive, it doesn't have very much SSD space. When Apple first shipped 1 TB Fusion Drives in 2012, they came with 128 GB of SSD space. Beginning in Late 2015, Apple cut that to a measly 24 to 32 GB. According to Wikipedia, your model has 32 GB of SSD space; according to the report, it has 28 GB – but either way, while it is "prime real estate", there is not nearly enough of it.

As for external SSDs, USB 3.1 Gen 2 / NVMe SSDs are faster than USB 3.0 / SATA ones – and are often not all that much more expensive.

Run the third party app DriveDx (free trial period) to check the health of the Hard Drive portion of the Fusion Drive setup. Post the complete DriveDx text report here using the "Additional Text" icon which looks like a piece of paper on the forum editing toolbar. It is fine to also post the report for the SSD as well. Most likely the Hard Drive portion of the Fusion Drive will be the second storage item on the left pane of DriveDx.

You can also try running Disk Utility First Aid on the "Fusion Drive" item and the hidden Container. Within Disk Utility you may need to click "View" and select "Show All Devices" before the Fusion Drive and hidden Container appear on the left pane of Disk Utility.

Even if the First Aid summary says everything is "Ok", click "Show Details" and scroll through the report for any unfixed warnings and errors. If there are any, then run First Aid again until they are gone. If after several attempts the errors remain, then you will need to run First Aid while booted into Recovery Mode.

The remote management of this Mac may be part of the problem as well since several of the crashes reported involved those items.

It is hard to say whether memory is a problem here since the system had not been running long enough for the memory information to be accurate. Use the iMac for several days without rebooting it (or powering it off) making sure to include your largest most system intensive workload. Then look at the "Memory" section of Activity Monitor while performing those workloads. Do you see the "Memory Pressure" graph in the red? If so, then that workload could benefit by more memory. If the memory pressure graph shows yellow, then you are borderline on having sufficient memory for that workload. If the "Swap" and "Compressed" options next to the graph show GBs, then you may benefit from more memory (or you could close unneeded apps when performing the more memory intensive workloads).

Also, you should install the macOS 15.7.3 update patch which was released about two weeks ago just in case it resolves the problem.

There was no EtreCheck report attached. Please re-try to attach it.

Remember a 2019 is getting kind of old now and cannot be updated to current versions of Mac OS so if you like to stay current it might be time to consider replacing the old beast.

You are correct, installing a SSD would make the machine faster than using an old spinning HD however it is MAJOR surgery unless you had a third party Apple Authorized Service Provider do the work. And you will still be left with an older Mac.

However, all that being said let's take a look at the EtreCheck report and then perhaps we can tell what the. issue is. Also, another thing to try is just restarting in Safe Mode, this might help. Click Safe Mode for instructions and please remember to make your keyboard wired by using the charging cable, plug the cable into the back of the Mac and the keyboard. Be patient too, doing a Safe Mode restart can take up to 5 minutes.

The report is in the Author's first post. Because of the problems Apple is having with the Support Communities sites, it was not there the first time I came into the post. I had to rebuild the page a before the Report (as shown in the following screenshot) appeared.

The read and write speeds seemed normal for a Fusion Drive.

The only thing that might be adding to the problem is that the Microsoft Creating Cloud Libraries is taking up 51%f of the CPU in the background. I don't have Creative Cloud so don't know if that is normal or how it may be reduced.

Also the Bfamily1 only have 8 GB of RAM. Since it's a 27" iMac he can add more. I recommend he launch Activity Monitor and monitor the Memory Pressure graph to see if it is getting into the yellow or red during the slow periods. If it does get into the yellow or red then adding another (8 or 16 GB's of RAM would be warranted. From my experience only an additional 8 GB (two 4 GB modules) would be sufficient. I wouldn't put more money into a vintage model (by Apple's view) than the two 4GB modules.

If Bfamily1 does get additional RAM I strongly recommend that he get it from OWC (MacSales.com) which are guaranteed to be compatible with Macs.

Still no report, please carefully read the following:

When you have your report, you can attach it when you reply to this message and we can then review it and help you determine what is needed to get your system running well again. 

For instructions on how to download your EtreCheck report and attach it to your reply to this message please click https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-250000211 It is helpful to us if you download the report to your Desktop.

Top Processes Snapshot by CPU:

Process (count) CPU (Source - Location)

Creative Cloud Libraries Synchronizer 51.88 % (Adobe Inc.)

EtreCheckPro 34.90 % (Etresoft, Inc.)

Creative Cloud UI Helper (Renderer) 11.74 % (Adobe Inc.)

WindowServer 4.54 % (Apple)

kernel_task 2.82 % (Apple)

Is it normal for the Adobe library synchronization process to chew up more than half of the CPU cycles?

Bfamily1 wrote:

Is for personal use but my husband did use it during Covid while working remote so it does have a few “business” or “company” things but they can definitely be removed now

Thank you. That could be applicable to your situation.

Those "things" will likely require removal by his company's IT department. If they are present, you may be able to view then by doing System Settings > General > Device Management.

We are seeing an uptick in reports here of people using their personal devices for company benfit and ending up with restrictive management profiles they cannot remove. That is especially bad when if the company goes out of business or the employee was dismissed under less-than-cordial circumstances.

Did you do the quick check for a split drive? I'm curious because sometimes a split cannot be 100% determined by Etrecheck alone.

Please attach the etrecheck report. There is none attached to your post.

The report doesn't look to bad for a Vintage iMac that only has 8GB of RAM.

After the Creative Cloud Libraries Synchronizer activity has subsided.

You should consider updating to the latest 15.7.3 of Sequoia.

What's new in the updates for macOS Sequoia - Apple Support