I have a late 2013 rMBP, 13" with the following specs:
- Processor: 2.6 GHz Intel Core i5
- RAM: 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
- Video: Intel Iris 1536 MB (integrated)
Before upgrading to Yosemite, Mavericks performed fine (everything was quick and snappy). I did a clean install of Yosemite (however, I took a bit of a strange path: reinstalled Mavericks and then upgraded to Yosemite via the App Store).
So, my problem is that the UI lags. Not immediately, but after a while (either using the laptop or have it in sleep mode and then use it) the UI gets laggy. Yosemite eats up all my RAM, and I don't really have that much apps open. Today, I had 3 PDFs open in Preview and was using Safari. Mission control and Expose were very slow and laggy.
I have already tried a PRAM reset, did not solve anything. Also reduced the transparancy, and did not work.
When reading forums, it seems that Yosemite has trouble with the amount of pixels of a retina screen. A friend of mine has a 2014 11" MacBook Air (base model) which runs Yosemite fine.
What do you recommend, should I do a clean install of Yosemite again (this time using a bootable image of Yosemite)? Or is it better to wait for Apple to fix this with an update?
I'm keen for your thoughts on this matter.
UPDATE 19-11-2014: Since the 10.10.1 update, overall stability of Yosemite seems to be improved and I have not yet encountered any lag. Is it solved….?
UPDATE 21-11-2014: Still having UI lag (after clean re-install of Yosemite), though it does occur less frequently with 10.10.1. Preview also performs slightly better, as well as Mission Control and Exposé.
UPDATE 03-12-2014: UI lag is still present, and as said, it occurs less frequently. What is strange however, is that the actual performance of the machine does not seem to suffer under the lag.
Best Answer
I'm experiencing some slowdown after a while even on my MBA. It's exactly how you described it. It's perfectly smooth after booting the machine but eventually, after using it for one day or so the animations (especially launching Mission Control, switching between spaces and full screen apps) get noticeably choppy. I don't think there's anything that can be done about it right now, I made a clean install and even executed an Onyx automation, but the problem persists. This is clearly an optimization problem in Yosemite and I really hope it will get better with the future updates.