Chosen Solution
My Macbook is a great computer and I love it, but for quite some time now it cannot do anything without spinning that frustrating color wheel. I can’t even get through typing this without seeing it. This happens when I open or close programs and applications when I’m on the internet pretty much all the time. A few days ago I backed up to an external hard drive to reformat the computer in hopes it was just crammed with junk and needed a good cleaning. This did not work, if anything it has gotten worse. The RAM shows to be ok, I have 4 gigs, and will probably upgrade that in the future as well. Really don’t want to spend the money on a new computer if I can easily fix this one with a new hard drive and some upgraded RAM. Any answers are appreciated.
On a side note, how full is your HDD? Loading issues, such as you are describing, can start to occur if your HDD is near max capacity. Try cleaning out your HDD of excess files and unused apps, and see if that helps. Doing a reformat and restore was a good idea, and gets rid of any excess temp files, however you will still need to go through your long term files (photos and etc), to really clear up space. If that doesn’t work, I would go with the RAM upgrade next. If your computer habits involve heavy usage apps, or having a ton of browser tabs open, that could also be slowing down your computer. Chrome in particular, especially when having 20+ tabs open can significantly slow down a computer.
Most likely a hard drive/IR cable issue. Replace with the one from the 2012 model. MacBook Pro 13" Unibody (Mid 2012) Hard Drive Cable MacBook Pro 13" Unibody Mid 2012 Hard Drive Cable Replacement If the condition last to long it starts destroying the data on the hard drive and necessitates a backup and reformatting of the drive.
