VLC suddenly became extremely slow on macOS

[x89675]

Hi everyone,
VLC suddenly became extremely slow while I was working. It was playing a video file and it was connected to an external display.
I disconnected the external display, then I downloaded another video file, then everything happened and it became slow while every other apps work as expected.
Opening VLC takes a long time and, a short system freeze. When it opens it can't open files because Open dialog is very slow and laggy. Opening file from Finder also doesn't work.

The interesting point is sometimes it works like a charm and none of the above signs appear :\

macOS: 10.14.6
VLC: 3.0.7.1

There is nothing weird about CPU, memory and disk, everything looks fine in Activity Monitor. The most CPU consuming process is WindowServer with near 12% usage while VLC is opening.

What I have done:

• Reinstalled VLC
• Cleared temp, cache, preferences, and application support
• Scanned for malware
• Reset NVRAM and SMC
• Erased mac disk
• Reinstalled macOS
• Went through diagnosis tools like mac hardware test, etc.
• Talked to the Apple support level 1 and, senior level, but no solution came up

[ePirat]

Thats a really weird issue, especially if CPU usage is fine… Does it happen while playing a video or even when nothing is playing too?

[ayaaws97]

I have the same problem, vlc slow to launch and freezes.

[atakacs]

FWW I see similar issues - not sure what is causing it

[ePirat]

Does it happen while playing a video or even when nothing is playing too? And which exact version of VLC are you using?

[icolorama]

Please help, it is the same here! When starting to play a video

Version 3.0.8 Vetinari (Intel 64bit) in macOS 10.15.2 (19C57)

[ePirat]

Whats your Mac model? (You can find that by clicking on the Apple log in the menubar and clicking on About this Mac)

[iHadi]

same problem here, suddenly vlc become so slow on startup even without playing a video...
and no solution found on the internet though ...

[iHadi]

my mac model is "MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2018)" and my MAC OS version is "10.15.5"... it was good till few days ago but suddenly it becomes very slow at startup...my VLC Version was 3.0.5 (I think) and updating it to latest version (3.0.10) doesn't solve the problem.

[vrchop]

Stop auto update on Mac , Quit bluetooth and wifi and try again..
I think Vlc trying to update before starting.. Its worked for me
then start only bluetooth and wifi

[MagnumX]

The interface works fine here while not playing a video and videos seem to play OK as long as I leave them alone, but using the cue controls to move around the video is extremely slow to respond and slow to reset where I can use it a second time, etc. I'm not exactly sure when this became a major problem as I just tended to use Mac's own preview for MP4 type files, but MKV files are another matter. I know it was at least a couple of years ago, probably during a major version change and I'm guessing based on the changelog it was V3.0. Before that, it was almost instantaneous for cue changes on the same Mac. I figured it was a bug and it would eventually be fixed. I may have even submitted a report back then, but I can't remember for certain. I know I mentioned it on several media and Mac forums.

Other players like kodi work perfectly fine in terms of cue speed. It almost feels like hardware acceleration isn't working correctly. Given it's an older Mac (2012 quad-core i7 MacMini Server, although updated with 16GB of ram and 2TB SSD), I'm guessing it is possible it is related to the GPU (Intel 3000HD) and hardware acceleration, perhaps not for media playback but interrupting it by trying to cue around to different places in the video? I mentioned this in its own thread, but there's been zero responses and somehow I'm guessing it will remain that way. Sadly, it makes VLC a lot less useful than it once was as trying to find certain places in movie is almost impossible now with it. I'm forced to use kodi instead, which can cue just fine on the same machine.