My MacBook Stalls Every Few Seconds

A MacBook is a notebook computer built by Apple. All of a MacBook's hardware comes from the same source, which lets it work together efficiently. Like other computers, though, Apple products are not immune to damage or system errors. A variety of issues can cause a MacBook to stall intermittently during use. Such troubles can often be identified and fixed through troubleshooting, but as the problem can be caused by either hardware or software, the process may take awhile to complete.

Restart Computer

Restarting your MacBook is a basic first step when you encounter problems. It can sometimes quickly clear up an issue that is causing some lagging or freezing. Restarting closes and resets all of your programs, your dock and your menu bar. It can shut down processes that may be hanging up your CPU.

Repair Disk Permissions

Sometimes the permissions for operations on your computer can become incorrect. Disk Utility's ability to put them back to the way they should be can smooth things out. Open your "Applications" folder, open the "Utilities" subfolder, then open "Disk Utility." Select "Macintosh HD" from the left side bar, then click "Repair Disk Permissions" near the bottom of the screen. This process takes time, but it will check permissions on your computer and fix them if they are incorrect.

Rebuild or Disable Spotlight

Spotlight, the search index tool for your MacBook, sometimes causes freezing issues. To address such issues, you can first try to reset and rebuild the index by using Terminal. Open Terminal, then type or paste in "sudo mdutil -E" without the quotes, and press "Enter." Terminal will index every file on your hard drive, which will take some time. If Spotlight still causes problems, try disabling it by typing or pasting "sudo mdutil -a -i off" into Terminal without the quotes. To turn Spotlight back on, enter the same command, changing "off" to "on."

Hardware Issues

Hardware issues such as faulty RAM or hard-drive errors often can cause operating problems. In this case, you will have to replace the faulty hardware. In some cases, you'll be able to determine the cause of the problem. If you can't, professional repair is a good option. If you aren't under warranty and you worry that Apple may charge too much, look at other computer repair stores that have parts for your MacBook; there are also a number of sites such as NewEgg and MacSales that sell RAM, hard drives and other components for Macs.