TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

I did exactly the same thing. Built a Windows 7 I-5 machine with 16GB and all SSD. Upgraded to 32GB and an I-7 and added more SSD over the years. Not quite ready to toss it yet, but looking for a graphics card selling somewhere close to list price (due to bitcoin mining) with 4GB VRAM to replace my older NVidia, which the latest rev of LR/PS notifies me is too small for optimum performance.

tcthome Loc: NJ

If you up-graded your OS, you might need to go into your LR preferences/performance settings & check your graphics card setting. Make sure the box is checked Why your in there, go into file handling & purge your file cache. this should be checked/done anytime your LR gets slow. You will need to close out of LR & restart LR. Good luck. Hope this helps.

SuperflyTNT Loc: Manassas VA

The best thing about a Windows box is I can build it myself, exactly as I want and can easily upgrade any component at any time.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

How big is your catalog?

I seem to recall that LR starts to bog down when there are 100,000 or more images in its catalog.

I don't experience this myself because I start a new catalog each year, so never end up with more than about half that many images.

There also was something about the preferences and whether or not a graphics card was enabled... but I don't know how that applies to Macs (I use a Windows machine).

pego101

Very good about the apple cult overpriced and with older tech as well.

pego101

And the naming of os versions is middle school stuff.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Yes. I like numeric OS versions. Calling your current OS Tucumcari or Watsonville tells me nothing about what it replaces.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Are you using the cloud-based Lightroom, or desktop-based Lightroom Classic? The current version of LrC is 11.0.1!

Is your installation of MacOS Big Sur fully updated to version 11.6.1?

Are all your photo files local? Is at least one third of each drive you use empty? Are you running all OS and applications on the SSD portion of the fusion drive?

Can you save your files on a faster SSD drive?

Have you run Disk First Aid from the Disk Utility app, to rule out drive issues? Have you ever run Onyx? It's a system cleaner utility.

My son runs Lightroom Classic on a Late 2020 M1 MacBook Air with 8GB Unified Memory and 512GB storage. It is very fast. My own Late 2020 M1 MacBook Air has 16GB memory and 1TB storage. It's even quicker. I can hold the arrow key down and scroll through hundreds of images so quickly I can't really see them. 16MP raw files export to JPEG in just under one second each.

Of course, all my files are local, and my internal SSD reads and writes around 2700 to 3000 MB/s. But it's not objectionably slower when writing to a Samsung T7 connected directly via USB-C.

Dynamics5

Lots to follow up on! Thanks all.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

And your point in commenting is? I was replying to Gene51 (who I most often agree with) and not the OP, who I am not familiar with and was not directly addressing.