The trick is determining whether or not the Launch Agent is doing anything useful or not. If you are using Etrecheck Pro (the paid version) and you scroll down the sidebar to Software you will find a list of the Launch Agents and with each there are three options:
  1. Show in Finder — and you can delete it from there
  2. Show Executable — which shows the actual executable activated by the Launch Agent
  3. Lookup — that will perform a search of the internet for infrmation on the specific Launch Agent
That list also indicates the status of a Launch Agent — is it..
  • Not loaded
  • Loaded
  • Running
The only ones that actually impact performance are those that are Running.

You should also consider Launch Daemons which are like Launch Agents but at the System rather than User level, and I would also take a look at Login Items.

I don't know if there is a similar GUI function in the free version of Etrecheck but you should be able to pull all of that data out of the Etrecheck Report in either version, but with a lot more work.

As a starting point, and assuming your desktop and laptop have the same software installed, you could run Etrecheck on both and the compare the two reports. Since your desktop is performing normally any Launch Agent, Launch Daemon, or Startup Item that appears on the laptop and not on the desktop would appear to be a candidate for deletion. To delete Launch Agents and Launch Daemons I would...
  1. Boot the computer into Safe mode
    1. Shut down completely
    2. Wait 10 seconds then press the power button
    3. Immediately after your Mac starts, press and hold the Shift key
    4. Release the Shift key when you see the gray Apple logo
  2. Navigate to ~/Library
  3. Create a new folder Launch Agents (Inactive)
  4. Drag any undesired Launch Agent from ~/Library/Launch Agents to ~/Library/Launch Agents (Inactive)
  5. Repeat these steps with /Library/Launch Agents and /Library/Launch Daemons
  6. Reboot you laptop normally and test to see if everything is working and performance has improved.
    • If anything does not work, you can always move the Launch Agent or Launch Daemon back to the original location.
    • If after a few weeks you are satisfied with the results delete the (Inactive) folders and their content.
  7. Take a hard look at System Preferences > Users & Groups > Your Account > Login Items and see if everything there is actually necessary and if not remove it.



If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein