My experience going from TP2 to TP3 and back?

My original set up is a 2011 17” MacBook Pro 10.6.8 with i7 2.3 Ghz, 8 GB of ram and upgraded 1 TB SSD running Traktor Pro 2 and S4 MK1 for eight years without a single glitch, crash or spinning beachball. The only only complaint that I have is the mic input preamp on the S4 MK1 is very weak and cannot handle high input levels making the output insufficient for my line of work that includes 99% weddings. I have bypassed the mixer completely with a separate mixer for the mic. This system is rock solid and works 100%

I skipped upgrading my Traktor S4 MK1 controller to the S4 MK2 as my controller works perfectly and really didn’t see the need for this upgrade at that time.

When the Traktor S4 MK3 arriv https://19216811.cam/ ed It looked like an amazing controller with enough new and upgraded features compared to my S4 MK1 that I would make the upgrade and retire my old S4 Some of the features that appealed to me were the improved sound card, spinning jog wheels, XLR out, improved mic preamps and just a better build quality overall. My past experience with NI and McBook was so good I wasn’t afraid to upgrade.

I looked at the NI system requirements for Traktor Pro 3 and it states mac OS 10.12, 10.13, 10.14 latest update. Intel Core i5 or equivalent CPU, 4 GB Ram. My 2011 MacBook Pro would not work as mine is 10.6.8 So I installed High Sierra 10.13 on my 2011 MacBook Pro to run Traktor Pro 3 and the new S4 MK3 After installing the software and music I got spinning beachballs when opening program (100% CPU) dragging and dropping tracks into a playlist folder or deck caused the beachball and the waveform to stop completely. When trying to analyze tracks beachball and program would freeze. Program crashed twice and when closing the program I got the beachball and 100-140% CPU usage. Laptop got very hot to the touch something it never did when running TP2 My computer tech told me that my computer cannot run TP3 as the CPU is being taxed out and I would need to upgrade my computer. My tech could not believe that my 2011 computer would not run TP3 as based on NI specs and upgrades I have done to MacBook it should. The specs are not clear enough according to my tech.

I now had to put my 2011 MacBook pro back to its original state and operating system. I then purchase a new 2018 MacBook Pro with i7 2.2 Ghz, 16 GB Ram and 1 TB SSD I now install TP3 and music. As I open the program I get the same spinning beachball as I did before for about 10 seconds. However I did not get the spinning beachball during playback or loading tracks into playlists as I did before. When running TP3 it averaged at about 50-60% cpu and the laptop got very hot. When closing TP3 I would get the spinning beachball for 10 seconds or more and then it would close. So basically the same symptoms as with the 2011 MacBook but slightly less with the new MacBook but still there. Both laptops were optimized as per NI suggestions for TP3 usage.

I have returned my Traktor controller and MacBook and I’m back to using my original set up. This is extremely disappointing. I have wasted my time and money on something that should have worked as good or better than the original. How can two different laptops with two different operating systems get the same or similar poor operating results?