Slicer is so buggy and keeps showing error on macbook air M5

sathishbalachandran
Wed, 08 Apr 2026 21:41:06 +0000
Support

Hello Slicer Support Team,

I am a Radiation Oncologist (MD, DNB) attempting to use 3D Slicer for my daily clinical cases (1-2 cases/day). I recently moved from an old, basic Windows laptop to a new MacBook Air M5, but the experience has been very difficult and I am unable to use the software.

The primary issues I am facing:

1. Security/Verification Issues: Upon installation, macOS could not verify the software. I had to manually go into my system settings and select “Open Anyway” just to get the application to start.

2. Frequent Hanging: Even for simple tasks like loading a CT scan or scrolling through slices, the software “hangs” and becomes unresponsive. I often see the jumping icon in my dock or the spinning wheel, and I have to force quit the app repeatedly.

3. TotalSegmentator is Unusable: I am completely unable to get the TotalSegmentator extension to work. Every time I try to run a segmentation—even in “Fast” mode—I get red error messages (like ImportError: cannot import name 'GradScaler').

4. “Tetris-like” Quality: When I did manage to get one test case to run on my old machine, the contours looked like “bricks” or “Tetris blocks” rather than smooth organs. On this new Mac, I can’t even get that far because the AI simply fails to start.

My Background: I am a medical doctor, not a “techie.” I do not know how to use the Terminal or write code. I purchased this MacBook M5 because I thought it would be faster and more stable for my clinical work, but currently, it is much worse than my old, cheap PC.

My Question: Is there a stable, simple version of Slicer meant for the M5 chip that doesn’t require technical knowledge to fix? I just need a tool that “vomits out” smooth, accurate contours for my patients without the software hanging every few minutes.

I am happy to provide logs if you can tell me where to find them in the menus.

12 posts - 7 participants