Fix for MacBook sudden decrease in speed/freezing?

Question

Hi,
     I am a long time user of apple products, one of which being a 2009 MacBook. Recently my MacBook has been slowing down (including on start up) and often getting the spinning color wheel (which most of you might know about already). Just a few days I started up my computer and I noticed this clicking noise repeatedly. At this point my computer was already getting very slow.
     As my computer progressively got slower, I noticed the clicking noises occurring more often. Now it has come to the point where I can not start up my computer at all. When I press the power button the grey screen pops up; however, it does not show the grey loading bar usually displayed under the apple logo. With this in mind, is there any way that this problem can be fixed? Is there anything that could be slowing my computer down in the first place?
     If this makes any difference to your answers I have upgraded the RAM from 2gb to 4gb (third party). Also, I have upgraded the software of the MacBook to Snow Leapord. I regularly use the apps that where originally there along with some other downloaded apps (tell me if you need specifics). I have many documents, files, and downloads on my computer as well. I regularly empty the trash so that is not the problem here. It is fully charged so lack of battery is not a problem either. Thanks for your help!

Answer 1

A couple of things may have happened. You could have run out of system resources. You could be nearing the capacity of your hard drives. To further diagnose your problem you need to take a look at your memory settings and, if you are using MP rendering, make sure that you have all CPU's accounted for. I've seen a bunch of setups where 8 cores are available but 6 or 4 are being used and even more setups where the Actual CPU's reported are 0. Then you need to make sure that your drives have plenty of space and that they have recently had a health check. If all of those things look good then you could try purging your ram every few frames. You'll find the settings by going to the AE preferences and holding down the shift key before you click General. At the bottom of the list you'll see a new section called Secret. Click there and purge every few frames.
If none of that works then we need to know everything about your composition, your render settings, your version of AE down to the last decimal point, and anything else that might have an effect on your project. It's hard to diagnose a patient if they won't put on the gown, if you know what I mean.