How can I improve the speed my macbook pro is running at without upgrading hardware?

Okay, I have a standard macbook pro, software is all fully up to date as is my OS, however over the past month or so it seems the mac often takes a fair few seconds to carry out certain functions, and comes up with the multi-coloured loading cursor thing often. It's not a case of memory as I have over 2/3rds of my disk space clear and I don't think my CPU is over-burdened as the monitor shows (if any of these processes are suspect please let me know):
I've ran a malware scan, and it came back with nothing bar a few tracking cookies but I doubt they're responsible. The mac is from 2011, but ran as good as new until about a month ago.
Any ideas how I can improve it's performance? Just a heads up, I have some vague technical awareness, but it's probably best to treat me like I know nothing. Thanks.

http://www.reedcorner.net/mpg/

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HT1338 how can I improve the speed of my Macbook? It's become incredibly slow...

how can I improve the speed of my Macbook? It's become incredibly slow...

Hi,
Troubleshooting Steps are... Restart... Reset... Restore from Backup... Restore as New...
Try a Reset of the Phone... You will Not Lose Any Data...
Turn the Phone Off...
Press and Hold the Sleep/Wake Button and the Home Button at the Same Time...
The Apple logo will Appear and then Disappear...
Usually takes about 10 - 15 Seconds...
Turn the Phone On...
If that does not help... See Here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1414
iPhone User Guide
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/iphone_user_guide.pdf
iPhone Syncing
http://www.apple.com/support/iphone/syncing/

How can i improve the speed of my mac?

my mac has 667 MHz, how can i improve the speed?

Sorry if that sounded not very helpful, but basically it comes down to that. Not much can improve the performance of machine of that vintage, to stand up to a current model, unless you spend almost as much on upgrades (some of which to consider are listed below).
Some thought should be given to the budget (money and time and effort) one is willing to spend. The G4 Digital Audio is possibly a good candidate for upgrading for someone who is interested in do-it-yourself computer stuff and bargain hunting for parts. It can even be a fun hobby. But even max-ing out all possible upgrades will still be lacking in performance compared to the current Mac models, I don't actually have any specific benchmarks, just my gut feel. And you may spend a good portion of the cost of a new machine on all those parts for the old machine.
Is this the 667MHz machine (G4 Digital Audio) in question?
http://www.lowendmac.com/ppc/digital-audio-power-mac-g4.html
http://eshop.macsales.com/Descriptions/specs/Framework.cfm?page=g4da.html&title= Power%20Macintosh%20G4%20Digital%20Audio
or is it some other model?
Here are some CPU upgrades, for example:
http://eshop.macsales.com/MyOWC/Upgrades.cfm?sort=pop&model=162&type=Processor&T I=2420&shoupgrds=Show+Upgrades
you can even get a small rebate for your original CPU
http://eshop.macsales.com/Service/rebate-program/
Any of those CPUs should double your processing speed, but you may also need more RAM...or the CPU will just be waiting for data to be read from the virtual memory on the hard drive.
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/133SD512328/
you could max it out with a whopping 1.5 GB, with 3 of these.
and you may need a better video card...
http://eshop.macsales.com/MyOWC/Upgrades.cfm?sort=pop&model=162&type=Video&TI=29 34&shoupgrds=Show+Upgrades
To add larger and faster hard drives than the original Ultra ATA/66 can handle you would need a PCI ATA133 or PCI SATA card...
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/ACARD/AEC6280MOB/
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Sonnet%20Technology/TSATA/
And if you need to install OS X from a DVD, and want to burn your own DVD, you may need a new optical drive, if one hasn't been installed already, to replace the CD-RW:
http://eshop.macsales.com/MyOWC/Upgrades.cfm?Model=162&Type=InternalOpticalDrives&sort=pop
Also, check out the Power Macintosh G4 forums if you have any questions about that particular model, (if I guessed correctly)
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=113
Even while I am trying to build a case to convince someone not to waste their money on this project, I am thinking to myself, where can I pick up one of these G4 towers to take on this project myself. Maybe a Quicksilver, no a FW400 MDD dual-boot for sure, I still have some OS 9 software. I did about all I can with my G3 Desktop, and spent more than my MacBook cost.

How can i stop the whirring noise macbook pro

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Backup your personal data off the machine
Most commonly used backup methods
Run a #3 Hardware Test here
..Step by Step to fix your Mac
Take the machine in for a checkup, it might be something clogging inside

I have a new ipad with retina display and the orientation change from portrait to landscape is extremely slow? How can I improve the speed?

Any ideas on how to improve the speed ?

Hi rodtheprod,
I apologize, I'm a bit unclear on the issue you are describing. If a movie from the iTunes Store supports multiple languages, they can usually be changed as outlined in the following article:
iTunes: Language settings for video
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5562
If this is not possible and no changes have been made to the country settings for the iTunes Store, you may want to try redownloading the movie (if it is still available):
Download past purchases
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2519
Regards,
- Brenden

How can I improve Wifi reception of MacBook Pro?

I have just bought an external display to use with my MacBook Air and MacBook Pro (17") on the second floor of my house. My modem/router is on the first floor on the opposite end of the house, no more than 55 ft. away.
My MacBook Air gets a strong full Wifi signal (all 5 bars are showing)—so strong that I can easily stream Netflix movies without interruption, but my MacBook Pro gets one so weak (only 2 bars are showing) that I can hardly surf to any webpage at all. And this occurs even though both computers are in exactly the same location.
I have AT&T U-Verse, which uses a model 3801HGV modem/router. No computers in my house are connected via ethernet; all through wireless.
My question: What can I do to improve my MacBook Pro's signal strength? Relocating the modem/router is not an option. Do I need to boost my router's signal somehow? If so, how? Or can I improve the reception of my MacBook Pro?
I do have an idle AirportExtreme that could be used in a solution, but I am not sure whether, or how, I could use it.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts.

55 ft is quite some distance, especially if you are runng 5 GHz.
Maybe it is dual band. 2.4GHz is more for distance even if a bit slower.
Adding a second router is a great idea. Just plug it in
open your airport utility. Automatic set up.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4259?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

How can I improve the speed of my G4 Powerbook.

My G-4 Powerbook, bought 3 years ago, is sooooooooooo slow. I am so tired of seeing that colorful spinning thing always spinning. I'm not yet ready for a new computer. . My system specs are 1.67ghz 512 RAM 80gb HD, and I'm running current version of Tiger. Would upgrading to 1G of RAM help? I was told by Apple's telephone tech support that I have 2 cards of 256 ram each. If I were to upgrade 1 or 2 of them to a 512 card I would see a big difference in speed. Anybody have any experience with this, or any comments. Would appreciate. Lyn in Manhattan

Welcome to the Apple discussions.
It's not unusual to see Powerbooks around 3 or so years old slowing down - I agree it gets old, fast. First thing to do is clean up the hard disk, which can accumulate 'stuff' over time. If you don't have it already, download OnyX for Tiger from http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs2/english/download.html . A number of people have used this to fine tune and improve the performance of their system.
In OnyX, use the maintenance tab, do permissions and scripts.
Use the cleaning tab: Internet clear caches, browser history, recent searches. Caches, if you clear your kernel/system cache, your system may be a little slower to reboot while it rebuilds the cache - I clear these before an operating system upgrade. Log, delete log files, crash reporter logs, and archived logs. Trash, delete. Misc, delete temporary and obsolete items.
Another resource to look at is Dr Smokes performance FAQ at http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/performance.html
Also, make sure you have at least 10% of your disk free, for systems usage. Performance can decline rapidly if there's not enough disk space.
An easy way to see if more memory would help is to bring up your activity monitor (on your hard drive in applications/utilities). Look at the system memory tab, specifically at page ins and page outs. If outs are more than 10%-20% of page ins, you can benefit from more memory. A page out is when the system writes memory to the hard drive, to make room for something else. Do that too much, and you impact performance. Recommend Crucial, Kingston (not their value ram, however), or Samsung as three brands that work reliably in our Powerbooks. Crucial's site is http://www.crucial.com , Kingston is at http://www.kingston.com , and Samsung is available through distibutors - I use OWC at http://www.macsales.com . If you decide to upgrade, I'd pull one of the 256MB cards and put a 1GB card in it's place. Going from 512MB to 768MB isn't that big a change.
This should get you rolling in the right direction - please post back with any questions.

How can I improve the speed of my QuickVPN connection?

I have finally got my "Quick"VPN connection working with my small business network. In the past, I used a PPTP VPN via Windows to connect to the network, but was limited to one person on at a time. Now I have a QuickVPN we can have up to 10 people connected, but the speed is considerably slower. I haven't done any hard core testing. Before I spend even more time on this, I wanted to see if there were any good ideas out there.
Do you have any?
Thanks!

I have finally got my "Quick"VPN connection working with my small business network. In the past, I used a PPTP VPN via Windows to connect to the network, but was limited to one person on at a time. Now I have a QuickVPN we can have up to 10 people connected, but the speed is considerably slower. I haven't done any hard core testing. Before I spend even more time on this, I wanted to see if there were any good ideas out there.
Do you have any?
Thanks!

How do i improve processing speed on macbook pro? it has 2gb memory

I purchased my macbook pro in 2012. It has 2gb memory. Currently on OSX version 10.9.
The processing speed has decreased over a period of time. Although i don't keep heavy data in the system. I have been able to fix it couple of times, but it keeps recurring every few weeks.

You won't get full performance from Mavericks with only 2 GB of memory.
One of the myths that circulate on this site is the myth that you must maintain a certain percentage, such as 10% or 15%, of free space on the startup volume. That myth is based on nothing except the fact that people keep repeating it.
According to Apple documentation, you need at least 9 GB of available space on the startup volume (as shown in the Finder Info window) for normal operation. You also need enough space left over to allow for growth of the data. There is little or no performance advantage to having more available space than the minimum Apple recommends. Available storage space that you'll never use is wasted space.

How can I identify what OS my Macbook pro is running?

Can't get this computer to tell me what the heck I'm running.

As stated, you are on Snow Leopard, you can upgrade to Lion (10.7.xx) if your intention is to use iCloud on your phone, you can also use iCloud without upgrading to Lion but it will (a) be a more complex setup procedure and (b) more expensive as you will have to purchase additional software if intending to use contacts and calendars as well as Mail.
If you do intend on upgrading to Lion please note the minimum requirements (Core 2 Duo processor and 2G of Ram) the real world requirement (4G of Ram) and you should verify that your software will continue to run after Lion (Office 2004 does not work but 2008 and 2011 do) any PPC program that you have will not work so check first.
Finally
Backup
Backup
Backup
Just in case.

How can i improve the speed of my imac G5 PowerPC?

my computer has memory of 512MB, 2.1Ghz CPU speed. i have owned it since 2005. i am not sure where to begin, but thought giving some stats would help others diagnose my problem.
the activity monitor says i have only 12 MB of free memory: 88MB Wired, 246MB Active, 146MB Inactive, for a total of 5100 Used. my page Ins/Outs is 1070428/399129.
it would appear i am using only 25-40% of my CPU, Firefox being the largest single process.
i also have over 1000 photos in iphoto, some of which are in RAW format. i also have a number of Excel files, some of which have saved pivot tables.

my page Ins/Outs is 1070428/399129.
That ratio ("outs are 37 percent of "ins") say you need more RAM. The system is having to use virtual memory which is slower than real memory. If System Profiler (in "Utilities") says your Model is "powerMac12,1" you have room to add more RAM, up to a total of 2.5G. With the ins/outs looking the way they do not. that would give a modest speed boost.
IF the free space on your hard drive is getting low,--like under about 20 percent--having too little physical RAM installed can aggravate things in that Virtual Memory has to search longer to find qualifying blocks on the hard drive to which it can write the overflow data.

How can I improve the speed of my VI to work in real-time at higher sample rates?

I am currently trying to implement a multi-channel control system, the vi of which is attached. It effectively consists of a number of additions and multiplications in the processing subvi (also attached), however, for 7 inputs and 7 outputs I cannot get it to work at sample rates higher than 3kHz without experiencing an overwrite error. Does anyone have any tips as to how I can get the processing to work more efficiently such that I can get it to work at higher sample rates?
Attachments:
Simul_AIAO_Buffer(Two_Boards)_control_FXLMS_for_1_leaky_no_SCXI.vi ‏128 KB
FXLMSsub_leak_v2.vi ‏70 KB
filtered_ref_1_chan.vi ‏39 KB

Hi mattwilko,
I believe the first issue that you should address is the building of arrays.
This is mainly happening on the edge of your loops.
This is my reasoning.
Allocating memory in RT to handle an array that is growing will blow away your determinism.
I would suggets pre-allocating all of your storage and work with the data in-place.
In LV 7.1 there are some great new tools that will help nail down issue of this type.
If you have LV 7.1 you may want to upgrade so you can take advantage of the new tools.
Trying to help,
Ben
Ben Rayner
I am currently active on.. MainStream Preppers
Rayner's Ridge is under construction

Why is my macbook pro running so slow and how do I improve the speed?

why is my macbook pro running so slow and how do I improve the speed?

Write off the MS stuff as indicators for now--starting with Office 2008, they developed very long launch times. The time to launch 2008 on my old 1.25Ghz G4 and my MBP 2.2G are virtually the same. Even document opens/saves are slow compared to Office 2004 and earlier.
1) You have adequate hard drive space so that eliminates one of the usual suspects.
2) Check for runaway background processes. Quit all running user applications so the computer is at normal idle. Find Activity Monitor in Applications > Utilities and launch it. If you've not run it before, change the "Show" pulldown at the top of the AM window from its default of "User Processes" to "All Processes." There is a column for "%CPU." Click that column header to sort by CPU usage. Watch the processes "bubble" for about a minute to get a better picture of the usage.
If any process is using more than about 25 percent of the CPU cycles while the computer is idling, post the names of the processes and we can see if they can be eliminated. My MBP shows nothing using more that about 5 percent on any given test run as long as I close all my user apps.
3) If you have never done any sort of maintenance procedures, taht can slow you down. Simply restarting the computer a few times a week clear a lot of temporary files. You also may wish to review this article on the Mac OSX periodic maintenance scripts, which, if run, also do a lot of cleanup:
http://thexlab.com/faqs/maintscripts.html
There are other useful articles on file maintenance associated with the one. Here's the index:
http://thexlab.com/faqs/faqs.html
Check out articles with "Maintain" and "Tuning" in the titles.
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My videos from my iphone are horrible when I transfer them to my PC. How can I improve the video on my PC? Can I just convert the files to WMV? When the video plays the speed is off, it's half slow-motion and staggers into normal play. The clips are slightly cut as well, the clips do not roll continuously. I'm taling about videos that are no more than 2 minutes long. I'm frustrated and I could really use some advice-my kids basketball games is what I'm recording and I'm trying to send them to my family (they are not very tech savvy). Thanks

Not it's only function but one for which it was most admirably suited, which is why I really hope someone can find a work around. I am hoping my post to the Apple feedback may prompt a useful response from Apple and I live in hope that my post here will elicit a useful response from another user. I did not miss the the text at the top of the feedback form but you presumably missed my initial text, 'someone here can explain' or my subsequent 'work around from another user'
Just in case anyone reading this has a large collection of music videos, video podcasts or iTunes U then DO NOT upgrade your iPad to iOS 5. If you are considering purchasing the iPad as a useful mobile device to experience these media organised in your iTunes please don't as you will be wasting your money. (unless someone on this forum knows of a way to undo the mess created by those infallible folks at Apple)
Yes I know it does other things but the purpose I bought it for doesn't work anymore

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Check the Internet speed to confirm it is what it is supposed to be by going to www.speedtest.net
On the ATV, try Settings > General > Reset.
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How can I improve the speed my macbook pro is running at without upgrading hardware?

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