Performance Degradtion on PowerBook G4-133 (1.2G RAM Tiger)

Question

It just runs slower, and slower until I finally have to reboot - Maybe Memory Leaks?
I have recently tried to breathe some new life into my somewhat neglected
PB-G4 133 by giving it an additional 1G of RAM, and a new 120G Hitachi HD.
I'm using Tiger since it came pre-installed on the Hitachi when I had that drive
installed, but previously the G4 had Panther. I also have Ubuntu Linux 8.05 installed on a external 250G FireLite. Ubuntu seems to run faster than Tiger,
but it runs hot and the fan goes full blast so I am a little worried about overheating and limit the uptime. This is a nice compact combination to take
on the road. The performance is OK when I first boot up, but as I fire up
more applications (iPhoto, LightRoom, Camino, Adium) the slower things get. Shutting down applications brings a marginal improvement in overall speed and responsiveness of the desktop. I have come into the Apple fold from the Linux world so I'm using tools like vm_stat, top, and iostat, whose cousins exist in linux, to track things down.
I also have an iBook G4 (1G RAM) which runs Open SUSE 10. This machine can run
for 6 months or more at a time with no performance degradation. My first generation MacBook (1G RAM and Tiger) runs faster than the PB, but it's just enough heavier that it usually gets left at home in favor or the smaller PowerBook.
I'm wondering if my PowerBook apps have some memory leaks that eat up the
free memory, never to be released ? Or maybe there is something that I'm overlooking?
Thanks in advance for reading this long post and for any ideas you folks may have.

Answer 1

Welcome back to Apple Discussions!
If this is a 15" or 17" Powerbook, it might need its clock battery replaced.
If this is a 12" Powerbook it might need its power manager reset.
If the clock battery has been replaced in the last 4 years, then its PRAM might need resetting.
Note, the overheating you might be experiencing while running Linux might be damaging some chips, and/or causing the Energy Saver settings to force the processor to go at a lower speed to keep the processor cool. In Mac OS X that's Apple menu -> System Preferences -> Energy Saver.
In Linux, I don't know what that would be, but pmset is the command used for it in Mac OS X's command line.
Camino and Adium depend on internet speeds. Try using OpenDNS for your DNS numbers. I find that's usually faster than using the internet service provider supplied DNSes. Changing the MTU in your network settings can also speed your internet, and toggling the IPv6 setting on/off may affect it as well.
If you are using numerous Dashboard widgets, some of them may not be compatible with your version of Mac OS X and those can slow internet speeds down too. iStat Pro has been known to have trouble with that too. If none of those appears to be at issue, are you seeing issues with these titles in WiFi hotspots, or just at home?
iPhoto has improved performance with each new release, and an oversized photo library can slow down earlier versions of iPhoto. I don't know how Lightroom works, but it may be the same issue.
Make sure your hard disk is not in excess of 85% full. This arbitrary number has been found to slow Mac OS X down.
If you still can't explain the slowdown, tell us when you've backed up your data at least twice, and tell us what you've tried so far?