Trying to speed up my Mac
I have an iMac with 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo. Lately, it has been booting up slowly and slowing down overall. I am wondering if it is safe to use Clean My Mac by McPaw?? There are quite a few positive comments in their reviews but also quite a few negative ones as well.
jacquelinefrommountain view wrote:
iMac with 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo.
Your machine qualifies for 10.6 Snow Leopard and can be upgraded to as far as 10.6.8 (but no 10.7 Lion)
Snow Leopard offers video card driver speed improvments over 10.5.8
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC573Z/A
Apple has cut support for 10.5 users, treating you like red headeded stepchildren for necessary security updates for root certificates.
My advice is you get a local Mac geek service to go over your machine, max your RAM, install a new 7,200 RPM hard drive, install 10.6.8 fresh and all your programs from fresh sources and files from backup.
Your machine will act like new.
Should run about a few hundred dollars, a lot less than a new iMac.
(note: very new iMac's the hard drives are NOT user replaceable as there is properietary software installed)
Keep your boot drive below 50% full ideally, but not more that 75% for best performance, more RAM and a faster RPM drive will also make your computer act faster.
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16276201#16276201
Similar Messages
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Is there a way to speed up a Mac (similar to de-fragging on a PC)? Mine has gotten slower and slower over time.
When memory/disc comes close to full would that have an effect on performance? How should I determine what programs/software to remove and free space?Things You Can Do To Resolve Slow Downs
If your computer seems to be running slower here are some things you can do:
Start with visits to: OS X Maintenance - MacAttorney;
The X Lab: The X-FAQs;
The Safe Mac » Mac Performance Guide;
The Safe Mac » The myth of the dirty Mac;
Mac maintenance Quick Assist.
Boot into Safe Mode then repair your hard drive and permissions:
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions Pre-Lion
Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
Repair the Hard Drive - Lion/Mountain Lion/Mavericks
Boot to the Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the Utilites Menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD disk icon and click on the arrow button below.
When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported, then click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu. Select Restart from the Apple menu.
Restart your computer normally and see if this has helped any. Next do some maintenance:
For situations Disk Utility cannot handle the best third-party utility is Disk Warrior; DW only fixes problems with the disk directory, but most disk problems are caused by directory corruption; Disk Warrior 4.x is now Intel Mac compatible.
Note: Alsoft ships DW on a bootable DVD that will startup Macs running Snow Leopard or earlier. It cannot start Macs that came with Lion or later pre-installed, however, DW will work on those models.
Suggestions for OS X Maintenance
OS X performs certain maintenance functions that are scheduled to occur on a daily, weekly, or monthly period. The maintenance scripts run in the early AM only if the computer is turned on 24/7 (no sleep.) If this isn't the case, then an excellent solution is to download and install a shareware utility such as Macaroni, JAW PseudoAnacron, or Anacron that will automate the maintenance activity regardless of whether the computer is turned off or asleep. Dependence upon third-party utilities to run the periodic maintenance scripts was significantly reduced since Tiger. These utilities have limited or no functionality with Snow Leopard or later and should not be installed.
OS X automatically defragments files less than 20 MBs in size, so unless you have a disk full of very large files there's little need for defragmenting the hard drive.
Helpful Links Regarding Malware Protection
An excellent link to read is Tom Reed's Mac Malware Guide.
Also, visit The XLab FAQs and read Detecting and avoiding malware and spyware.
See these Apple articles:
Mac OS X Snow Leopard and malware detection
OS X Lion- Protect your Mac from malware
OS X Mountain Lion- Protect your Mac from malware
About file quarantine in OS X
If you require anti-virus protection I recommend using VirusBarrier Express 1.1.6 or Dr.Web Light both from the App Store. They're both free, and since they're from the App Store, they won't destabilize the system. (Thank you to Thomas Reed for these recommendations.)
Troubleshooting Applications
I recommend downloading a utility such as TinkerTool System, OnyX, Mavericks Cache Cleaner, or Cocktail that you can use for removing old log files and archives, clearing caches, etc. Corrupted cache, log, or temporary files can cause application or OS X crashes as well as kernel panics.
If you have Snow Leopard or Leopard, then for similar repairs install the freeware utility Applejack. If you cannot start up in OS X, you may be able to start in single-user mode from which you can run Applejack to do a whole set of repair and maintenance routines from the command line. Note that AppleJack 1.5 is required for Leopard. AppleJack 1.6 is compatible with Snow Leopard. Applejack does not work with Lion and later.
Basic Backup
For some people Time Machine will be more than adequate. Time Machine is part of OS X. There are two components:
1. A Time Machine preferences panel as part of System Preferences;
2. A Time Machine application located in the Applications folder. It is
used to manage backups and to restore backups. Time Machine
requires a backup drive that is at least twice the capacity of the
drive being backed up.
Alternatively, get an external drive at least equal in size to the internal hard drive and make (and maintain) a bootable clone/backup. You can make a bootable clone using the Restore option of Disk Utility. You can also make and maintain clones with good backup software. My personal recommendations are (order is not significant):
1. Carbon Copy Cloner
2. Get Backup
3. Deja Vu
4. SuperDuper!
5. Synk Pro
6. Tri-Backup
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files. For help with using Time Machine visit Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help with all things Time Machine.
Referenced software can be found at MacUpdate.
Additional Hints
Be sure you have an adequate amount of RAM installed for the number of applications you run concurrently. Be sure you leave a minimum of 10% of the hard drive's capacity as free space.
Add more RAM. If your computer has less than 2 GBs of RAM and you are using OS X Leopard or later, then you can do with more RAM. Snow Leopard and Lion work much better with 4 GBs of RAM than their system minimums. The more concurrent applications you tend to use the more RAM you should have.
Always maintain at least 15 GBs or 10% of your hard drive's capacity as free space, whichever is greater. OS X is frequently accessing your hard drive, so providing adequate free space will keep things from slowing down.
Check for applications that may be hogging the CPU:
Pre-Mavericks
Open Activity Monitor in the Utilities folder. Select All Processes from the Processes dropdown menu. Click twice on the CPU% column header to display in descending order. If you find a process using a large amount of CPU time (>=70,) then select the process and click on the Quit icon in the toolbar. Click on the Force Quit button to kill the process. See if that helps. Be sure to note the name of the runaway process so you can track down the cause of the problem.
Mavericks and later
Open Activity Monitor in the Utilities folder. Select All Processes from the View menu. Click on the CPU tab in the toolbar. Click twice on the CPU% column header to display in descending order. If you find a process using a large amount of CPU time (>=70,) then select the process and click on the Quit icon in the toolbar. Click on the Force Quit button to kill the process. See if that helps. Be sure to note the name of the runaway process so you can track down the cause of the problem.
Often this problem occurs because of a corrupted cache or preferences file or an attempt to write to a corrupted log file. -
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This worked amazingly!! Thanks for the post awvik360!
I was able to access the internal hard drive and perform a permissions fix through disk utility and re-apply the OS X 10.5.6 combo update on a totally debilitated machine (Mac Pro early 08).
Some clarification though:
{{ I used a MacBook Pro instead of USB/ExternalHD to run a working copy of OS X. }}
~ Just start up the healthy OS X (laptop) in target disk mode (hold 't' key while it powers up)
~ Connect it to the impaired Mac with the highest speed cable available (fire800>fire400>USB)
~ Start up the impaired Mac while holding the alt/option key to select the boot drive.
~ Select the connected OS X (laptop hard disk) and start er up.
~ Run disk utility and you can now use the Fix Permissions option on the impaired Mac's internal hard drive.
~ Run the OS X Combo Update (or presumably other offending update/program) and make sure to change the destination to the internal disk of the impaired Mac
~ Shut down, unplug target disk, start up, and you should be good to go.
I was in some kind of uber-kernel panic and could not start up in safe mode OR from the installation disc, and this worked! Definitely a good emergency procedure to have in your back pocket.
Note: ...target disk pairing must be in this direction. I tried setting up the impaired Mac as target and connecting it to running laptop, and it let me run the install fine, but it didn't fix the problem...must be something with permissions that the impaired Mac needs to install to itself, even if the OS is running on another disk/machine.
-T. -
Hello All
Simple question !
Why the Download Speed on A mac slower than on A PC ? Or on OS X Than Windows
Many Users have this problem ..
I looked every where i tried every single method and suggestions
Changing DNS
Updating my router software AND SO ON
Nothing help !!
What is really confusing me is
I have windows operating system running on my mac "Vmware"
My internet concoction speed 4mb
when i download file on windows i get the full download speed 480 to 512
when i switch back to my mac i get maximum 350 !!
It's the same machine ?? Why !!
Thank you
Message was edited by: Rayan AlbaderUSB speed is limited to the speed of all the connected devices on the same bus. The bus is the portion of the computer's data traffic cop that connects several USB devices at once. Go to Apple menu -> About This Mac -> More Info to determine if there are any slower items connected to the same bus. Some USB ports may connect to a different bus under the USB section. If you want to see which bus a device has moved to after physically moving it, select Refresh from the View menu. Additionally some USB non-Apple devices may trip up if you put your machine to sleep either but closing the lid, or manually from the Apple menu, or automatically through the timer in the Energy Saver System Preferences. Some of these connection devices have latency issues. This means, they need a place to store their downloads before they come onto your computer. It may be their driver on the PC has settings to store something on the machine directly. Make sure your Mac isn't too full*:
http://www.macmaps.com/diskfull.html
- * Links to my pages may give me compensation. -
What is the best and easiest way to speed up a Mac-MINI?
What is the best and easiest way to speed up a Mac Mini without adding memory?
I'd tried to reply yesterday to your question but for some reason it didn't go anywhere and I got a red message box in the Discussion post area with "error." After trying three times, including log-out, clear cookies from browser (and history) and back in, I still was unable to add my post with links to resources for your Mini, here. And the last time I tried that, the copied text also went missing as I found it gone after considering to make a Text document of it, for later posting.
Anyway, the http://iFixit.com site has guides on how to replace RAM in the computer you have. Note there are different models shown and from what I remember, yours is the last 'old look' Mini with an optical drive. The model after that is thin, a 2010 model with slot in front for discs; the next one has no internal optical drive.
RAM specs: 2 - 204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM (replace pair) up to 8GB total. Best price would be an online vendor of repute, once you know about what they sell for, you could ask a local mac expert if they could get you a better than retail price. I get ram from OEMPCworld and shipping is about $1. including insurance to my post office box, priority or 1st class. At about half retail. Crucial (website) offers parts, too; and so does OWC (other world computing).
In addition, I recommended checking into the build specs and quality of the OWC (esales) site for external enclosures with their own power supply, for hard disk drive; for storage and bootable clones on different partitions. And see about Bombiche Carbon copy cloner, it is a commercial product now, not donationware. I've used it successfully to make competely bootable clones on a suitable external HDD (drive should have own power supply, too) A 750GB HDD in a self-powered enclosure that can boot Mac OS X from a clone, is a good start on backing up your upgraded OSX in a way you can clone it back into an empty, wiped or new HDD inside the computer; and it can run from the external. You can't necessarily use a TimeMachine that way.
This should be your Mini -- check other indicators to be sure:
http://www.ifixit.com/Device/Mac_Mini_Model_A1283
A serial number lookup site such as the one I end up using because I had it bookmarked is OK: http://www.powerbookmedic.com/identify-mac-serial.php & also have mactracker http://mactracker.ca
Anyway, before I time out or exceed post content(?) This is not all I meant to write before.
Good luck & happy computing! -
I am unable to burn mp3 audio files to cd.Every time it says failed due to media write error.I have tried different speeds.Can anyone help pls?
There are several different incompatible media sold as writeable CDs. You MUST match the media to the abilities of your drive.
I was flummoxed by buying 8x media when my drive was a 2x drive. I needed the other type, and there was nothing helpful in the diagnostics or the packaging that helped me understand that.
EDIT: There is an interesting helpful feature buried in System Profiler ... (read the last two lines of the report):
About this Mac > ( More Info ) > Report > Disc burning -
I am trying to remove Office for Mac from my Macbook Air. I've deleted the files and moved to Trash, but can not empty Trash. This message continues to display when I attempt to empty Trash and thereby delete all Microsoft plist files...
You can't delete Office simply by throwing the app in the trash.
Here are the instructions for removing it, follow them exactly. -
I have tried to connect the new mac to an existing time capsule both directly through ethernet and through wifi. Both times I get Internet connection OK but Airport Utility is stuck searching for the base station. I have two existing macs which are connected fine and have both been backing up quite happily. The first two macs are the same user (me) and the new one is for a different user in the house. All the macs are running Mavericks.
I have tried rebooting the time capsule and the new mac - didn't help.
Any information as to what I can try would be most welcome.
Many thanksHi All
I have solved my problem! It was the old chestnut the firewall issue. We have McAfee firewalls on our machines and the wifi network was set up as a public rather than a home network. I changed it to Home or Work and het presto the time capsule appeared. I didn't have this problem with the other machines at all.
I hope this helps someone!! -
Something keeps trying to download on my mac and I don't know what it is. It is not in the apple store and just comes out nowhere and request for my password to download something and I don't know what it is. How to make this stop? It pops up every single day.
Erica,
I can, with 99.99% certainty, tell you that you are absolutely right in not wanting to download or install this "Helper," whatever it is (but we can be equally certain it would not "help" anything).
I cannot comment as to Oglethorpe's recommendation of 'adwaremedic'; I am unfamiliar with it. His links to the Apple discussion and support pages warrant your time and attention.
It might be really simple -- Trying looking in your Downloads folder, trash anything that you don't know with certainty is something you want to keep, and then Secure Empty your Trash. Then remove the AdBlock extension, LastPass, and Web of Trust extensions to Safari and re-boot. If the issue goes away, still be extraordinarily careful in the future.
Unfortunately, it's probably not going to be that simple to get rid of, in which case I'd then try the line by line editing in HT203987.
I have no further suggestions (other than a complete wipe and re-install...but that's a pain because trying to restore from Time Machine would simply ... restore the Mal).
For the rest of us, please post when you find a solution.
Best.
BPW
(Also, try to edit your second post -- black out your last name on the screenshot and re-post it for others) -
hi guys i have 2 ? 1 my daughters iphone is trying to update on my mac cant get it off help please ,,, 2 i have an old apple id and when i try to up date it keeps looking for the password how do i delete this old apple id help
Hi.
I had a similar problem myself. This is what helped me.
I went to the App store app, scrolled to the bottom, logged out of the account, re logged in with my Apple ID. Then went back to app updates. Once I put in my ID password all was fine. -
I am trying to log onto a Mac Mini I haven't used in awhile and I forgot the password. I am trying to reset the password with my apple ID but the computer keeps saying the Apple ID and the password are incorrect whenever I know they are, as I am using the exact same ID right now.
I have switched my password in the past, so my theory is my mac mini thinks that my password has not changed and it will not update because The Wi-Fi password has also changed so it cannot connect to any servers...Does that sound like I am on the right track?
Is there a way to update my Wi-Fi password (saved into the computer) without logging on?If the user account is associated with an Apple ID, and you know the Apple ID password, then maybe the Apple ID can be used to reset your user account password.
Otherwise, boot into Recovery by holding down the key combination command-R at startup. Release the keys when you see a gray screen with a spinning dial.
When the OS X Utilities screen appears, select
Utilities ▹ Terminal
from the menu bar.
In the Terminal window, type this:
resetpassword
That's one word with no spaces. Then press return. A Reset Password window opens.
Select your boot volume if not already selected.
Select your username from the menu labeled Select the user account if not already selected.
Follow the prompts to reset the password. It's safest to choose a password that includes only the characters a-z, A-Z, and 0-9.
Select
▹ Restart
from the menu bar.
You should now be able to log in with the new password, but your Keychain will be reset (empty.) If you've forgotten the Keychain password (which is ordinarily the same as your login password), there's no way to recover it. -
My desktop IMac OSX 10.6.8 : IMovie '11: Trying to upload a home movie clip from my Panosonic camera model PV-DV203D. I've had this camera several years, and used it with Windows desktop. Now trying to work with my Mac. I have a USB cable, both ends fit, but iMovie '11 does not recognize it. Is there a driver fix for this?
What kind of Mac to you have? This camera is a tape based DV one that connects best with firewire and I cannot tell if your Mac has firewire. If your mac *does* have firewire, get a camcorder firewire cable and try again.
ETA: Oops, I am pretty sure that all the "desktop iMacs" have firewire, so you should be good to go. You will probably need a cord that goes from FW800 to your camcorder. -
My iphone wont connect to itunes on my macbook after I have already synced it. I am running the lastest itunes 10.4 and I have tried restarting both phone and mac. Can anyone suggest what I can do?
You will have to put your phone into recovery mode and restore the phone as new. Since you don't have a back up, you will lose all the data on your phone but you will be able to use it again.
Use this article iOS: Forgotten passcode or device disabled after entering wrong passcode
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1212?viewlocale=en_US
Good luck! -
I am trying to decide on which Mac laptop I should get
I am trying to decide on which Mac laptop I should get
nobody can tell you without knowing your parameters of usage
If mostly photo and video editing (or a lot of same), then get a higher end pro.
If casual typical use, the Air is a powerhouse of which many are fooled by its slim size thinking it cannot do much, when in fact its a full powered notebook that amazes most people first time in use.
recommend 8GB min. RAM on either model. -
priority:
I am trying to facetime on my mac but keep getting the message "The server encountered an error processing registration. Please try again later." I have gotten this multiple times. how can I get around this?
i also have tried downloading "FaceTap" application to get facetime on my ipad and failed too. i thought i failed because i couldnt download latest 6.0 iOS or later. i downloaded latest software update for iOS but was 5.8 I thinkWait until Apple fix it. See: http://www.apple.com/support/icloud/systemstatus/
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