software woes

[Tommy!]

hey everyone
I've had my PRECIOUS 12" pb revision A for over a year now and I couldn't be happier... But lately it's been giving me **** and I don't know if I should just do a clean install / wipe out the system.

The first thing is, the Finder has been acting very odd... If I do anything in it, soon after i hear my fan going off like crazy, and the activity monitor says its using ~90% of the CPU. But it says this minutes after I have done anything, when the finder is inactive--i restart the finder and it goes back to using 0% CPU.

Another thing is ichat... if I talk to anyone, it adds them as a buddy automatically... Also, If I add anyone as a buddy myself, it doesn't let me talk to him/her--I have to log off and then log back on to talk to this person.

Also, iPhoto. If I am flipping through photos, iPhoto partially freezes. I can go back to organize view, but can't look at any more photos full-size...

So what is up here? I was thinking of doing a clean install but don't know if that would fix everything ok. Also, i don't want to wipe everything out unless its realllllllly necessary. Thanks so much guys!!!

tommy

[HexMonkey]

As a first step try repairing permissions (Applications/Utilites/Disk Utility) if you haven't already.

If that doesn't fix things, then there may be a corrupt file in your user's Library. Create a new user (System Preferences/Accounts) and see if the problems occur there.

If they don't, then the source of the problem will be in your user's Library folder. In this case, you can either a) Use the new user primarily instead of the old one, or b) Use trial and error to find the corrupt file(s) in the Library folder of your old user, by temporarily moving things in and out of it until it fixes the problems. The most likely source of the problems is in Home/Library/Preferences.

[varmit]

putting on a clean install would be a good way to do your spring cleaning of you Mac. I'll be doing it myself soon too, to get rid of all my school work that I don't need and didn't save. These problems probably will be solved with a fresh install, so save everything you want, boot from the cd, format the drive, and put a fresh install on there.

If the problems persist, take it to an Apple store because it would mean its a hardware problem, they can make sure everything is seated right on the logic board.

[Koodauw]

I'll second a fresh install, if repairing permissions doesn't work. You could try re-installing iChat, using Pacifist, and the install CD, but its a bit of a chore. I like to do a clean install from time to time. It's like getting a new computer to me.

Although some will say it is the easy wayout...not searching hard and solving the problems, but it is the quickest. Good luck.

[Horrortaxi]

I'd go with the new user. I strongly doubt that any of your problems are system wide. Take 1 minute, create a new user, and see if you have the same problems there. If not, copy your documents, etc over to the new account (don't copy the library file because that's most likely where your problems are). It will be much quicker and accomplish the same thing.