8gb ram, 2TB HDD - WHY SO SLOW???

T

tufluf

macrumors newbie

Original poster

Apr 22, 2012

2

0

• Apr 22, 2012

• #1

Hey guys, Im new to this, usually i find my answer from a question someone else has already asked, but I have a 2009 20" iMac (2.66ghz).
It originally had 2gb of ram and a 320gb hard drive.
I upgraded to 8gb ram and it ran like a dream.
Yesterday I replaced my hard drive with a 2tb internal hard drive, and since then it's started running really slow...
Apps taking a long time to load, safari too, and general stuff like saving a file takes a lot of time to process.

I have repaired the disk using disk utility but it said it was all ok, i am currently defraging which I am hoping might help? I don't know much about this stuff, but is my computer too old to run such a big hard drive?? What else could it be?
I appreciate any help.

 

stridemat

Moderator

Staff member

Apr 2, 2008

11,381

899

UK

• Apr 22, 2012

• #2

Did you restore from a back up?

I would back up your files and then reinstall OS X and then copy your files back.

 

simsaladimbamba

Guest

Nov 28, 2010

22,670

31

located

• Apr 22, 2012

• #3

Performance Tips For Mac OS X

You can use the following applications to benchmark the speed of your HDD / SSD, to see, if it is the culprit:

• AJA System Test
• Blackmagic Disk Speed Test
• Xbench

 

1

141n5

macrumors member

Mar 11, 2012

48

0

Scotland

• Apr 22, 2012

• #4

I was having similar problems until I found a thread on checking the activity monitor where I found a dashboard client hogging CPU use.

Searched here and found steps on here and Apple on how to clear out the offending p.list file

Downloaded and ran an Onyx to clean to purge caches etc.

Rebooted with a PRAM reset

and it was like having a new machine.

Tips that worked for me...

 

T

tufluf

macrumors newbie

Original poster

Apr 22, 2012

2

0

• Apr 22, 2012

• #5

stridemat said:

Did you restore from a back up?

I would back up your files and then reinstall OS X and then copy your files back.

Click to expand...

I restored from time machine... Would it be better if I just reinstall osx and move files back from external hard drive?
Sorry, serious newbie..!

 

sparkie1984

macrumors 68030

Dec 20, 2009

2,909

2,227

a small village near London

• Apr 22, 2012

• #6

Is your new drive a "green" one if so I believe they run slower to be more efficient therefor may be slower in operation

 

Chundles

macrumors G5

Jul 4, 2005

12,037

493

• Apr 22, 2012

• #7

Reckon the drive's probably a dud.

 

R

robgendreau

macrumors 68040

Jul 13, 2008

3,472

340

• Apr 22, 2012

• #8

I generally find restoring to be less successful in your situation than installing a new system and then using setup assistant to migrate from your backup.

But check Activity Monitor and Console to see what's going on, and try starting up with a new user account. Those steps often identify a wonky application or process that's holding everything up.