Is a Powerbook 1.67 Ghz supposed to be that slow?

[gusanitoverde]

I recently bought my Powerbook 17 inches 1.67 Ghz, at the Apple Store in The Grove. I am very happy with it. But I have noticed that it is kind of slow. In example, if I preview an iMovie, the image will “hesitate” for a split second couple of times, and the same is true for iTunes as I turn on the full screen visualizations, those will not display smoothly, but will eventually kind of “freeze” for a split second and then continue. Are Powerbooks really that slow? Yesterday, I finally was able to buy 1 GB RAM (Kingston). I installed it yesterday and now it has 1.5 GB of RAM. I was disappointed to see that the RAM was recognized by my laptop, but there is no visible improvement, the screen keeps on hesitating and freezing and takes the same time to open iPhoto libraries, etc… Is this an isolated problem? Or are all Powerbooks the same?

Thanks!

 

[plinkoman]

to answer your question, no, they're not that slow.

i have the same(depending on your hard drive) powerbook as you, and i have no troubles with it. it really is a lot faster then most people give it credit for.

the only thing i've experienced similar to what you described was when i was playing movies from a network drive, but a simple upgrade to a router with gigabit ports fixed that, but that wasn't the powerbooks fault. are you doing anything over networked drives?

 

[iCeQuBe]

I recently bought my Powerbook 17 inches 1.67 Ghz, at the Apple Store in The Grove. I am very happy with it. But I have noticed that it is kind of slow. In example, if I preview an iMovie, the image will “hesitate” for a split second couple of times, and the same is true for iTunes as I turn on the full screen visualizations, those will not display smoothly, but will eventually kind of “freeze” for a split second and then continue. Are Powerbooks really that slow? Yesterday, I finally was able to buy 1 GB RAM (Kingston). I installed it yesterday and now it has 1.5 GB of RAM. I was disappointed to see that the RAM was recognized by my laptop, but there is no visible improvement, the screen keeps on hesitating and freezing and takes the same time to open iPhoto libraries, etc… Is this an isolated problem? Or are all Powerbooks the same?

Thanks!

I have a 1.5 Ghz 12" PB and have not noticed any of the things with my PB you are experiencing and it is slower than yours. Maybe there is something wrong with your PB hardware wise. You could have someone at the Apple store check it out.

 

[Daedalus256]

This is really odd. My 1.33ghz 15" Pbook powers through a lot of these apps. Mine has a gig of RAM and a Radeon 9700 too. Very interesting. What do you mean by "split-second"? Are we talking like a couple seconds to load a program? I mean honestly you can't expect "HOLY CRAP IT LOADED BEFORE I CLCKED IT DEM APPLES IS GOOD!"

 

[Spectrum]

We have both a 1Ghz and a 1.25Ghz 17" iMac here at work. For some reason, the 1.25Ghz is constantly stalling for split second when displaying iTunes visualisations or the "flurry" screensaver. I have no idea why this is the case, but I suspect it is either a glitch in the hardware, or a software/firmware bug that needs repairing. It certainly isn't because it is underpowered, since the 1Ghz does it all just fine.

I suspect a similar issue could be plaguing your new PB. Try repairing permissions, zapping PRAM/resetting PMU, and installing software updates. Also check activity monitor to confirm that there is no rouge program eating up resources.

I recently bought my Powerbook 17 inches 1.67 Ghz, at the Apple Store in The Grove. I am very happy with it. But I have noticed that it is kind of slow. In example, if I preview an iMovie, the image will “hesitate” for a split second couple of times, and the same is true for iTunes as I turn on the full screen visualizations, those will not display smoothly, but will eventually kind of “freeze” for a split second and then continue. Are Powerbooks really that slow? Yesterday, I finally was able to buy 1 GB RAM (Kingston). I installed it yesterday and now it has 1.5 GB of RAM. I was disappointed to see that the RAM was recognized by my laptop, but there is no visible improvement, the screen keeps on hesitating and freezing and takes the same time to open iPhoto libraries, etc… Is this an isolated problem? Or are all Powerbooks the same?

Thanks!

 

[mklos]

You may want to reinstall Mac OS X. I've had a couple of Macs come with bad installations for OS X, but after reinstalling Mac OS X, everything runs fine. I know you may think its bad for Apple to ship computers with bad installations of OS X, but 1 or 2 out of hundreds Macs produced that day isn't bad.

 

[PeterKG]

I have had to go through three replacements for numerous flaws, until the fourth one seems to be great. The first three seemed to be very slow. They all had very noisy Toshiba or Hitachi hard drives. My latest one has a completely silent Seagate hard drive and the performance is fantastic. I'm thinking maybe the drives were defective.

 

[OutThere]

Make sure it is set to "Highest Performance" it usually comes set to "Normal" (Automatic Scaling) or "Better Energy Savings" (Reduced Performance), which is silly as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Eidorian]

Make sure it is set to "Highest Performance" it usually comes set to "Normal" (Automatic Scaling) or "Better Energy Savings" (Reduced Performance), which is silly as far as I'm concerned.

Can G4's do that? I've looked on my Power Mac G4 Quicksilver and a Mac Mini. I don't see those performance options for the CPU. I know there are for the Power Options on and off of AC power for the laptops.

My iMac G5 has those CPU performance options. Highest is space heater mode.

 

[OutThere]

Just snapped this on my Powerbook...I don't think it works the same way on G4s and G5s, but it's way slower at "Better Energy Savings":

 

[dmw007]

My iMac G5 has those CPU performance options. Highest is space heater mode.

Very true Eidorian, I can keep my room nice and warm by keeping both my iBook G4 and my Power Mac G5 on and set to highest performance while running folding@home.

 

[Eidorian]

Just snapped this on my Powerbook...I don't think it works the same way on G4s and G5s, but it's way slower at "Better Energy Savings":

Thanks for that clarification. I thought it was just power usage options.

 

[gusanitoverde]

However,

I have had to go through three replacements for numerous flaws, until the fourth one seems to be great. The first three seemed to be very slow. They all had very noisy Toshiba or Hitachi hard drives. My latest one has a completely silent Seagate hard drive and the performance is fantastic. I'm thinking maybe the drives were defective.

I have 4 months with my powerbook, do you think that they will exchange it?

 

[gusanitoverde]

I will try to do this...

Just snapped this on my Powerbook...I don't think it works the same way on G4s and G5s, but it's way slower at "Better Energy Savings":

I hope it works, I will monitor the PB and write my findings.

 

[bousozoku]

Make sure it is set to "Highest Performance" it usually comes set to "Normal" (Automatic Scaling) or "Better Energy Savings" (Reduced Performance), which is silly as far as I'm concerned.

That's the one thing that really bothered me. When it's plugged into the wall, why should it be on automatic and not highest?

I spent a few hours trying to find everything, thinking that the machine was defective. I'm really surprised by Apple's default choices sometimes. Between that and not having the firewall on by default, I think someone at Apple truly isn't thinking about their customers or their image.

 

[mrichmon]

That's the one thing that really bothered me. When it's plugged into the wall, why should it be on automatic and not highest?

I spent a few hours trying to find everything, thinking that the machine was defective. I'm really surprised by Apple's default choices sometimes. Between that and not having the firewall on by default, I think someone at Apple truly isn't thinking about their customers or their image.

When powered by the wall adapter you should be set to "highest performance". The reason being that "automatic" with some applications has the habit of speeding up the processor then slowing it down which can result in noticable pauses. Effectively what happens is that the energy settings code notices a lot of work for the CPU and starts running the CPU at high speed, after a brief time, there is not much work to be done so the CPU is switched to reduced speed, after a short time there is a lot of work again so this loops.

This explaination is not strictly accurate but is a reasonable way of thinking about things. If most of what you do is reading email and surfing the web then you are unlikely to notice any effects from having the energy settings set to "Automatic".

However, if like me you run processor intensive applications, then setting the energy settings to "Highest" when plugged into a power adapter and either "Highest" or "Lowest" when running off the battery depending on whether you care most about battery life or raw compute power. I personally find that on battery power I'm willing to live with the CPU running at the lowest speed rather than have noticable speed changes when set to "automatic".

 

[PeterKG]

When powered by the wall adapter you should be set to "highest performance". The reason being that "automatic" with some applications has the habit of speeding up the processor then slowing it down which can result in noticable pauses. Effectively what happens is that the energy settings code notices a lot of work for the CPU and starts running the CPU at high speed, after a brief time, there is not much work to be done so the CPU is switched to reduced speed, after a short time there is a lot of work again so this loops.

This explaination is not strictly accurate but is a reasonable way of thinking about things. If most of what you do is reading email and surfing the web then you are unlikely to notice any effects from having the energy settings set to "Automatic".

However, if like me you run processor intensive applications, then setting the energy settings to "Highest" when plugged into a power adapter and either "Highest" or "Lowest" when running off the battery depending on whether you care most about battery life or raw compute power. I personally find that on battery power I'm willing to live with the CPU running at the lowest speed rather than have noticable speed changes when set to "automatic".

On the new Powerbooks, there is no Highest Performance or Automatic. The choices are Better Performance, Normal, Better Energy Settings, Custom.

 

[PeterKG]

I have 4 months with my powerbook, do you think that they will exchange it?

I returned all three of mine within the 14 day return period.

 

[runninmac]

I returned all three of mine within the 14 day return period.

And I belive if you bought it within the Holiday shopping season you have untill the January 8th I *belive* to return it. (im not sure if its for opened items or not)

 

[bousozoku]

When powered by the wall adapter you should be set to "highest performance". The reason being that "automatic" with some applications has the habit of speeding up the processor then slowing it down which can result in noticable pauses. Effectively what happens is that the energy settings code notices a lot of work for the CPU and starts running the CPU at high speed, after a brief time, there is not much work to be done so the CPU is switched to reduced speed, after a short time there is a lot of work again so this loops.

This explaination is not strictly accurate but is a reasonable way of thinking about things. If most of what you do is reading email and surfing the web then you are unlikely to notice any effects from having the energy settings set to "Automatic".

However, if like me you run processor intensive applications, then setting the energy settings to "Highest" when plugged into a power adapter and either "Highest" or "Lowest" when running off the battery depending on whether you care most about battery life or raw compute power. I personally find that on battery power I'm willing to live with the CPU running at the lowest speed rather than have noticable speed changes when set to "automatic".

Thanks, I figured it out hours after I got the machine. It just doesn't make sense that Apple ships it with those settings. Is battery life improved, running at automatic, when it's not running from the battery?

I have the thing set to automatic on battery power because Photoshop Elements is already slow and sloppy on highest though Photoshop 7 runs acceptably well. Of course, having 2 GB of RAM might help as well instead of 768 MB.

 

[gusanitoverde]

My Findings:

I did enable the processor for better and highest performance in system preferences, I also repaired permissions, did software update (which I am updated) and did an extensive hardware test with the original CD. Problem remains. Sitation persists. One more glitch. Once in a while the track pad is unresponsive. Specially, when I did the hardwarew test, it was a pain to point at anything! My powerbook remains the same.