OS X super slow at start up

[CDailey]

Okay, first of all, I'm posting this from an IBM laptop with WIndows XP because it has taken over 6 minutes (timed with a stop watch) for my Mac Book Pro to start up. It took 4 minutes and 53 seconds alone before the Apple logo showed up on the grey screen. I'm running OS 10.4.8 on a 2.16ghz Core Duo Mac Book Pro with 1 GB of ram and a 100GB hard drive with 30GB currently free. The only thing I can think of that could cause a prolonged start up would be the "lack" of space on the hard drive, but even with 30GB free, theres no way it should take over 6 minutes for the computer to boot the desktop. OSX has generally been kinda sluggish during normal operation as well. Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm a Mac noob, so have I done something wrong here that I don't know about?

 

[killmoms]

With those kinds of specs you DEFINITELY shouldn't be having a problem like this, so I'm going to assume something is wrong hardware-wise. Have you run the Apple Hardware Test on the DVD that comes with your MBP? Pop in that DVD, restart and hold the Option key, then you should be able to choose the Apple Hardware Test. Run that and see if anything comes up as being problematic.

I'd imagine there's something wrong with the hard drive that's requiring it to read the same stuff over and over due to errors or something. A computer like that should not take 6 minutes to boot.

 

[plinden]

Try some of the things I suggested earlier today in another post - https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=3287963#post3287963

(I can't be bothered typing them in again)

Edit: Actually if it's on booting, you'd be interested only in "repair disk" from Disk Utility, and the Hardware Test.

 

[miniConvert]

Yeah, use the OS X CD to verify the disk (and repair if needed) and run a hardware test. Sounds very unusual. If you haven't already, try removing login items also just to be sure.

 

[CDailey]

Thank you for the help guys. I did the verify disk and it said that it needed to be repaired so I stuck the Tiger DVD in, restarted and ran the disk repair and now it's back to normal! Can someone explain how a disk gets to the state to where it needs to be repaired? Is it similar to how a Windows disk gets fragmented?

 

[bousozoku]

Thank you for the help guys. I did the verify disk and it said that it needed to be repaired so I stuck the Tiger DVD in, restarted and ran the disk repair and now it's back to normal! Can someone explain how a disk gets to the state to where it needs to be repaired? Is it similar to how a Windows disk gets fragmented?

It's got nothing to do with fragmentation, but it's similar to Windows where you boot and the disk checking utility starts running. The equivalent to Disk Utility runs every time you boot Mac OS X but it apparently wasn't able to fix it because the pieces in need of repair were already in use.

 

[CDailey]

Oh, ok. Gotcha

 

[steelfist]

repartition and reinstall. works for windows and osx, only last resort though. but all the junk will be gone, and software wise, it's brand new. if the same problem persists, your hardware is getting old and bad.

 

[CDailey]

Hmm...well I found out something interesting tonight. With my external hard drive plugged in, the system was hanging like before when starting up. As soon as I unplugged it, the Apple logo showed up, and then OSX started loading. How could my external drive cause this?

 

[bousozoku]

Hmm...well I found out something interesting tonight. With my external hard drive plugged in, the system was hanging like before when starting up. As soon as I unplugged it, the Apple logo showed up, and then OSX started loading. How could my external drive cause this?

Pathetic USB interface, perhaps?

Actually, I've had my external drive connected at times through a PC Card interface and the whole system would wait for the drive at times. Then again, my USB flash memory (key) drive does the same thing. I suspect it's a problem with Mac OS X 10.4.8. The boot times haven't changed, though.

 

[CDailey]

Why would it just all of a sudden start doing it though? I also think the drive is dieing too. It recently started to make a clicking noise whenever I turn it on, and from what I recall (I've only had one drive ever die on me) that is definitely not a good thing. I really hope it's not 100% dead yet and theres still some life left in it. At least enough for me to be able to transfer all the data to a new external drive...

 

[bousozoku]

Why would it just all of a sudden start doing it though? I also think the drive is dieing too. It recently started to make a clicking noise whenever I turn it on, and from what I recall (I've only had one drive ever die on me) that is definitely not a good thing. I really hope it's not 100% dead yet and theres still some life left in it. At least enough for me to be able to transfer all the data to a new external drive...

It's Floriduh. Everything dies early here because of the humidity and the vicinity to the Bermuda Triangle. Well, okay, maybe the Bermuda Triangle doesn't affect it.

 

[CDailey]

Haha. Do you think it sounds like my hdd is dieing? That would make me just a little bit angry. At least I can take comfort in buying a 500GB WDMybook for $130.

 

[bousozoku]

Haha. Do you think it sounds like my hdd is dieing? That would make me just a little bit angry. At least I can take comfort in buying a 500GB WDMybook for $130.

The clicking usually signals that the drive is dying. It could be a fan hitting something, but they generally don't have a metallic sound.

I swear that I've gone through a lot of drives since living here vs. up north. Of course, it could be that most of them were lower cost, UltraATA drives instead of the SCSI drives I used to use in other machines. The SCSI drive I bought in 1990 is still running just fine.