Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Am I the only one experiencing Snow Leopard constantly becoming slower and slower?

R

Ramius

macrumors 6502
Original poster
I was an early adaptor of Snow Leopard, and it was everything you wanted. Fast, effecient and all the hot stuff.

But through all the software updates, I´ve experienced that the OS has become gradually slower and slower.

Programs takes longer to load, Safari crashes ALOT more than before. Running several programs takes alot more effort for the machine. Even the startup takes longer!

I find this strange, as I have no viruses, and have used the Macbook (2008) quite in a mature way. I have 50gb free space on the hard drive. I make sure to delete programs and files not in use. I have almost no icons on the desktop, I´ve run disk repairs, clean ups and all that hardware healthcare you can mention.

Is it time for a hard disc formatting? I´ve never done in on Mac, and don´t see the need either, because I really can´t find a logical reason for the slowness. Other than Apple may be ****ing up the OS with their updates, to make customers feel that suddenly their machine is slow, and could use an upgrade (Lion this time), which is praised as faster and more effecient than its predecessor every time.
 
I don't really have any suggestions for you on speeding it up, if it were me I would format and do a fresh install.

I can tell you that I have two installs of SL, both are running just as fast as the day they were installed.
 
My installation is solid. I'm not seeing any performance or stability issues with SL. Not sure what to recommend.
 
Have you all updated consistently, keeping fresh with the latest software and firmware updates?

And what machines are you using? I´m using the very first Macbook unibody.
 
Rock solid for me. I suggest doing some maintenance (clear out caches, repair permissions, run cron scripts etc) or reformat.
 
Ramius said:
Have you all updated consistently, keeping fresh with the latest software and firmware updates?

And what machines are you using? I´m using the very first Macbook unibody.
Click to expand...

Yup, I keep my macs (2 macs + 1 hackintosh) updated and current.
 
Ramius said:
Have you all updated consistently, keeping fresh with the latest software and firmware updates?

And what machines are you using? I´m using the very first Macbook unibody.
Click to expand...

I've got the hardware, no problems here. Is your HDD near full? My wife had a similar problem because her Trash and Downloads folder were taking up about 40GB.😱
 
No.
Like I said, I do manage the machine properly, by having lots of free space, clearing trash cans, caches, condoms, downloads and all that stuff.

Are you all saying that Snow Leopard after a years usage, is still as fast as it was brand new?

Does programs start up as quickly as before?

Most noticeable is much safari crashes. When I´m on chatroulette, I can almost see a crash occuring, before it happens. The whole speed and effeciency of the operating system gives away all kinds of tells.
 
On my wife's Mini, we couldn't watch a youtube video without stuttering. I force quit firefox and we could watch it in safari in flash just fine. If you are experiencing performance issues, launch activity monitor and see who is running away with your cpu. In my case it was firefox which is getting replaced with chrome on all our machines going forward. I won't use safari. Would you believe that every time I open preferences and check the status of "open safe files after download" and the damn thing is checked again no matter how many times I've unchecked it?

I prefer not to run any browser that think it's some sort of "trusted" part of the OS kernel. 🙄 It's troubling that (some of) the biggest security holes on the two major desktop OS's these days are exploits of the browsers written by the companies that wrote the OS. For now I prefer not to run Safari for some of the same reasons I prefer not to run IE.
 
That was my thoughts too, so I only use Safari. Therefor, firefox is not my problem.

Several times a day now, especially after startup, I experience writing something... either in the adressbar of Safari, in a message window in Adium, or in a typing program like Word. WHERE EVER you can write - and it lags.

I write it, and then it doesnt appear on the screen before five seconds later.
 
I'd suggest downloading a utility app called "Grand Perspective".

GP will present you with a graphic representation of all the files on your hard drive, grouped by size.

It _might_ be that you have an ENORMOUS-sized prefs file or log(s) that is both eating up disk space and slowing things down. With GP you can identify the file, and trash it.

Also, might be worth turning off and/or trashing any Safari "additions" you may be using (if you are using any).
 
Fishrrman said:
I'd suggest downloading a utility app called "Grand Perspective".

GP will present you with a graphic representation of all the files on your hard drive, grouped by size.

It _might_ be that you have an ENORMOUS-sized prefs file or log(s) that is both eating up disk space and slowing things down. With GP you can identify the file, and trash it.

Also, might be worth turning off and/or trashing any Safari "additions" you may be using (if you are using any).
Click to expand...

Yeah I have a few safari add ons, but nobody told me they would slow the internet down.

Like when I´m on Break for instance, ALL the videos start laggy. So I have to pause it, which happens five seconds after I hit the pause button, and then play it back from the start. Almost 50% of the times I´m watching videos.

Is that because flash sucks, or safari sucks?
 
Ramius said:
Yeah I have a few safari add ons, but nobody told me they would slow the internet down.

Like when I´m on Break for instance, ALL the videos start laggy. So I have to pause it, which happens five seconds after I hit the pause button, and then play it back from the start. Almost 50% of the times I´m watching videos.

Is that because flash sucks, or safari sucks?
Click to expand...
Yes, some add-ons can and will slow down your browsing experience.

As for video starting laggy? If these are streamed, it could depend on the internet connection. ALso, on break from what?

And well flash sucks, but it may not be your problem.

You should however clear browser, flash and other appropriate caches and see what happens. And as other suggest, see what else your computer is doing. For instance, is Mail checking for mail when you start these videos on break.

And how much ram do you have in your computer? Is it enough for what you are running? Is Flash at the latest version?
 
Bear said:
Yes, some add-ons can and will slow down your browsing experience.

As for video starting laggy? If these are streamed, it could depend on the internet connection. ALso, on break from what?

And well flash sucks, but it may not be your problem.

You should however clear browser, flash and other appropriate caches and see what happens. And as other suggest, see what else your computer is doing. For instance, is Mail checking for mail when you start these videos on break.

And how much ram do you have in your computer? Is it enough for what you are running? Is Flash at the latest version?
Click to expand...

Yes, everything is updated, safaris cache is cleared regurarly, not too many programs run simultanously.

I have the default ammount of ram that came with the Macbook, which is 2gb.

I was referring to Break.com

Out of all my addons in safari, only one is active, which is AdBlock. And in theory, that should make internet even faster! Because it´s clearing out all the annoying spam from websites.
 
I'd have to agree that I've noticed this too on my 17" iMac (2007) 1.83 GHz C2D. With 2GB RAM and 160 GB HDD. This machine is painfully slow now. Beach balls everywhere. Especially since daughter started making videos with iMovie. Although, I realize this machine has a low-end graphics card and that will contribute to the slowdown.

I think part of my problem is 3 user accounts and with several apps running in each account things really slow to a crawl. Typical snapshot of running apps:

Wife Acct:

Safari (multiple tabs open)
Mail
iCal
iTunes

Daughter

Safari
iMovie

Son

Safari
iTunes

This is usually the current state of the computer at any given time. It's kind of a pain to close all your apps so that when the kids go over to their acct to play games on the web, the machine can handle it. Plug in an iPod and forget about it. Takes a minute for iPhoto and iTunes to launch after connecting the iPod. 😡

Bottom line: I'm gonna do a fresh install of SL and stick to one family account and see if that brings back the snappiness of SL. SL is a great, stable OS, but as with any OS your machine has to have the specs to be able to use it as you want.
 
Ramius said:
Yes, everything is updated, safaris cache is cleared regurarly, not too many programs run simultanously.

I have the default ammount of ram that came with the Macbook, which is 2gb.

I was referring to Break.com

Out of all my addons in safari, only one is active, which is AdBlock. And in theory, that should make internet even faster! Because it´s clearing out all the annoying spam from websites.
Click to expand...

If I were you, I would spend $100 and get some more RAM if you plan to continue using the machine. My 8GB Kingston RAM has been kind to me.
 
Three years is nearing the end of a hard disk's useful life. Go get a WD Scorpio Black, jam it in, and restore from backup. It'll be like a new machine for less than a hundred bucks.
 
I don´t think that sounds economically feasable. The machine still works, and I´m not gonna spend hundreds of dollars on hardware upgrading. Hell, that´s why I bought a Mac in the first place. So it could "just work".

But I do suspect that as they continously update the OS, they are programming it in such a way, with newer types of code, and more processes, that it actually requires more and more computing power for each year. They don´t tell us this of course. But it is very logical if you think deeply about it. Some of you are probably gonna call this an accusation of conspiracy, which it isn´t. It´s simply the way things evolve in technology, also behind the scenes.
 
Ramius said:
That was my thoughts too, so I only use Safari. Therefor, firefox is not my problem.

Several times a day now, especially after startup, I experience writing something... either in the adressbar of Safari, in a message window in Adium, or in a typing program like Word. WHERE EVER you can write - and it lags.

I write it, and then it doesnt appear on the screen before five seconds later.
Click to expand...

This has been happening to me a lot as of late - though on Leopard. It's driving me gradually insane. Reinstalled, wiped the HD - and it's still not as snappy as I'm used to, stuffed in a new HD - same story. Now questioning if it's something to do with failing or degrading hardware elsewhere in my iMac. Also happening on my work PC, too for the past 2 weeks - and I question if I've got a tumor forming in my skull - many of the computers I'm working with are getting slower with their UIs.

Maybe I'm just extra sensitive to user interface latency? Just last week a racing game I played a while back on PS3 got fired up for the first time in a long while. Thought I had "lost my touch" as my lap times were utter crap, constantly banging off of walls ect... Shut off the surround sound, reduced the display output from 1080p to 720p under the logic that it would reduce taxing on the hardware and might speed things up a bit... Was really starting to question my state of mind until I fired it back up with the new settings - and dropped lap times 0.2 seconds within my personal best from years ago.

Finally - you cleared Condoms out of Snow Leopard? That raises a lot of questions - beyond programming lingo - do I need to socialize myself again to catch on new terminology? 😱
 
sjinsjca said:
Three years is nearing the end of a hard disk's useful life. Go get a WD Scorpio Black, jam it in, and restore from backup. It'll be like a new machine for less than a hundred bucks.
Click to expand...

Yep. Mine just went and slow performance was how it started.
 
If this has to do with hardware decaying, I find it very ironical. Because mr Steve Jobs replied to a journalist a few years ago, during a question and answers section, that Apple used only hardware made from high quality materials. Which drove their prices up.
 
This probably has nothing to do with it, but how often do you restart you Mac? Does it run for a week without a restart? My impression is that memory leaks, will cause the kind of slow down your talking about. I've got an old G5 tower and if I use it for 3 or 4 days without a restart I start getting a spinning beach ball all the time.
 
Start it up every morning, turn it off every night.
-
Edit
Just now I experienced another anoying thing. When I was refreshing a website in Safari - Itunes in the back was lagging the music, which at the time was Michael Jackson - Keep the faith.

So it cant even play music and surf the net at the same time. I was certainly able to do this without ANY problems before.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back