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BioCore

macrumors regular
Original poster
So I own a late 2007 MBP with a 2.2GHz C2D CPU, 2GB RAM and 128MB Video card.

I like to use pixelmator (photo editing program). Now for the most part I tend to run very few apps at the same time and if I do run a lot most are simple apps that don't take too much CPU power unless they are crashing.

But there come at times when I notice or usually always that my CPU is idling at around 70 to 90%, which I think means that 70 to 90% of its CPU is free, correct? (I am using iStat statistics btw).

the real problem is when I start to use some of the filters and more advanced features in Pixelmator, it tends to only sometimes start lagging even when there is a lot of free CPU power. Can anyone maybe suggest how to fix this or if this is more of an app problem?

Also if I am making a mistake with something, thanks for clarifying me.
 
You have 200% available on your processor (2 cores x 100%). You're seeing the percentage used.

For your problem, you might want to check the Pixelmator site for your graphics card, as it relies extensively on the gpu for many of its functions.
 
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