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Few Questions about rMBP (potential problems?)

C

Classiclays

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 28, 2012
44
0
I have a few questions about my rMBP that hopefully you guys will be able to help me with. It is the base model 15" that first came out last year.

1) The main problem is slow transfer speeds. I transfer movies between my desktop and my Macbook via USB thumb drive. On one of my recent transfers, it took 19 minutes to put 4.3 GB from my Macbook onto the USB. This has happened on many occasions and on my desktop (which doesn't even have a SSD and is quite old), it transfers much quicker.

2) When I plug headphones into my MacBook, the left side of the headphone isn't as loud as the right side. I tried this with different pairs of headphones so I can confirm it is not headphone problems but rather problems with the MacBook itself. I know some soundtracks differentiate which sounds come from which sides of the headphone but that's not the case either. I don't mind the problem too much but if it can be fixed, I might as well go ahead to preserve my sanity.

Not really a question, but here goes:

3) I love reinstalling fresh OS on my desktop since it keeps everything tidy and more "secure" by keeping things isolated. Would it be a good idea to routinely do the same on my Macbook? I won't do a complete reinstall since I don't want to reinstall ML (I'm more well-versed on Windows computers) but I'll just delete any changes made since the original setup. I'll have to Google how to do this.
 
Bump. I found a recovery guide by Apple (though it's lacking a bit) but mainly need help with first two questions.
 
Bump! Can anyone help me out?

The first problem is with the headphone jack, which causes one side of the headphones to play at a lower volume.

The second problem is slow transfer speeds.
 
For 2), did you check your headphone settings? There is a Balance setting that might be off.
Besides that, if you can you should a) test the headphones on a different device and b) test the mac with a different set of headphones.

For 1), I wouldn't know where to start looking for problems. However what you could do is to run a speed test on your hard drive, e.g. BlackMagic Disc speed test.

Hope this helps
 
Thumb drives can be very slow. I move my video files from my PC to my Mac with a gigabit ethernet connection. It takes less than two minutes to move a 4GB file.
 
Thanks for replying Thunder.

For the headphones, your suggestion for checking the output balance fixed the problem. It seems that without the headphones plugged in, the balance was equal. However, once the headphones were in, it would become skewed. I couldn't find the problem originally but thanks to you, I was able to.

For the speed test, I downloaded the program off the App store. I get write speed at around 390-400 MB/S and read around 440-450 MB/S. The program seems to be repeatedly doing the tests but I'm assuming that's what it's supposed to do? Was tested at 5 GB stress if that means anything.

KevinC867 said:
Thumb drives can be very slow. I move my video files from my PC to my Mac with a gigabit ethernet connection. It takes less than two minutes to move a 4GB file.
Click to expand...

Kevin, how do you use an ethernet connection to transfer files? It's probably simple but I've never done it before. I would use a program like Dropbox for wireless transfers but I like to move GB's at a time.

Either way though, my desktop which is a few years old and doesn't have a SSD can transfer files faster than my Macbook with an SSD, so that raises some questions and causes me some concerns.
 
Hi Classic,

OSX keeps different settings (volume, balance, etc) for different output sources, i.e. you can have different volume settings for the built in speakers and for headphones.

The results from your hard drive speed test seem fine. There could be some compatibility issues with your thumb drive. One more thing you could check is when you plug it in, in the System Report, whether it is properly recognized as USB 3.0 drive or not. Overall I wouldn't be worried about the laptop having an issue.
 
Thanks again Thunder.

I'm glad the results are fine. If there's a compatibility issue, perhaps I will try with another USB and report back. The main one I've been using recently is the 16GB SanDisk Cruzer Glide (http://www.sandisk.com/products/usb/drives/cruzer-glide/). Both ths USB hub and Cruzer Glide for speed say "up to 480 MB/S." And I don't know if this means something but SMART status is not supported.

One of the features (SanDisk Secure), which I don't use, says that it is compatible with Mac OSX v10.5+ and I assume the rest of the drive is as well. Certainly has me stumped.

Edit: Didn't see anything about it being a USB 3.0 drive or not.
 
Update: I tried with another USB and was able to transfer 2GB in about 2 minutes. I tried putting the same files on the Cruzer and it estimated 7 minutes. I guess it was a compatibility issue. I don't know if 1 GB/ minute transfer is considered fast around these parts but it's good enough for me.

Thanks for all the help guys.
 
Classiclays said:
Update: I tried with another USB and was able to transfer 2GB in about 2 minutes. I tried putting the same files on the Cruzer and it estimated 7 minutes. I guess it was a compatibility issue. I don't know if 1 GB/ minute transfer is considered fast around these parts but it's good enough for me.

Thanks for all the help guys.
Click to expand...

Well 1gb a min is approx 17mb/s so it is kinda slow I believe for a usb 3.0 and an SSD...
 
There can be a lot of variation between USB drives. Just because they support USB 3.0 does not mean they have a controller that gives decent throughput.
 
Perhaps I'm mistaken but I believe USB thumb drives come in 2.0 and 3.0? My thumb drives are probably 2.0 if that is the case. Still, I think it's slower than it should be but I'm pretty satisfied with 1 GB/ Min. No idea how it could be faster though.
 
Classiclays said:
Perhaps I'm mistaken but I believe USB thumb drives come in 2.0 and 3.0? My thumb drives are probably 2.0 if that is the case. Still, I think it's slower than it should be but I'm pretty satisfied with 1 GB/ Min. No idea how it could be faster though.
Click to expand...

Well hahaha yeah ofc you have to have a usb 3.0 AND 3.0 port for it to get fast speeds. So for your 2.0 USB 17-18mb/s is probably average maybe even a bit faster than average.
 
Great!! Case closed then. USB 3.0 is obviously the future so I'll be buying a new one in the near future.

I bought the Cruzer a few months ago so I was surprised it wasn't 3.0.
 
yea check the audio settings my mbpr for some reason does that too it auto puts the volume louder on the right than left tho the headphones i use does have a built in mic might have something to do with it never the less its annoying. the usb is because its 2.0 thats accurate time frame for the file size u are listing
 
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