MacBook Air 2012 vs 2017 (2012 is faster)

[blasto333]

I have a 2012 mac book air and a 2017. Both with 8gb ram and 512GB SSD. They both have about 60GB of free space. The 2017 runs the latest OS (The one before upcoming Big Sur) and the 2012 runs High Sierra (10.13.6)

Everything just feels faster. Safari, terminal...etc on 2012. The 2017 isn't slow by any stretch but it is just noticeably faster on 2012.

Anything that could cause this? They run pretty much the same type of software.

I am taking the 2017 in for a new battery. Should I tell repair people them it doesn't feel as snappy as my 2012?

 

[ignatius345]

First thing I'd do: open Activity Monitor on that newer Air, go to CPU usage, and see if anything is running amok.

If that doesn't turn up anything, try setting up a new user account (in Users & Groups) on the 2017 Air. Restart and log into that new account instead of your old one. When you first log in, don't tie it to your iCloud account because that will initiate all kinds of syncing that will slow things down. Just treat it like a generic user account and play around with it for a while, see how it feels under your normal usage. That will at least give you a baseline for the '17 Air.

All that said, it could well be that High Sierra on that '12 Air is just overall less taxing than Catalina on the '17 ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[blasto333]

I didn't see anything crazy and fresh user didn't make a difference. I updated 2012 air to Catalina and still 2012 is faster

 

[blasto333]

Fresh user DID make a difference in 2017 mac book air now being faster. It is now faster than before. What should I look at to see why? I don't want to make a new user

 

[blasto333]

Also I did an apples to apples comparison and made a new account on each machine and launched safari in each of them and loaded macrumors.com. It was almost exactly the same speed. the 2017 was a tad faster but not much