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MBP getting slow -- Some advice?

T

trigguh

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 7, 2011
3
0
Hey all!

Long time reader, first time pos- oh wait, that's pretty cheesy.

I'm a proud owner of a mid-2010 13" MacBook pro. I kinda regret not buying the 15", but to be honest I couldn't afford it. Maybe in the future.

For now, however, my poor little MBP is getting old. My booting is taking a while and the whole system is seeming sluggish. I'm far from an OS X expert, but I know my way around. I've tried following a few 'clean up' guides on the net, but they're all pretty basic. If I was on Windows, I'd simply reformat and start from scratch - but I was wondering if you guys could suggest anything to help speed up?

I only have 4GB RAM, would an upgrade to 8GB help?

Am I going to have to bite the bullet and buy an SSD, like a few friends have suggested?

Thanks in advance

Karl
 
trigguh said:
Hey all!

Long time reader, first time pos- oh wait, that's pretty cheesy.

I'm a proud owner of a mid-2010 13" MacBook pro. I kinda regret not buying the 15", but to be honest I couldn't afford it. Maybe in the future.

For now, however, my poor little MBP is getting old. My booting is taking a while and the whole system is seeming sluggish. I'm far from an OS X expert, but I know my way around. I've tried following a few 'clean up' guides on the net, but they're all pretty basic. If I was on Windows, I'd simply reformat and start from scratch - but I was wondering if you guys could suggest anything to help speed up?

I only have 4GB RAM, would an upgrade to 8GB help?

Am I going to have to bite the bullet and buy an SSD, like a few friends have suggested?

Thanks in advance

Karl
Click to expand...

for a clean install on OS X put in the disc that came with your MBP and reboot when you hear the chime, hold down option key this will let you boot from the disk, now you can format your partition and do a clean install
 
iisforiphone said:
for a clean install on OS X put in the disc that came with your MBP and reboot when you hear the chime, hold down option key this will let you boot from the disk, now you can format your partition and do a clean install
Click to expand...

Don't get me wrong, I know how to reinstall OS X - but I was wondering if an upgrade or some ninja tricks would help first? :)
 
iisforiphone said:
ahh, sorry i think thats the cleanest way to do a install and remove everything at the same time
Click to expand...

Haha I think you have the wrong end of the stick -- I'm not too bothered about removing things, just wondering if there's any tips/tricks to speed it up.

For example in Windows I'd delete temporary files etc.
 
trigguh said:
Haha I think you have the wrong end of the stick -- I'm not too bothered about removing things, just wondering if there's any tips/tricks to speed it up.

For example in Windows I'd delete temporary files etc.
Click to expand...


another thing to try is restart your MBP, than use it normally for a few hours than check your Activity Monitor in Utlities, under the Memory tab you will see Page In's and Page Out's if your page outs get high that means your running short on RAM duing that normall use that will let you know if more RAM would help
 
Are you using Snow Leopard, or Lion? If you're running Lion, did you just upgrade from SL or do a clean install? If you did an upgrade, I'd recommend a clean install...it really does seem to help things.

As for RAM, you might or might not see a difference if you upgrade to 8GB. You didn't say much about how you use your MBP or what kinds of programs you usually run. To see if you need more RAM, go about your usual business, and check Activity Monitor after a while. Check your free and inactive RAM, and see what your page-outs are. (Keep in mind that page-outs only reset when you restart your computer, so they do add up over time). If you're having a lot of page-outs, adding RAM will help. If you're not, then you probably won't see any difference if you add another 4GB.
 
Last edited:
sweetbrat said:
Are you using Snow Leopard, or Lion? If you're running Lion, did you just upgrade from SL or do a clean install? If you did an upgrade, I'd recommend a clean install...it really does seem to help things.

As for RAM, you might or might not see a difference if you upgrade to 8GB. You didn't say much about how you use your MBP or what kinds of programs you usually run. To see if you need more RAM, go about your usual business, and check Activity Monitor after a while. Check your free and inactive RAM, and see what your page-ins are. (Keep in mind that page-ins only reset when you restart your computer, so they do add up over time). If you're having a lot of page-ins, adding RAM will help. If you're not, then you probably won't see any difference if you add another 4GB.
Click to expand...

sorry i have to disagree, its Page-Outs you should keep an eye on
 
I am reading this as well because my 2011 13" MBP seems a little slow as well. If you install Lion from scratch does that mean you should load all your programs from scratch or can you load the os from scratch and then restore your time machine backup?

Cheers


sweetbrat said:
Are you using Snow Leopard, or Lion? If you're running Lion, did you just upgrade from SL or do a clean install? If you did an upgrade, I'd recommend a clean install...it really does seem to help things.
Click to expand...
 
yycguy said:
I am reading this as well because my 2011 13" MBP seems a little slow as well. If you install Lion from scratch does that mean you should load all your programs from scratch or can you load the os from scratch and then restore your time machine backup?

Cheers
Click to expand...

actually was kind of wondering the same thing. my early 2011 13" isnt slowing down too bad yet, but i know its going to happen.
 
My speed-up checklist:

1. If you leave your MBP on 24/7, get in the habit of restarting every day or two or simply turn it off when it isn't in use. I have found that RAM tends to get tied-up if my Macs run continuously for more than a couple of days.

2. Increase the RAM. Depending on what you use your MBP for maxing out the RAM can make a big difference... If you upgrade to Lion I think that 4GB is the absolute minimum considering that some RAM is used by the integrated GPU. My 13" MBP 2011 uses 384MB of the available RAM, so there's 1/3GB right off the top.

3. Defragment the drive using iDefrag or cloning the drive to an external, then erase and copy everything back to the internal drive.

4. Reduce the number of apps that are running simultaneously, even if some are in the background. Use the Activity Monitor to ascertain what apps are mazing-out your CPU and RAM.

5. Make sure that you have at least 10% free space on your internal drive. A nearly-full drive can slow things down and cause weird symptoms that can drive you crazy.

I realize that some folks will disagree with #1 and #3, but the fact of the matter is that OS X doesn't play as nice with RAM and fragmentation as some would have us think.

The good thing about my suggestions in #1 and #3 is they don't take as much time as arguing about how well OS X handles RAM and disk fragmentation and they don't cost a dime (unless you go with the iDefrag option). And you can download iDefrag and see how bad your disk fragmentation is for free before you take any steps to fix it.
 
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