If I restore my mac to original and then restore it to my time capsule back up
Will that still be like a fresh install of the os?
Will that still be like a fresh install of the os?
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My mac is very very slow quick question for someone smarter then me.
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Sort of, but not quite.
If you wipe the system clean, install the operating system anew, and then use Migration Assistant directed at your Time Capsule backup, then your main operating system files will be fresh. However, any junk left behind from previously-installed programs will be brought back alongside your backup. This can fix certain problems and it's fairly effortless (just takes a bit of time), but it won't necessarily fix everything. The worst-case scenario is to wipe everything, reinstall the operating system, and then reconfigure and reinstall everything manually.
Fishrrman asks a good question, though. It's possible that the slow-downs aren't software-related, in which case none of the above will solve anything for you.
You can select certain aspects of the backup to migrate, but you can't go file by file. For example, you can choose to migrate applications or not; you can choose specific user accounts to migrate over; you can choose if you want your settings to be migrated over or not. Glance through some of the screenshots on Apple's Migration Assistant guide to see what I mean.
And remember, I'm talking about installing OS X fresh and then using Migration Assistant to migrate from your backup. This is different from restoring from the backup. As far as I can remember from the last time I did a restore, restoring from the backup lets you choose a backup date and time to recover from, and that's it; you do not get to choose what data from the backup to restore or leave behind.
Regarding merging photos, yes, you can. Are you both using Photos, or iPhoto? Do you have Aperture installed? If you do have Aperture, the process should be fairly painless and straight-forward. If you have iPhoto and/or Photos, the process may be a bit more involved (unless you want to spend $20 for some third-party software that is seemingly capable of doing it easily). Have a look at this Macworld article for more information.
any will do that supports usb 1, 2 or 3
just move some data over there
I am not talking about a SSD, a 5400 or 7200 rpm will do nicely
OP:
A suggestion to consider when you first get the external drive.
I'm going to speculate that your internal HDD has become hopelessly fragmented. Not just FILE fragmentation, but that your FREE SPACE is fragmented, as well.
In normal operation, the Mac OS requires that certain temp and swap files be created, written to and read from the drive (apps may need the free space, as well).
Unless you have a sufficiently large enough area of "contiguous" free space (not fragmented), the OS will have to go "hunting around" and write/read to those thousands of small areas of free space here-and-there. On a platter-based HDD, this can take extra time, and slow things down.
It's possible to defragment the drive AND re-concactenate the free space that normally resides "at the end" of a drive when the drive is new.
To do this, you need an external drive.
You then do this:
1. Use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to clone the contents of the internal drive to the external drive.
2. Boot from the external clone (hold down the option key at bootup until the startup manager appears, then select external drive and hit return)
3. When you get to the finder, use Disk Utility to RE-INITIALIZE the internal drive.
4. Now, use either CCC or SD to "Re-clone" the external drive BACK TO the internal drive.
5. During the copying process, all the files will be copied contiguously, with a large block of free space behind.
This is EASY to do, all it takes is a little time.
This will not "clear out" any corrupt files, but it will defrag the drive and should give the OS the free space it needs...
A suggestion to consider when you first get the external drive.
I'm going to speculate that your internal HDD has become hopelessly fragmented. Not just FILE fragmentation, but that your FREE SPACE is fragmented, as well.
In normal operation, the Mac OS requires that certain temp and swap files be created, written to and read from the drive (apps may need the free space, as well).
Unless you have a sufficiently large enough area of "contiguous" free space (not fragmented), the OS will have to go "hunting around" and write/read to those thousands of small areas of free space here-and-there. On a platter-based HDD, this can take extra time, and slow things down.
It's possible to defragment the drive AND re-concactenate the free space that normally resides "at the end" of a drive when the drive is new.
To do this, you need an external drive.
You then do this:
1. Use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to clone the contents of the internal drive to the external drive.
2. Boot from the external clone (hold down the option key at bootup until the startup manager appears, then select external drive and hit return)
3. When you get to the finder, use Disk Utility to RE-INITIALIZE the internal drive.
4. Now, use either CCC or SD to "Re-clone" the external drive BACK TO the internal drive.
5. During the copying process, all the files will be copied contiguously, with a large block of free space behind.
This is EASY to do, all it takes is a little time.
This will not "clear out" any corrupt files, but it will defrag the drive and should give the OS the free space it needs...
I would replace the HDD if I were you, preferably with a 1 or 2 TB SSHD Hybrid Drive. I had the same problem.
My iMac was terribly slow, as my HDD was almost full.
So with the help of an instructional video on Youtube (ifixit.com) I replaced it with a 2 TB SSHD Hybrid Drive from Seagate.
It easy to do yourself, and it takes less than an hour to do. Restore the system from Time Machine, and of you go...
The result was a greatly improved system performance, feels like new again, and the costs are much lower compared to a replacement with a SSD.
My iMac was terribly slow, as my HDD was almost full.
So with the help of an instructional video on Youtube (ifixit.com) I replaced it with a 2 TB SSHD Hybrid Drive from Seagate.
It easy to do yourself, and it takes less than an hour to do. Restore the system from Time Machine, and of you go...
The result was a greatly improved system performance, feels like new again, and the costs are much lower compared to a replacement with a SSD.