Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

New MacBook is S..L...O...W

B

badlydrawnboy

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Oct 20, 2003
1,531
418
I got a new MacBook 2.4 Ghz with stock 2 GB of RAM. Prior to that I had a 3-year old MacBook with 1.8 Ghz processor, 2 GB of RAM and an upgraded 7200 RPM hard drive.

What has really surprised (and disappointed me) is that my old 1.8 Ghz MacBook was much snappier and more responsive than my new one, despite a much slower processor. I'm not doing anything intensive. Just launching apps like Safari, Mail, iCal, etc. This morning I opened up Numbers, and it took a full 10-15 seconds to get to the splash screen.

Can't be the memory, because it also had 2 GB. I suppose it could be the 7200 RPM hard drive, but I wouldn't have thought it would make such a big difference.

Any other possibilities come to mind? I've run system maintenance with Cocktail and rebuilt the directory using DiskWarrior (shouldn't be necessary with a new computer), and nothing has helped.

I'm considering getting a 7200 RPM hard drive, since they're pretty cheap. Or upgrading to 4 GB RAM. Any sense of what might give me the bigger improvement in responsiveness?
 
Do you have a preference between Hitachi, Seagate and WD for internal drives? Been a while since I bought one, not sure which is best. Thanks for your help.
 
Was your old macbook a core duo running 10.4/5?

Also 5400vs7200 isn't that much different, there are so many benchmarks out there to prove it too.
 
/screwed

LUL. I'll bet a new drive will perk it right up. The benchmarks say the new MacBooks run circles around those old Core Duos and 667mhz bus models.

I'm talking 1,000 points by Geekbench. In my experience with my MacBook and MacBook Pro, 500 points is a dramatic difference!
 
badlydrawnboy said:
I got a new MacBook 2.4 Ghz with stock 2 GB of RAM. Prior to that I had a 3-year old MacBook with 1.8 Ghz processor, 2 GB of RAM and an upgraded 7200 RPM hard drive.

What has really surprised (and disappointed me) is that my old 1.8 Ghz MacBook was much snappier and more responsive than my new one, despite a much slower processor. I'm not doing anything intensive. Just launching apps like Safari, Mail, iCal, etc. This morning I opened up Numbers, and it took a full 10-15 seconds to get to the splash screen.

Can't be the memory, because it also had 2 GB. I suppose it could be the 7200 RPM hard drive, but I wouldn't have thought it would make such a big difference.

Any other possibilities come to mind? I've run system maintenance with Cocktail and rebuilt the directory using DiskWarrior (shouldn't be necessary with a new computer), and nothing has helped.

I'm considering getting a 7200 RPM hard drive, since they're pretty cheap. Or upgrading to 4 GB RAM. Any sense of what might give me the bigger improvement in responsiveness?
Click to expand...
Try running Activity Monitor and see what is happening. When the system is slow, are there lots of IO's, or, is there no free memory? Many more processes are 64-bits now with your C2D, which makes them slightly larger, and, you may need a just little more memory depending on what you are doing. Depending on what you see, you may want to upgrade to 4 GB. If the slowness is associated with I/O, the disk drive ideas are good.
 
MrCheeto said:
/screwed

LUL. I'll bet a new drive will perk it right up. The benchmarks say the new MacBooks run circles around those old Core Duos and 667mhz bus models.

I'm talking 1,000 points by Geekbench. In my experience with my MacBook and MacBook Pro, 500 points is a dramatic difference!
Click to expand...

That's why I think something has to be wrong. Doesn't make sense that I'd need a new hard drive to make this brand new MB faster than my 3-year old one.
 
jnpy!$4g3cwk said:
Try running Activity Monitor and see what is happening. When the system is slow, are there lots of IO's, or, is there no free memory? Many more processes are 64-bits now with your C2D, which makes them slightly larger, and, you may need a just little more memory depending on what you are doing. Depending on what you see, you may want to upgrade to 4 GB. If the slowness is associated with I/O, the disk drive ideas are good.
Click to expand...

Interesting. I'm looking at the System Memory tab in Activity Monitor. It says only 13 MB of free memory! Wired is 450 MB, Active is 1.07 GB, Inactive is 537 MB, and Used is 1.99 GB.

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this. I've only got a few apps open: Safari, Mail, Things, Activity Monitor. Seems like that shouldn't use up 2 GB of RAM, should it?

It certainly didn't on my last MacBook.

I'm getting spinning beach balls when I try to close tabs or windows in Safari.
 
badlydrawnboy said:
Interesting. I'm looking at the System Memory tab in Activity Monitor. It says only 13 MB of free memory! Wired is 450 MB, Active is 1.07 GB, Inactive is 537 MB, and Used is 1.99 GB.

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this. I've only got a few apps open: Safari, Mail, Things, Activity Monitor. Seems like that shouldn't use up 2 GB of RAM, should it?

It certainly didn't on my last MacBook.

I'm getting spinning beach balls when I try to close tabs or windows in Safari.
Click to expand...


Well, that's not good,my MB is the previous version to your and mine has no slow down at all. I think a clean install,or archive and reinstall might help. :)
 
badlydrawnboy said:
Interesting. I'm looking at the System Memory tab in Activity Monitor. It says only 13 MB of free memory! Wired is 450 MB, Active is 1.07 GB, Inactive is 537 MB, and Used is 1.99 GB.

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this. I've only got a few apps open: Safari, Mail, Things, Activity Monitor. Seems like that shouldn't use up 2 GB of RAM, should it?

It certainly didn't on my last MacBook.

I'm getting spinning beach balls when I try to close tabs or windows in Safari.
Click to expand...

Inactive memory is basically free memory. I really hate the way Apple labels their memory. If you had little free memory AND little inactive memory I would be concerned.

I would try to new install first, and that doesnt solve anything I would take it up with apple. Your computer should not be acting like that at all out of the box, unless you've installed something that is causing the problem.

What about the processor? Is there a process that is using a lot more processor than others?
 
Also curious did you back up the old machine and apply it to the new one? Ive heard and seen issues sometimes when a HD is cloned to another HD. You might try repairing disk permissions in disk utility. A fresh install is always the best option.
 
pricej636 said:
What about the processor? Is there a process that is using a lot more processor than others?
Click to expand...

No, it doesn't seem to be a processor issue. I started Numbers up with no other apps open and it still took 10-15 seconds.

I did not transfer anything over from my old MB, because I know from previous experience that can cause problems. I did a 100% clean install of the OS and all of my apps.

I think I'm going to have to do that again. Shouldn't take long b/c I use my laptop primarily as a companion to my desktop. I don't store much data on it, and just use Dropbox for the important stuff I need to access. So it's really just a question of reinstalling the OS and then apps.

I'll contact Apple if that doesn't do the trick. I definitely agree that this is not normal. I've been using Macs for almost 20 years, and I haven't seen anything like this so far with a new Mac.
 
badlydrawnboy said:
That's why I think something has to be wrong. Doesn't make sense that I'd need a new hard drive to make this brand new MB faster than my 3-year old one.
Click to expand...

My suspicion is something is wrong.

Take it to an Apple Store and show them the 10-15 sec app-load time. That is not normal.

My first move would be to check the hard disk. It could be not-quite-right.
 
Okay, I reinstalled the OS from scratch. Ran much, much faster - as I would expect. However, just now I created a second account for my wife. Immediately I noticed a huge slow down, spinning beach balls, etc.

What's strange is that we had a second account on the 3-year old MacBook 1.83 with only 2 GB RAM and had absolutely no problems.

Any ideas?
 
Don't run two user accounts at the same time?

As in, you must LOG OUT of one user before LOGGING IN on another, NOT just switching users.

This is only if you're doing intense work or notice any performance issues. The way you can tell who is logged in is to go to the switcher icon at the top and any users logged in will have a check next to their name.
 
Guess I'm still perplexed about why I'd notice such a huge slowdown with a brand new computer 3 years newer than my last MacBook, which I never had this kind of problem with. Makes me think something is still wrong - even after a complete reinstall.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back