Performance Issues, Need Some Help...

[zakthemack]

Hello all, I need some help...

First I have a PB G4 1.33 ghz 256mb of RAM, running OSX 10.3.

Over the past couple of weeks I've been getting the multi colored pinwheel an awful lot. Obviously I'm a little light on RAM, but it's never been a problem in the past; and I've not added or changed my usage at all.

Any advice?

I was thinking about doing a rebuild but can't find my restore disk, or my airport xpress disk.

I could upgrade to Tiger, but Leopard comes out soon, so I was going to wait.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Makosuke]

Well, if you haven't installed anything or changed your use habits, and assuming there's nothing physically wrong with the computer, then the problems are most likely due to hard drive fragmentation. That would be a little surprising to me, though, unless you move around a lot of large files or have a tendency to keep your drive nearly full most of the time.

If it is drive fragmentation, really your only options are to pay for a defragger (TechTool Pro, for example) or do a full backup and reinstall. If you can't find your install discs, you could get an external drive, clone the full boot partition to it with CarbonCopyCloner or the like, then wipe the internal drive, then clone back. That will, at least in theory, completely defragment the drive.

I'd be more inclined to believe that your issues are due to changes in what you're running or doing that you aren't realizing. For example, more heavy Flash content in web pages, leading to heavier RAM use for your browser, leading to slowdowns. Have a peek at Activity Monitor and see if the Pageout count is huge (which, with 256MB free, wouldn't surprise me at all).

If you're planning on upgrading to Leopard, you're going to need more RAM anyway, so I'd recommend buying a gig and installing it now. You'll probably clear up most of the slowdowns, and you'll be ready when Leopard ships.

If that DOESN'T help, you've either got some background process running that's eating up CPU or there's something wrong with the drive.