Please help: My OS has slowed down

[Noctilux.95]

I have a 2009 Mac Pro (4,1) with 2.66 GHZ Quad Core, 240 gig OWC SSD (45 gig still available), 5770 Video Card, and 16 gig of ram.

Currently running Mountain Lion.

My computer was running super fast after the initial upgrades. Now for the last few months I'm seeing my application launch slower, the dreaded rainbow pizza more often, and some freezes.

What can I do to speed up my Mac again?


Thanks!

 

[GGJstudios]

What can I do to speed up my Mac again?

If you're having performance issues, this may help:

Performance Tips For Mac OS X​

Delete any unnecessary apps from the following locations:

• System Preferences > Accounts > yourusername > Login Items
  (Lion and ML users: System Preferences > Users & Groups > yourusername > Login Items)
  
  
• /Library/LaunchAgents/
  (Lion and ML users: In Finder, click Go > Go to Folder > then enter the path above)
  
  
• ~/Library/LaunchAgents/
  (Lion and ML users: In Finder, click Go > Go to Folder > then enter the path above)
  
  
• /Library/StartupItems/
  (Lion and ML users: In Finder, click Go > Go to Folder > then enter the path above)

If it's still running slow,

1. Launch Activity Monitor
2. Change "My Processes" at the top to "All Processes"
3. Click on the CPU column heading once or twice, so the arrow points downward (highest values on top).
4. Click on the System Memory tab at the bottom.
5. Take a screen shot of the entire Activity Monitor window, then scroll down to see the rest of the list, take another screen shot
6. Post your screenshots.