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AnrBjotk

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 4, 2010
132
3
Rcently my mac become really slow. Really slow. It gets that little twirly rainbow from just scrolling a webpage. Or typing. In the activity monitor it says I have sometimes have 450 mb free memory... Is that normal? And what can I do - except add on more?
 
Rcently my mac become really slow. Really slow. It gets that little twirly rainbow from just scrolling a webpage. Or typing. In the activity monitor it says I have sometimes have 450 mb free memory... Is that normal? And what can I do - except add on more?

OS X will always utilise as much RAM as possible for best performance. Don't worry too much about that. There's likely to be a different issue.

Try checking the HDD SMART Data to ensure it's not corrupted. Anything other than 'passed' means you need a new HDD. You can download SMART Utility here.

If SMART Utility comes back clean, try verifying the volume in Disk Utility. If there are any issues, you'll need to repair through the recovery partition (please quote this if you need assistance).

If Disk Utility comes back OK (basically, no red writing), then you can try restarting your Mac with the option 'Reopen windows when logging back in' disabled. This will prevent any background memory leaks/software conflicts from reopening.

If that still doesn't make a positive impact, and none of the above troubleshooting steps have indicated an issue, try:

- Ensuring the OS is fully up-to-date
- Repair Disk Permissions in Disk Utility & restart
- Reset NVRAM/SMC

Speak with you soon.
 
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OS X will always utilise as much RAM as possible for best performance. Don't worry too much about that. There's likely to be a different issue.

Try checking the HDD SMART Data to ensure it's not corrupted. Anything other than 'passed' means you need a new HDD. You can download SMART Utility here.

If SMART Utility comes back clean, try verifying the volume in Disk Utility. If there are any issues, you'll need to repair through the recovery partition (please quote this if you need assistance).

If Disk Utility comes back OK (basically, no red writing), then you can try restarting your Mac with the option 'Reopen windows when logging back in' disabled. This will prevent any background memory leaks/software conflicts from reopening.

If that still doesn't make a positive impact, and none of the above troubleshooting steps have indicated an issue, try:

- Ensuring the OS is fully up-to-date
- Repair Disk Permissions in Disk Utility & restart
- Reset NVRAM/SMC

Speak with you soon.

I was just gonna post, say "gee, thanks, you saved me" Did a "verify disc righs"(? translate) and it found a bunch of errors. "Different rights on System/Library/X. User should be 0, is 95" etc. Weird stuff. Fixed them and it ran like a beauty. But a day later same problem and again, it found a bunch of mistakes. Any idea what that means? Pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive. pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive. pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive....
 
may want to back up your data (docs, pictures) and do a fresh install of OS X.

If you still get those errors after the fresh install of OS X, then it could be time for a new hard drive.
 
Rcently my mac become really slow. Really slow. It gets that little twirly rainbow from just scrolling a webpage. Or typing. In the activity monitor it says I have sometimes have 450 mb free memory... Is that normal? And what can I do - except add on more?
Those are the symptoms of a dying hard drive.

Keep a backup handy, you may need it sooner than you'd think.
 
btw, I'm assuming the "verify/repair disc" option has no impact here... right?
 
I was just gonna post, say "gee, thanks, you saved me" Did a "verify disc righs"(? translate) and it found a bunch of errors. "Different rights on System/Library/X. User should be 0, is 95" etc. Weird stuff. Fixed them and it ran like a beauty. But a day later same problem and again, it found a bunch of mistakes. Any idea what that means? Pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive. pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive. pleasedontsaygetnewharddrive....

Did you run SMART Utility? Did it come back as passed?
 
btw, I'm assuming the "verify/repair disc" option has no impact here... right?
Software cannot make up for hardware failures.

A hard drive's pretty cheap, they're easy to switch out (only a few screws to undo) and cost less than $100.
 
I found a solution for a new drive, but I cant get anything done until Im home from my vacation on saturday.
Question: should I turn the Mac off? Or leave it in sleep mode (sort of worried that if I turn it off, it wont start again...
 
Software cannot make up for hardware failures.

A hard drive's pretty cheap, they're easy to switch out (only a few screws to undo) and cost less than $100.

100? For what? Ive found 250Gb SSDs for 100, but for a 500 GB its more like 220... Am I looking in wrong places?
 
100? For what? Ive found 250Gb SSDs for 100, but for a 500 GB its more like 220... Am I looking in wrong places?
Nobody said anything about SSDs. I assumed you wanted to replace your hard drive with another hard drive, in which case what I wrote stands true.

Do you truly need that much storage?
 
Nobody said anything about SSDs. I assumed you wanted to replace your hard drive with another hard drive, in which case what I wrote stands true.

Do you truly need that much storage?

Forgive my ignorance. Is not SSD a form of harddrive? And are you suggesting another type?
I may not need 500... true (Ive only used 170 of my old one, even after 5 years). Im just thinking about the best replacement. But is, for instance, a 250 (ot 500GB) Samsung 850 EVO a, in yr opinion, a suitable replacement?
What would u suggest?
 
Its a storage device yes... rather than spinning platters, data is stored on NAND flash memory.
If you plan to replace the drive, you are as well going the SSD route rather than HDD.

SSD is much better in terms of performance for random IO workloads.
 
Forgive my ignorance. Is not SSD a form of harddrive? And are you suggesting another type?
I may not need 500... true (Ive only used 170 of my old one, even after 5 years). Im just thinking about the best replacement. But is, for instance, a 250 (ot 500GB) Samsung 850 EVO a, in yr opinion, a suitable replacement?
What would u suggest?
Yes a SATA SSD uses the same form factor as a traditional hard drive. People usually refer to a mechanical, platter storage as a HDD (as in, Hard Disk Drive, aka hard drive) whereas NAND-based storage is known as SSD (Solid State Drive).

When I hear hard drive, I think of the mechanical variant. When I here SSD, I think NAND variant.

Since you wanted a new hard drive, I thought the one you wanted was the mechanical one.

The Samsung drive is a good, reliable one, I'd have no qualms with recommending it.
 
Its a storage device yes... rather than spinning platters, data is stored on NAND flash memory.
If you plan to replace the drive, you are as well going the SSD route rather than HDD.

SSD is much better in terms of performance for random IO workloads.

I.e. SSD will be an upgrade, right? Worth the extra cash, right? (leading the witness). And can it be that the Samsung Evo isnt compatible with a macbook? (what is the "standard" SSD for macbook then?)
 
SSD be an upgrade - whats the criteria for measure? if its TB of data, not, if its 240/512GB and random IO, totally.
Standard SSD - for which macbook? The 'current' line up doesn't use standard form factor SSDs... For the older devices running HDDs, you can pretty much go in one of many directions. EVO, would be fine. but do you want read, or write performance or a balance of both, again not all SSDs are equal..
 
I.e. SSD will be an upgrade, right? Worth the extra cash, right? (leading the witness). And can it be that the Samsung Evo isnt compatible with a macbook? (what is the "standard" SSD for macbook then?)

If you are coming from a spinning platter drive, a SSD will make the machine feel likes it is a brand new 2015 model, everything will feel a lot faster.
 
I.e. SSD will be an upgrade, right? Worth the extra cash, right? (leading the witness). And can it be that the Samsung Evo isnt compatible with a macbook? (what is the "standard" SSD for macbook then?)
In terms of speed, the Samsung drive is about 5x faster in continuous reads and writes, and even faster in random I/O tasks.

There is no such thing as a SSD "for Macs". Since the switch to Intel processors back in '06, a Mac is nothing more than a regular PC, in a pretty aluminum case, that can run OS X.

The drive you are looking at is fully compatible and will work, unless you receive a dud (which can happen) or you break something in the process of upgrading (not likely if you know which end of a screwdriver goes where).
 
So I just spent a lot of money on a brand new SSD and tho it runs fine, it stell gets a thousand errors on disc rights... What is that? My friend says its because I have so much crap on my mac....
 
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