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Reinstalling OS X

SESpy

SESpy

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 13, 2010
228
0
So, I have a Unibody MacBook, the white one, and lately it's too slow.
I mean the CPU is Core 2 Duo at 2.2 GHz and has 2GB RAM DDR3 but it's killing me lately. I am a student and I don't want to waste money on a new Macbook so I have a question.
What if I pop the OS X CD that came in the box and reinstall the OS?
What will I lose? I don't have any backup? Will I lose all the documents and software?
 
If you have Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard (10/2007 to 8/2009), you get the option to do an Archive and Install, which creates a "Previous System" folder and puts all your documents, files and settings into. If you use that, you will have a new installation, like a clean installation of Mac OS X.

If you have Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, the standard installation method will not delete any data of yours or even applications you installed, it will just replace the system files and after the installation is done, you will log into the computer and it will look just like before.

With Mac OS X 10.5 and 10.6 there are options do do a system wipe, but that will delete all data on the HDD Mac OS X is installed onto.

And it is recommended anyway to have a backup of your data, as HDDs can fail and they will fail, some sooner, some later. ANd the slowness you experience right now might be even caused by a dying HDD, therefore back your data up, in any way you can - DVDs, HDD, DropBox, ... .
 
I have 10.6 Snow Leopard.
So what do you recommend I should do? Should I do a system wipe or not?
And is there a way to check my hard disk is dying or something? I have a software called Check-Up...
 
Last edited:
SESpy said:
I have 10.6 Snow Leopard.
So what do you recommend I should do? Should I do a system wipe or not?
Click to expand...

When I reinstall Mac OS X, I make a system wipe. Maybe the root of your problems can be solved easier, but we need much more information from you.
For example how and when and how long the slowness manifests itself and so on. Have you taken a look at Activity Monitor yet?
 
It's been like this for a month or less. It takes 12-15 seconds to start the browser and I also noticed the start-up and shutdown time is longer.
What do you need to know from Activity Monitor? Just tell me and I'll post it right away.
 
A couple of other things to look at.

How full is your HDD?

What daemons and apps do you leave running? (Activity Monitor will answer this as requested above). A couple of screen shots of Activity Monitor will help us see what's going on.

Just hold down the apple (command) key, and press Tab once then let up while still holding apple key down.

If you have a lot of apps open, start tabbing through them and quitting any you don't need running by pressing the Q when that particular app is highlighted.

Repair Disk Permissions
Verify Disk Permissions

Next, boot from the Apple Install DVD, and after selecting the language, use the top menubar that comes up to open Disk Utility.

Select your OS Drive from the list, and do Repair Disk, then Verify Disk, and see if any errors come up. If not, reboot into your current OS Drive and see if that helped.

After those steps (about and hour) are taken, we can try to help further with info on how to best reinstall and keep all your stuff you want / need.
 
bmcgonag said:
A couple of other things to look at.

How full is your HDD?

What daemons and apps do you leave running? (Activity Monitor will answer this as requested above). A couple of screen shots of Activity Monitor will help us see what's going on.

Just hold down the apple (command) key, and press Tab once then let up while still holding apple key down.

If you have a lot of apps open, start tabbing through them and quitting any you don't need running by pressing the Q when that particular app is highlighted.

Repair Disk Permissions
Verify Disk Permissions

Next, boot from the Apple Install DVD, and after selecting the language, use the top menubar that comes up to open Disk Utility.

Select your OS Drive from the list, and do Repair Disk, then Verify Disk, and see if any errors come up. If not, reboot into your current OS Drive and see if that helped.

After those steps (about and hour) are taken, we can try to help further with info on how to best reinstall and keep all your stuff you want / need.
Click to expand...

Out of 250GB, I have 26% used ( 60.3 GB )
I have Safari and Mail running also I have HyperDock running as well as
DashBoard KickStart and BetterTouchTool.

Here are some screen shots:
screenshot20110113at315.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


I'll try verifying and repairing my disk permissions from the Disk Utility tool first and then I will pop the CD :)
Thank you for your help!
 
SESpy said:
Out of 250GB, I have 26% used ( 60.3 GB )
I have Safari and Mail running also I have HyperDock running as well as
DashBoard KickStart and BetterTouchTool.

Here are some screen shots:
screenshot20110113at315.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


I'll try verifying and repairing my disk permissions from the Disk Utility tool first and then I will pop the CD :)
Thank you for your help!
Click to expand...

Screenshots (click on them for larger versions)

screenshot20110113at315.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png


screenshot20110113at316.png
 
thanks simsaladimbamba.
so anything unusual you noticed from activity monitor?
I am now verifying disk permissions and it's going really slow, it keeps saying 26 minutes like 5 minutes ago...
 
So I verified and repaired the disk permissions.
I verified the disk and it said the HDD seems to be OK.

I'll pop the Apple CD tomorrow. I am too tired now and it's 4am :D
If this doesn't help, I will have the most important things backed up or I'll burn them on CDs or something and I will do a system wipe followed by resetting the PRAM!
 
There is a lot that you didn't scroll through on the Activity monitor. Would be helpful if you'll sort on the column that shows how much is being used. Sort largest to smallest, then we can see what's eating up the most on each.
 
bmcgonag said:
There is a lot that you didn't scroll through on the Activity monitor. Would be helpful if you'll sort on the column that shows how much is being used. Sort largest to smallest, then we can see what's eating up the most on each.
Click to expand...

Here are the new screenshots:

http://img405.imageshack.us/f/screenshot20110114at201.png/

http://img5.imageshack.us/f/screenshot20110114at201.png/

http://img339.imageshack.us/f/screenshot20110114at201.png/

Thanks to all for trying to help out :)
 
I don't see anything that just jumps out at me, but we were only looking at CPU.

HDD wise, as long as it's good, you are no where near full so that shouldn't be an issue.

Memory may be an issue, but from looking at what's running I wouldn't think so.

Is it always slow from boot up on, or does it just get slow after some time?
 
well it is slower on shut down than on start up. it's not always like that, it happens sometimes but it bugs the hell out of me :mad:
 
it can be hard to pinpoint exactly what causing the system to slow down. It may not be necessary to reinstall of OS, but they can fixed issues with the system. Have you been updating the latest OS from apple update software?
 
so, you suggest that I should remove the Mac App Store? That's what I read in that thread. And no, I don't have a bootcamp partition.
 
No.

That thread has got nothing to do with the Mac App Store. Go and re read what the thread is about. That thread got something do with the problem that is similar to problem that you having. You said your system has slowed down, right?

Well in this case, as it already be aforementioned from other people, that already been suggested to you, you can use Maintenance tools such as Onyx, which you can download it for free (google it), and to see whether that will speed up your computer, But I assumed you already done that and did not work and still something causing the system to slowed down. Although you go and try cleaning out caches. that probably degrade the performance at first. You can try reset PRAM settings



Oh and it's good idea to make a backup.
 
Last edited:
I'll try resetting the PRAM settings. I have cleaned the cache already :)
 
you can report back if the problem still persist, otherwise I would suggest go ahead do a clean installation, and then use Migration Assistant to restore files that you backup.
 
My advice would be to do the following when your system gets slow:
1. Open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal
2. Type "purge" (no quotes) and press enter

There will be a short delay. If this seems to solve the slowness of your system then I would recommend for you to upgrade to 4GB of RAM. In any event, let us know what happens. However, I don't think reinstalling OS X will solve the issues you are having.
 
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