Windows 7 made my MacBook Pro 10x times faster

[EarthNeutron]

Ok, so you probably now me as the person bit..ch!ng 24/7 about how slow my mac is.

I get the beach ball every 20 seconds, in Safari, mail, setting so on and so forth
20-30 seconds to enter standby and over a decade to turn on

Anyway, yesterday I installed windows via bootcamp so that I could play some games and test out my intel hd 3000 performance. Guess what? My Mac hasn't been more snappier!!

UNDER 1 seconds to stand by
App open in under 2-3 seconds

WTTTFF??? This isn't supposed to be normal, especially on a Mac.


I always though my HDD was the problem, but it was the OS actually.


(NOTE) I have 20/270gb free space on my Mac OS and 3/30GB free space on windows 7.

 

[that1guyy]

You should do a fresh re-install of OSX to see if it is faster. Also, it may be RAM issues with OSX. I don't know how much memory Win 7 takes as opposed to Lion.

 

[MarkMS]

Have you tried reinstalling OS X? Did you install any weird or shady apps? Any apps that run in the background and slow OS X down? Did you call up AppleCare?

Just to let you know, my MBP with an Intel SSD has beat a few Windows 7 computers with SSDs too. OS X is plenty fast. I just think you have some app or a corrupt file that's slowing it down.

PS. You should leave, at minimum, 10-15% free HDD space. So on a 270GB partition, you need at-least 27GB. Try freeing some space and see if that helps.

 

[EarthNeutron]

You should do a fresh re-install of OSX to see if it is faster. Also, it may be RAM issues with OSX. I don't know how much memory Win 7 takes as opposed to Lion.

I already did a fresh reinstall and the speed was exactly the same. (OFC that I restored from my Time Machine backup)

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Have you tried reinstalling OS X? Did you install any weird or shady apps? Any apps that run in the background and slow OS X down? Did you call up AppleCare?

Just to let you know, my MBP with an Intel SSD has beat a few Windows 7 computers with SSDs too. OS X is plenty fast. I just think you have some app or a corrupt file that's slowing it down.

PS. You should leave, at minimum, 10-15% free HDD space. So on a 270GB partition, you need at-least 27GB. Try freeing some space and see if that helps.

Yes, I reinstalled OS X but the speed was exactly the same. ATM I have Skype,dropbox,temperature check, free ram, caffeine running in the background (the show up in the status bar all the time)

I've already free'd some space. Currently at 84gb free.

 

[MarkMS]

I already did a fresh reinstall and the speed was exactly the same. (OFC that I restored from my Time Machine backup)

What's OFC? I'm trying to figure out if you reinstalled OS X then did an immediate Time Machine restore or if you reinstalled OS X vanilla, played around with it, then later on did a restore via Migration Assistant.

If you restored the Time Machine backup just as you finished reinstalling OS X, I'd reinstall OS X again and try it without any of your files. It's time consuming, but I'm wondering if there is a corrupt files somewhere you restored.

 

[FrancoisC]

You should try a clean install WITHOUT restoring from Time Machine, which will essentially bring back any problem you had before…

Do a manual backup of your files/iTunes Library/ect… and restore them after your clean install, but manually.

 

[EarthNeutron]

What's OFC? I'm trying to figure out if you reinstalled OS X then did an immediate Time Machine restore or if you reinstalled OS X vanilla, played around with it, then later on did a restore via Migration Assistant.

If you restored the Time Machine backup just as you finished reinstalling OS X, I'd reinstall OS X again and try it without any of your files. It's time consuming, but I'm wondering if there is a corrupt files somewhere you restored.

OFC=of course

I restored from my Time Machine backup right away, after formatting my HDD.
Ok, I'm going to try playing with my vanilla OS X just to see if any of the problems will be present. I'll reinstall OS X vanilla in a few hours and let you guys know how it went.

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You should try a clean install WITHOUT restoring from Time Machine, which will essentially bring back any problem you had before…

Do a manual backup of your files/iTunes Library/ect… and restore them after your clean install, but manually.

OK, thx. I'll try it in a few hours and let you know if it's faster/slower and so on..

 

[mdgm]

How much RAM is in your machine?

 

[SDAVE]

Something's up.

Fresh install that thing. Keep your homefolder on another drive so you have a backup of it and just do a fresh Lion install. When you use Disk Utility to format your drive, do a Full 1 pass format (takes a while) and install fresh then manually put your files back (no system files, just stuff from your desktop and documents folders...ie pictures, iTunes Library XML, music, etc.)

Using TimeMachine brings back the old plists, etc...so you don't want that. You want a fresh copy.

 

[TacticalDesire]

Windows 7 is a snappy OS in general. I've typically had better performance out of windows than I have out of OSX. That being said, try what everyone else is saying and do a fresh install of OSX and don't restore from your time machine backup. I've dealt with macs in a similar state as yours and it's not fun trying to use them in that condition.

 

[Dangerous Theory]

Windows 7 is a snappy OS in general. I've typically had better performance out of windows than I have out of OSX. That being said, try what everyone else is saying and do a fresh install of OSX and don't restore from your time machine backup. I've dealt with macs in a similar state as yours and it's not fun trying to use them in that condition.

Only right at the beginning. Windows quickly becomes chunky and slow.

 

[Stetrain]

You've probably heard this already but it seems like something is seriously up with your OSX install or hardware.

Windows 7 works pretty well on an MBP but in my experience it shouldn't boot or respond noticeably faster than OSX.

If a clean install of OSX still has the same beach-balling problems then call AppleCare or take it to an Apple store.

 

[TacticalDesire]

Only right at the beginning. Windows quickly becomes chunky and slow.

Not at all. That was Definitely true with Windows XP and to a lesser extent Vista. However that issue is no longer really a problem in Windows 7. Little maintenance is necessary to keep it running as snappy as clean install. I haven't had any performance issues with the same install for almost two years. Still extremely fast.

 

[Freyqq]

Windows 7 actually should be slower for a couple reasons, none having to do with the OS itself.

1. When you install bootcamp, you assign it the 2nd half of the disk. For hard drives, the fastest area is near the outer edge and it gets slower the farther inwards you go. So, anything involving the hard drive will be noticeably slower in bootcamp.
2. Apple's windows drivers are horrible.

 

[saberahul]

Guess your Mac likes Windows more than its own kind... hey we all have our preferences... if your Mac likes it that way - so be it, I'll try not to share my opinions on it

 

[-Hackintosh-]

Did you have Snow Leopard, and then upgrade to Lion? A lot of people have performance issues when they do that.

 

[k995]

Only right at the beginning. Windows quickly becomes chunky and slow.

Have an imac and several windows 7 PC's , been running without any hitch or slowdown for over a year now .

And I do install a lot more software on the 7's then on the OSX .

You are probably taking about an older windows version .

 

[takeshi74]

You should try a clean install WITHOUT restoring from Time Machine, which will essentially bring back any problem you had before…

^ This. The point of a wipe/reinstall for troubleshooting is to get to a "known good" state.

 

[BeachChair]

Ok, so you probably now me as the person bit..ch!ng 24/7 about how slow my mac is.

I get the beach ball every 20 seconds, in Safari, mail, setting so on and so forth
20-30 seconds to enter standby and over a decade to turn on

Anyway, yesterday I installed windows via bootcamp so that I could play some games and test out my intel hd 3000 performance. Guess what? My Mac hasn't been more snappier!!

UNDER 1 seconds to stand by
App open in under 2-3 seconds

WTTTFF??? This isn't supposed to be normal, especially on a Mac.


I always though my HDD was the problem, but it was the OS actually.


(NOTE) I have 20/270gb free space on my Mac OS and 3/30GB free space on windows 7.

Sounds like you have the exact same problem my GF's Macbook used to have. It all came down to some corrupt sectors on the hard disk. Doing clean installs would only help for a while before the OS happened to once again start putting essential files and pageswaps in these corrupt sectors.
Tl;dr: Get a new hard disk.

 

[deannnnn]

+1 on doing a fresh install. By restoring from Time Machine you essentially reinstalled all of the problems causing your Mac to be slow, back onto your Mac.