Why does my powerbook suck?

[solum]

I have a G4 powerbook, which used to be awesome, but is starting to run super s l o w. Now, the 60 gig HDD has only 10 gig left...is this likely to be the cause of the crap performance, or are there other obvious things I should be checking out? I am mainly noticing the bad performance in cubase, which i hadn't previously had any trouble with.

[marcus]

Man, Ive been using a Mac Mini for a while now and in comparison to my top-spec PC its such a slouch! Theres better mac experts than me on this forum but Id say that the disc usage probably doesnt help matters, and if youve not upgraded to Tiger then it might be worthwhile, I found it faster to use than Panther. I dont know of many tweaks you can do to improve speed on a Mac myself, have you found that its gotten slower over time as then it might be that the apps you use now are more resource hungry than when you first got it?

Im sure theres a whole heap of performance related things you can do, the others are sure to advise soon enough.

[solum]

Man, Ive been using a Mac Mini for a while now and in comparison to my top-spec PC its such a slouch! Theres better mac experts than me on this forum but Id say that the disc usage probably doesnt help matters, and if youve not upgraded to Tiger then it might be worthwhile, I found it faster to use than Panther. I dont know of many tweaks you can do to improve speed on a Mac myself, have you found that its gotten slower over time as then it might be that the apps you use now are more resource hungry than when you first got it?

Im sure theres a whole heap of performance related things you can do, the others are sure to advise soon enough.

The thing is, since I switched to mac (2 yrs ago), I have been constantly impressed by the consistency of my computer--it doesn't crash, etc etc. But it isn't as fast as a similarly priced PC, and it's starting to drive me crazy now that it goes slow. It has got slower over time, massively so; in fact I maxed out the RAM but that only helped for about a month or so. Hmmmmm.

Macs are funny--I have a complete love/hate relationship with mine.

[muddy]

marcus, compared to your top spec the mac mini is bound to be a slouch. it's the lowest of low entry machines! it's like saying your brand new Ford Focus isn't as fast as your M3 Beemer.

it's pokey primarily because of the low spec drive, a 4200 RPM laptop drive. Probably low speed to keep the heat down in the tiny enclosure. Upgrade to a 5400 or 7200 RPM drive and you'll notice an immeadiate difference.

the most important thing you can ever do with a mac running OS X is to buy more RAM. NOW! anything less than 1GB is criminal. You'll double the speed by simply doubling the ram. best place to buy RAM is http://www.crucial.com/uk
Macs are a little picky about RAM compared to PCs, and Crucical always sell good chips.

The mac may need defragging, although this isn't as much of a problem as it used to be, as the system will defrag any file under 20MB when executed/opened automagically.

As a rule, try and keep about 20% of your total disk space free, so the system has a good amount of swap disk space free to take over. Anything less, and the system is trying to write down memory data into fragmented little pockets because the 512MB isn't enough for the system, Mail, Safari and iTunes, and on a 4200RPM drive it's gonna go nuts!

I have 1.4Ghz Mac Mini at home, and love it. I've kept the system as clean as possible, only installing Default Folder and Quicksilver as my utils. I do web design and dev on it and graphic design. no problems. oh, and MAME.

I have a 1Ghz Powerbook 12" which at times feels quicker than the mini, but it's purely down to disk access time.

I use Firefox on the powerbook, as it's quicker and less of a memory hog than Safari. Install the Flash and Ad blockers in Firefox and it's ace.

I have a dual 533 G4 under the stairs with about a terabyte of disk space acting as the house server. that thing is nearly as fast as the Powerbook, still, simply because of the disk speeds. Oh, and OS X in dual proc macs is like working on glass, it's super smooth, which whilst doesn't mean it's faster, it just "feels" faster.

As one of you said, upgrade to Tiger, as it's a lot better. Just don't use too many widgets, they slaughter the system too.

hope this helps a little. Anything else, just ask

mud

[solum]

Thanks for your reply mud!

I have maxed out the RAM at 640Mb so I reckon it must just be b/c the HDD is so full. I was thinking that I might get an external FireWire drive, copy the whole lot over, format the powerbook, then copy back the stuff I need on a regular basis. Sound like a good idea?

(Oh, and I'll get Tiger too)

[muddy]

maxed out the ram at 640MB?
How did you do that? What model Powerbook is it? Checked Crucial for a RAM upgrade?

Yeah, getting an external drive is a great idea. But remember, an external HD is not backing up, as they can still go bad, so make sure you burn anything you intend keeping long term to CD/DVD.

[solum]

maxed out the ram at 640MB?
How did you do that? What model Powerbook is it? Checked Crucial for a RAM upgrade?

Yeah, getting an external drive is a great idea. But remember, an external HD is not backing up, as they can still go bad, so make sure you burn anything you intend keeping long term to CD/DVD.

Its an 867 12", with 512MB built in, so 640 is the max

EDIT: Sorry, I was being stupid; I mean it had 128 built-in. :doh:

[andrewfee]

There are utilities to help speed things up by cleaning caches, repairing permissions etc. I've never actually had to use them though, so I can't say how well they'll work.

I've often seen OnyX highly recommended.

http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html

It does seem strange though, OSX usually doesn't slow down (at least not nearly as much as Windows) over time. If OnyX doesn't help, try running the hardware test disc and doing a full test. (will take a while)

[muddy]

Its an 867 12", with 512MB built in, so 640 is the max

let me get this right, sorry if i'm being a little thick! you have 512MB installed that came with the powerbook. You've fitted another 128MB taking it to 640?

You could remove the 128MB chip and add a 512MB instead, taking you upto 1024MB... click here

This would give you a massive boost.

[Paleface]

Muddy: technically, the RevA 12" doesn't support a gig of RAM.

Solum: have you upgraded to Tiger? I have exactly the same spec laptop as you, and ever since moving to Tiger, in general, the processor overheats more, the fans come on more (which annoys me) - however, in terms of responsiveness, it's usually OK. Audio software in particularly isn't quite as sprightly as before - I see you mentioned Cubase. Still, it's noticeable that it's a two year old machine. And my battery life is dying... the usual "old battery" problem.

Have you repaired disk permissions? That's always worth trying, I've found. And how hot is it getting now?

[muddy]

Muddy: technically, the RevA 12" doesn't support a gig of RAM.

ahh I see, soldered 128MB on the board and a 512MB installed. Helps if the information is laid out in that manner!

[marcus]

Oops I forgot, on my Mac Mini I stuck 1GB in it and it made it a hell of a lot faster, obviously, for my basic needs of web browsing, Itunes etc its fine but anything more intensive such as importing and converting from a videocamera is very slow. I think increasing the RAM and putting on Tiger is the best way to go.

[muddy]

if you are doing digital video editing the the Mac mini is just not cut out for the task. Best thing to do is get an external Firewire drive, with a 7200 RPM drive and use that to dump all your video to.

You probably know that drives are pretty cheap now, I got an external 250GB Firewire Lacie drive from dabs.com for about ?150

[solum]

Have you repaired disk permissions? That's always worth trying, I've found. And how hot is it getting now?

It doesn't get any hotter than before, but that is still pretty hot.

I'm going to repair disk permissions now, and we'll see how that affects things...

Cheers for the help guys, will update if anything works...

[solum]

Thanks for the onyX suggestion: seems to have done the trick!