Help me with my 2011 11" MBA performance

[Quackington]

Hi there,

I'm another user tempted by the latest Macbook Pro refresh, but I'm wondering if I should try to get another year out of my 2011 MBA. I've had it for 7 years now. I also have a 2006 iMac, but that machine is so ancient now and can barely do anything (I've not switched it on in ages as a result).

Here are the specs:

- MacBook Air 11" from 2011 running Sierra. 1.8GHz Intel i7, 4GB RAM, 256GB SSD.

This is fine for light browsing and word processing (or light Excel work), but have a few too many tabs open or (God forbid) a YouTube video, and the machine gets very hot and the fan goes off really loud and spends ages running. I often leave my MBA sleeping overnight. This week, I put it to sleep not long after I'd been using it fo a while, the fans had been on quite loudly. The next morning when I woke the MBA, it had shut down and restarted - it just said an unexpected shutdown had happened. I wonder if this was due to the fan being on quite heavily and the machine not liking the lid shut and being put to sleep whilst it's hot?

Are there any recommended things I can do to improve the performance of the MBA? Here are a few things I'm thinking about:

1. High Sierra - I'm running Sierra at the moment. Is it worth upgrading to High Sierra? I was running Mountain Lion on it for ages until upgrading to Sierra about a year ago. I'm just worried about having the latest OS on such an old machine, I guess. Especially one with 4GB ram, which is the max it can have.

2. Any recommendations for browser optimisation? I mainly use Firefox (occasionally Chrome) and don't like to use ad blockers as I like to support the industry, but given how hot this machine gets and how loud the fan gets...I'd be open to suggestions.

I've checked memory. Out of 256GB, I have 80GB left. I'm actually unsure of what's taking up so much space, so I'll have a dig around. 80GB spare is a fair amount though, right? Any recommendations on cleaning up the drive or how to check what's taking the most space would be most welcome.

Thanks.

 

[Audit13]

There isn't much you can do since the ram can't be increased.

80 GB of free space is fine.

High Sierra is not going to significantly increase performance based on my change over from Sierra to high Sierra.

Not sure if Firefox uses a lot of ram but Safari tends to be best.

 

[Quackington]

There isn't much you can do since the ram can't be increased.

80 GB of free space is fine.

High Sierra is not going to significantly increase performance based on my change over from Sierra to high Sierra.

Not sure if Firefox uses a lot of ram but Safari tends to be best.

Thanks for responding. Did you upgrade to High Sierra on an MBA?

I used Safari a good few years ago but it used to crash on me regularly so I switched to Firefox. I’m sure there has been improvements since then, but I’m very used to Firefox now.

 

[KGB7]

Clean it. Repaste it. Wipe the hard drive and do a fresh install.

 

[Audit13]

Thanks for responding. Did you upgrade to High Sierra on an MBA?

I used Safari a good few years ago but it used to crash on me regularly so I switched to Firefox. I’m sure there has been improvements since then, but I’m very used to Firefox now.

I'm running High Sierra on my late 2013 13" Pro and early 2015 Air.

 

[Quackington]

Clean it. Repaste it. Wipe the hard drive and do a fresh install.

Should this improve things? I'd really like to avoid it if possible. I've not done a clean erase and install for ages, probably on my old PowerBook 12". Just concerned about the fuss of backing up stuff, moving things to an external drive and losing preference settings etc.

 

[Mrbobb]

Just concerned about the fuss of backing up stuff, moving things to an external drive and losing preference settings etc.

If u don't have an ext backup drive to begin with maybe this is a good time to do this necessary thing that people cry about when things go awry.

Sudden shutdown: I wager your original battery is about to die. If u just want to keep this for another year, ur looking for a 3rd party battery, $40-$80.

Loud fan: Ask Apple how much to clean, replace fan, and re-paste heatsink if u don't want to do it.

if all these is too much for you, New Laptop.

 

[cincygolfgrrl]

Just concerned about the fuss of backing up stuff, moving things to an external drive and losing preference settings etc.

I run High Sierra on my 2011 11" i5 4GB 128GB MacBook Air. It works as well as it ever did. High Sierra is the last OS we'll be able to upgrade a 2011 MBA, if that figures into your calculations.

I have to agree with Mrbobb, external USB drives are pretty cheap. Make a backup—use Time Machine if nothing else. As you've described your MBA, it could be near its end. It would be a shame to lose seven years data.

 

[MrGimper]

If u don't have an ext backup drive to begin with maybe this is a good time to do this necessary thing that people cry about when things go awry.

Sudden shutdown: I wager your original battery is about to die. If u just want to keep this for another year, ur looking for a 3rd party battery, $40-$80.

Loud fan: Ask Apple how much to clean, replace fan, and re-paste heatsink if u don't want to do it.

if all these is too much for you, New Laptop.

Re-paste is simple. I'd not done it since back in the early 2000's when i built machines, but managed to do it the other day on my 2014 13" MBP. Open it up, re-paste it, give it a good blow out with compressed air and a decent (non-static) brush and you'd probably be surprised.

 

[MBAir2010]

I have the exact MacBook that is runnng better after going back to El Capitan just 2 months ago.
I’m do extensive photo editing and web searching for photos.
The sites like espn, bbc, mlb stream better and crisper than highest Sierra.
When the temp is above 90 degrees, the fan kicks on more than a cooler day.
I’m not telling you to regress, but that made me enjoy my MacBook Air again.

 

[weezerr]

I put a new battery in mine last year and it brought it back to life. Blew out tons of dust and crud that was in there as well. Still limping along with the 2011 until the end of the year to see if a new 13 product comes out like the rumors say.

Also seems like 10.14 is going to be a great release which you can easily get working on legacy devices with the dosdude patcher.

 

[Boyd01]

Just concerned about the fuss of backing up stuff, moving things to an external drive and losing preference settings etc.

Do you really not have a full backup? If not, then forget all this other stuff and get at least two external drives. Carbon Copy Cloner will make an exact copy of your internal ssd and you should not lose any preferences if you restore from it. I have done this several times before on various machines when swapping disks. I even installed a clone of my MBA on a new Mac Mini and everything was identical when I started up. The only thing that might be necessary after restoring from a clone is entering a few software serial numbers from Adobe, Microsoft, etc. programs.

I would not be comfortable without at least two backups of all my computers.

 

[Quackington]

I run High Sierra on my 2011 11" i5 4GB 128GB MacBook Air. It works as well as it ever did. High Sierra is the last OS we'll be able to upgrade a 2011 MBA, if that figures into your calculations.

I have to agree with Mrbobb, external USB drives are pretty cheap. Make a backup—use Time Machine if nothing else. As you've described your MBA, it could be near its end. It would be a shame to lose seven years data.

Do you really not have a full backup? If not, then forget all this other stuff and get at least two external drives. Carbon Copy Cloner will make an exact copy of your internal ssd and you should not lose any preferences if you restore from it. I have done this several times before on various machines when swapping disks. I even installed a clone of my MBA on a new Mac Mini and everything was identical when I started up. The only thing that might be necessary after restoring from a clone is entering a few software serial numbers from Adobe, Microsoft, etc. programs.

I would not be comfortable without at least two backups of all my computers.

Thanks for the responses, everyone.

Backing up - I'll be getting Western Digital HDD and will try to use Time Machine to back up. Last year, IIRC I upgraded from Mountain Lion to Sierra, around April/May time. On Mountain Lion, my time machine back-up would constant fail during the process. I can't remember if I tried it or not once I upgraded to Sierra. I just got annoyed at it and gave up.

Re. battery, I checked my battery info. It shows a cycle count of 306 and condition as normal. Surely that means the battery is alright? 306 for a laptop that is 7 years old.

 

[Boyd01]

On Mountain Lion, my time machine back-up would constant fail during the process. I can't remember if I tried it or not once I upgraded to Sierra. I just got annoyed at it and gave up.

So how annoyed would you be if you turned on your computer one day, it was dead and all your files were gone forever? Or maybe you'll come home and find that someone has stolen your computer?

Unless you just don't care, you should deal with this immediately. A seven year old computer with no backup? That's crazy!

 

[Quackington]

So how annoyed would you be if you turned on your computer one day, it was dead and all your files were gone forever? Or maybe you'll come home and find that someone has stolen your computer?

Unless you just don't care, you should deal with this immediately. A seven year old computer with no backup? That's crazy!

Hah, yes...I'd be very annoyed. But I suspect if my computer got stolen from my home, my back-up HDD would probably be stolen along with it!

 

[Boyd01]

That's always possible, and also why I said you need at least two backups. Stash one of them somewhere. A third backup stored off-site is also a good idea. Seriously... come up with a plan to preserve whatever data is important to you. I have several computers with different backup strategies. But my most important files are on the 512gb SSD in my 2013 MacBook Air. I have the following backups:

1. continuous wireless backups to an AirPort Time Capsule
2. continuous wireless backups to BackBlaze
3. weekly backups to a time machine disk that is stored off-site
4. monthly backups to bootable carbon copy clone disk that is stored in another room