iMac performance question

[ks-man]

I have an early 2009 iMac 24" with a 3.06 processor and 4gb of ram. I can't remember how it was when I first got it, but for a while now it seems to be very slow compared to what I would expect. After a restart the first time I open up many applications they bounce a number of times (10-20) before the app will open. It is particularly bad on Chrome, iTunes and iPhoto. Even if it hasn't been restarted recently I find that apps take a long time open and other tasks just aren't that snappy compared to what I would expect from a still high end machine.

I also have a late 2010 MBA with a 1.86 processor and also 4gb of ram and it is far quicker at pretty much all tasks. I know the MBA has a Flash hard drive which will contribute but I wouldn't think the iMac should be so much slower than the MBA.

Going on memory I feel like my upgrade to Snow Leopard which was supposed to make the iMac faster on regular tasks didn't have much of an impact. I didn't do a clean install then and I'm wondering if I should go through the arduous task of finally doing a clean install. Before I do that is there anything else people would recommend to try before the clean install?

Thanks for the help.

 

[spacepower7]

Download the 10.6.7 Combo update and reinstall. It's about 1GB in size and it will reinstall every 10.6.x update between 10.6 and the current 10.6.7.

Sometimes doing this fixes bugs. Also repair permissions in Disk Utility in your Applications/Utilities folder.

 

[eljanitor]

Update the OS to the most recent version. Run a permissions check, and possibly a repair. Defrag the hard drive. That should help you out.

Another question I would ask you is: What is the percentage of free space on your main hard drive?

 

[ks-man]

Something I read on a different thread talks about an issue where Spotlight tries to index a Bootcamp drive. I did the suggestion here and created a file called .metadata_never_index in the root folder of my Bootcamp drive and this may have solved the problem. I'll need to play around with the computer for a couple of days but opening applications seem to be much snappier. Chrome opened in 4 bounces after a restart which has never happened and Mail opened on the first bounce.

Other people who use Bootcamp may want to try this method and see if their computer starts to perform better.

 

[ks-man]

Wow, just using it for 15 mins and I can feel a massive difference. It seems to be a secret around here, I'll start a new thread to make sure people see it.

 

[antman2x2]

Glad to see you got this fixed! I was gonna say, your system isnt old at all and 10-20 bounces is... not good.

But good job finding the solution!