iMac running sluggish! Help

[thechris69]

Alrighty.... im proud to say that i purchased a 17 inch C2D iMac back in september when I was 15 years old, all with money that I worked hard for...

Now, about 7 months after I recieved the beast... im noticing minor-inconviences that werent apparent back when I first got the iMac...

1. Slower boot-times... I could brag to my friends that my cpu could boot in under 20 seconds... now its up to about 30 seconds

2. Takes much longer for basic apps to open, such as... iTunes, safari, msn messenger... etc..

There are more. and im not willing to list all of them... as you can see my iMac wasnt the beast as it once was... some problems I think that relate to this minor slowdown are: mass downloads, age, constant use.. etc..

Maybe I need more ram? I only have a gig...

The hard-drive wasnt as full as it once was... from 160 gb to about 45 gb now...

So my question is... is there any programs I can download that can clean up my computer and make it running as smooth as it once did without re-installing 10.4?? Thanks, any help would be RIDICULOUSLY appreciated

 

[Lovesong]

One of the more common things that happens, especially given your slower boor times, is that you have too many login items. Look under your user account. There should be a tab there that will list all the items that are opening once you login. The best thing to do is to get rid of them all.
Another thing that might have happened, and I'm speaking from experience here, is that you tried downloading and installing something like ShapeShifter. That thing kills your speed, your boot time, and eats up RAM like popcorn. I doubt that your RAM is the issue- a gig should be enough, unless you're trying to run Photoshop, Shake, and Aperture at the same time, and you have plenty of hard drive space (when you get to under 4 GBs, you might notice some issues).

 

[WillJS]

Also try:

Sys Prefs --> Startup Disk --> Make sure "Mac OS X on xxx" is selected.

 

[Sam*]

i sort of had the same problem as you

but i just reinstalled osx, but then funnily enough first time it came out slower

so done it again and now its all back up to speed, still feels a tad slower than it did on day one though


but you could try onyX, might help

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/system_disk_utilities/onyx.html

 

[thechris69]

i should of stated this at the begininng.... are there anny programs other then Disk Utility to just go around and clean up all the garbage in the computer... disk utility i find does absolutely nothing... so similar programs that clean up ur computer are what is needed for this predicament... any suggestions would be spectacular!

 

[dartzorichalcos]

i should of stated this at the begininng.... are there anny programs other then Disk Utility to just go around and clean up all the garbage in the computer... disk utility i find does absolutely nothing... so similar programs that clean up ur computer are what is needed for this predicament... any suggestions would be spectacular!

Try Bye Bye Dashboard if you want. Dashboard can be a memory hog.

 

[MacBass]

Another slightly more involved process you could try is to empty your Cache folder. Its a little trick I picked up from Apple Care.

 

[Erendiox]

i should of stated this at the begininng.... are there anny programs other then Disk Utility to just go around and clean up all the garbage in the computer... disk utility i find does absolutely nothing... so similar programs that clean up ur computer are what is needed for this predicament... any suggestions would be spectacular!

You should take a look at Onyx.