Macbook Trouble - slower than expected

[adviolin]

I bought a macbook (the white midline model with 2GB ram) in early February, and am generally very happy with my purchase, but I can't help feel as if something is slightly off. I notice lags in such simple things as switching windows, or closing tabs. Sometimes it even takes half a second for text to appear after I've typed it. Also, in the first two months, the fans never ran at all (unless I'd used a computationally intensive program, which was rare) Today, the fan was on all day, even when nothing was going on. I use the computer to read email, use the internet and chat with my friends - nothing fancy. I've used mac G4 and iMac machines and they are all blazingly fast. I can't help feel gipped that it takes 5 seconds to open firefox in the morning when on the iMacs at our school it opens instantly.

Overall this computer is much better than the one I had before. Am I being too picky in expecting the macbook to be faster than this? Is there a way I can check to see if there might be a problem? Any help would be great. Thanks to everyone in advance.

 

[Zwhaler]

First thing I would do is go to activity moniter, and check your Page Outs (under system memory) tell me that number.

I occasionally run programs like OnyX to clean up the system and give it a performance boost. There isn't much else you can do to speed up your system. Perhaps you should have gone with a MacBook Pro...

 

[adviolin]

Page ins/outs are 44814/0

 

[Zwhaler]

Well, your system seems to be running fine, so I guess this is a case of high expectations I would still recommend OnyX, it may help boost your performance.

 

[erikamsterdam]

Perhaps you should have gone with a MacBook Pro...

The Macbook Pro does not open Firefox any faster than a Macbook, that is a silly remark. Same harddisk, same processor.
5 seconds is way too long, especially with 2GB. My Macbook does it in just over a second or so.
Maybe you can try to make a new User and check how it responds if you log in as that new user. Maybe something went wrong in your user profile. Is it just FF that is slow?

 

[Zwhaler]

MacBook Pro does have a faster C2D inside it, but either way if you want a new computer that bad wait for Santa Rosa. I second trying a new user. If the problem goes away, use the new user and transfer your files. Those times are way too long for a 2 Ghz computer. My 2.33 iMac opens FF within one little icon bounce.

 

[gr8tfly]

Next time your fans are running when you're not expecting them to, check Activity Monitor to try and track down what's taking up your CPU %. (tell it to show "all processes")

Launch times can vary - I just launched FF several times: 1st was 5 sec, next was less than 1. After running Activity Monitor, it took about 2. (2.33GHz MBP C2D, 3GB RAM)