My Mac Pro arrives! ...(is it supposed to be this slow browsing?)

[dupedd]

After much waiting and watching I was able to snag a 2.66ghz MP refurb(1GB ram) and it just arrived yesterday. I get everything all hooked up and immediately go through my similar motions, web-browsing and keeping up with my regular sites and find that the MP is really only comparable speedwise to my Dell Dimension t700r(with 500mb ram)...ie- not fast. Now, I'm planning on buying more RAM before I start recording music with it just as soon as I find out what RAM, how much and where. I need at least an extra GB, but this just seems wrong somehow...
So is this common? It really isn't very fast at all. Could I have something setup wrong somehow?

 

[alexprice]

Web browsing is dependant on internet connection speeds.

What connection do you have?

 

[dupedd]

It's Cox high speed internet. I think it's cable. I'm not sure the difference between csble, broadband, DSL. They're all just words to me but I know for sure we don't have dial-up or anything.

 

[ortuno2k]

Check and make sure that you're not using your internet connection for other stuff - like downloading updates, etc.

If you're updating the software and haven't noticed, your browsing speeds will suffer.

 

[pdpfilms]

A Mac Pro is not going to fly at browsing. It's going to be comparable to any other Mac from the last two years or so with simple tasks such as this.

Where it's going to fly is in encoding, ripping, or any processor-intensive task. Word processing, emailing, IMing, iTunesing, browsing, and many other tasks will feel no different.

 

[apfhex]

not fast

Define "not fast" though. It is just the waiting for pages to load? Does it scroll slowly? Do Flash animations play slowly? Is it slow on all websites?

Safari occasionally gets hung up for me (especially when loading lots of tabs), but it's generally fast. Not much different than IE7 or Firefox on Windows Vista on my Mac Pro. But if you want you can try Firefox or Camino or Opera or Shiira or one of the other multitudes of Mac browsers and see if they're "faster".

One thing you'll want to make sure is you have the latest version of the Flash plugin, and if you're viewing sites with WMV content, get the Flip4Mac QuickTime plugin.

 

[dupedd]

Yeah, specifically it takes a while for pages to load and it's on every website I've been to I think. It's really about the same speed browsing as my old Windows XP computer. AND i'm not running anything else, no updating going on. It's just sorta slow, ya know. I'm wondering if I could have set anything up wrong in system preferences somehow. Will browsing and downloading speed up when I get more RAM?

Thanks for WMV plugin idea

 

[disconap]

This is probably a dumb question, but you've done all the basic debugging, right? Repaired permissions, updated software/OS, run your hardware test disc, etc?

 

[grahamtearne]

Of course web browsing speed is going to be the same as your old windows xp computer. The web browsing speed is limited by your internet download speed. If your browsing is too slow maybe you need to look at upgrading your internet connection.

Adding ram will have no effect on your web browsing whatsoever. However, having said that if you actually mean your web browser is slow and unresponsive (ie takes a long time to load the browser, struggles with plugins etc) then you may have some issues. BUT download speed and web page loading times have nothing to do with how much ram or what cpu you have, its determined by your internet connection. For example a £500 Mac mini and a £2000 Mac pro will be the same at web browsing when using the same internet connection (although the Mac pro will obviosuly initially load the browser faster and what not)

 

[dupedd]

I've updated the software/OS. I don't know what you mean by "repair permissions" though. Hmm and why do I need to run my hardware test disk? Seriously Ive never setup a new computer before...


Okay, so maybe I'll look into a faster connection service. Maybe DSL possibly? Is it faster. Yeah, the browser loads fast enough and no trouble downloading plugins, it's just loading new pages. I didn't know browsing speed had solely to do with the internet connection. Learn something new everyday


anyway, I'm loving my new MP, even if it is a little slow

 

[brooker]

I've updated the software/OS. I don't know what you mean by "repair permissions" though. Hmm and why do I need to run my hardware test disk? Seriously Ive never setup a new computer before...


Okay, so maybe I'll look into a faster connection service. Maybe DSL possibly? Is it faster. Yeah, the browser loads fast enough and no trouble downloading plugins, it's just loading new pages. I didn't know browsing speed had solely to do with the internet connection. Learn something new everyday


anyway, I'm loving my new MP, even if it is a little slow

You can test your internet connection speed here:

http://speakeasy.net/speedtest/

Click the name of the city closest to you. It will run a test, and tell you both your download and upload speeds. Once it does, post those numbers here and let us know how it did!

 

[Multimedia]

You Need To Add Two 2GB Sticks At Least

After much waiting and watching I was able to snag a 2.66ghz MP refurb(1GB ram) and it just arrived yesterday. I get everything all hooked up and immediately go through my similar motions, web-browsing and keeping up with my regular sites and find that the MP is really only comparable speedwise to my Dell Dimension t700r(with 500mb ram)...ie- not fast. Now, I'm planning on buying more RAM before I start recording music with it just as soon as I find out what RAM, how much and where. I need at least an extra GB, but this just seems wrong somehow...
So is this common? It really isn't very fast at all. Could I have something setup wrong somehow?

Buy two 2GB sticks from Omni via Ramseeker for $423.96 + $14 for Big Heat Sinks. anything less than 1GB per core will not work properly. You have to phone Omni, tell them you want the bigger heat sinks but that you have the Ramseeker price above. $437.96 total. Do not buy less than 4GB more RAM or you will be hurting yourself. And don't waste slots buying 1GB sticks that cost the same.

 

[dupedd]

Well I did the test over there at speakeasy; 5109 KBPS download and 2123 KBPS upload. I did it a couple times and they varied, by 125KBPS for upload. Is this good?

I've read about getting no less than 2 2GB Sticks at a time but I don't know if I can swing that kind of money at this time(I've spent a small fortune already on my new MP and display and items for my recording studio). 4GB's just seems like overkill a bit for me. The most I'll be running at any one time anytime soon is Logic for recording and those won't be HUGE projects really. I see the point of buying the most RAM at up front to avoid having to upgrade later but I'd also just sort of expect prices to come down for RAM overtime and it not really be such a big deal "shooting myself in the foot" buying smaller sticks now. Does that make any sense?

 

[daveL]

Browsers do a lot of DNS lookups. Perhaps your ISP has crappy DNS servers. Try opendns.com. It's free, fast and provides phishing filters. All you have to do is enter their 2 DNS server IP addresses in your network settings for the network interface you are using. If you have a router, you can just set them there, but it doesn't sound as though you are very network savvy.

 

[QCassidy352]

Well I did the test over there at speakeasy; 5109 KBPS download and 2123 KBPS upload. I did it a couple times and they varied, by 125KBPS for upload. Is this good?

I got 1148 down/348 up on my macbook. I have verizon 768k DSL. I don't consider my browsing "slow," but pages don't open instantly or anything. I've never used a computer that didn't take at least a second or two to open most pages.

About the RAM - of course more RAM is good, but you don't need more than 1 GB to surf the web (unless you're going to some seriously multimedia-heavy sites... no pun intended, Multimedia.) If you're seeing slowness in web browsing, I think it's far more likely to be either your connection or the speed of the servers your are connecting to than a RAM issue.

 

[thagomizer]

This was posted on xlr8yourmac.com a while back. Certain brands of cable modems have poor performance with Macs:

----
This reminded me of a comment last year on some brands of cable modems having lower performance on the Mac. (I couldn't remember the link to the thread on that in the past - there was one on the Apple forums, but Bruce sent a link to the thread in a reply below.)
Also as a FYI, I had someone last week say that the Airport Extreme 2007-001 update (required to install before the 802.11n enabler) broke compatibilty with WEP on 2wire.com routers (2wire.com products are often OEM equipment for some cable and DSL providers.)
Bruce sent a link to a previous Apple forum thread on Macs and Cable Modems:

" The Apple Discussions link you mentioned on the Cable Modems is
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2985422
It's amazing how many people refuse to believe that the Chipset is the problem, yet everyone that got rid of their...
"All Linksys Cable Modems
All Motorola Cable Modems except for the SB5120
All Scientific Atlanta Cable Modem"
Fixed their problem as far as I can tell.
-Bruce "

----


Also, go into your Network control panel, open up each of your interfaces, and turn OFF IPv6 in each one. This will speed up your DNS lookups a bit.

 

[Cameront9]

Are you using Safari to browse? Because Many users perceive Safari to be slower because it waits to download the whole page before showing to you (or most of it) rather than loading as you go as in Firefox or IE.

I'm surprised no one mentioned this, actually.

 

[apfhex]

Well I did the test over there at speakeasy; 5109 KBPS download and 2123 KBPS upload. I did it a couple times and they varied, by 125KBPS for upload. Is this good?

Well, how fast of a connection are you paying for? And there's always going to be some variation between tests due to various conditions.

"It's amazing how many people refuse to believe that the Chipset is the problem, yet everyone that got rid of their...
"All Linksys Cable Modems
All Motorola Cable Modems except for the SB5120
All Scientific Atlanta Cable Modem"
Fixed their problem as far as I can tell."

I've only ever had a Motorola SB4220 and Scientific-Atlanta modem and they both perform(ed) absolutely as fast as Comcast allows. So if you're not using a Linksys, Motorola, or S-A, what does that even leave?

I'm surprised no one mentioned this, actually.

I asked the OP above what browser they were using because I was thinking the same thing, although I really don't notice the difference much.

I really think it's just the OP's internet connection that's the only factor here, and no faster computer can do anything about that.

 

[miniConvert]

Don't all be confusing the OP's net connection throughput with possible latency problems.

You can have 10 megs up and down, but if you've got horrible latency then browsing is going to feel slow as hell. Trust me, I used to have Internet via Satellite and, while it was lovely having the bandwidth at the time and great once a download was underway, browsing was just death.

Also, definitely try different DNS servers.

Anyway, I think it's safe to say that the Mac Pro is not slow - at anything

 

[jaguarx]

This is nothing to do with your MP and all to do with your network and net connection. Adding vast quantities of ram isn't going to help you one iota with browsing speeds. The gig of ram per core thing is nice, it'll certainly help it be faster with high-load stuff like encoding but unless you're going to be maxing out the thing anytime soon it's not *needed* as multimedia suggests.

 

[dupedd]

Browsers do a lot of DNS lookups. Perhaps your ISP has crappy DNS servers. Try opendns.com. It's free, fast and provides phishing filters. All you have to do is enter their 2 DNS server IP addresses in your network settings for the network interface you are using. If you have a router, you can just set them there, but it doesn't sound as though you are very network savvy.

I went and changed my DNS servers out for their's. IT IS NOW FASTER BROWSING, I'm glad to say BTW, Ive just been using Safari so far. I just dowloaded firefox so I'll check that but Safari is significantly faster. Thanks for the tip!
What did you mean by the router comment though?

Also, go into your Network control panel, open up each of your interfaces, and turn OFF IPv6 in each one. This will speed up your DNS lookups a bit.

I did this as well but I was wondering if there were any drawbacks to turning it off. It was set to automatic.

One thing you'll want to make sure is you have the latest version of the Flash plugin

Which flash plugin do you mean? I picked up Adobe. (BTW...I just got through checking out the Apple software pages for the first time! I had no idea there was so much cool stuff!)

 

[rectangular]

Really, you need at least 10GB of ram for a website to load, and if you want websites with a JPG to load in under an hour, your really going to need an OCTO mac pro

 

[daveL]

I went and changed my DNS servers out for their's. IT IS NOW FASTER BROWSING, I'm glad to say BTW, Ive just been using Safari so far. I just dowloaded firefox so I'll check that but Safari is significantly faster. Thanks for the tip!
What did you mean by the router comment though?



I did this as well but I was wondering if there were any drawbacks to turning it off. It was set to automatic.


Which flash plugin do you mean? I picked up Adobe. (BTW...I just got through checking out the Apple software pages for the first time! I had no idea there was so much cool stuff!)

The router comment was referring to a home network with its own router connected to the cable or DSL modem. If you have a router (Linksys, Netgear, Buffalo, Apple etc.), you can set the DNS server addresses in the router, so you don't have to set them in each machine on your local network. It wasn't clear to me that you understood networking well enough to want to be bothered with this, since it's certainly not necessary.

IPv6 is not widely used, at this point. Turning it off won't hurt anything, and having it off gives you slightly better performance.

The only Flash plug-in comes from Adobe, so you should have the latest one, if you recently downloaded it.

 

[daveL]

Really, you need at least 10GB of ram for a website to load, and if you want websites with a JPG to load in under an hour, your really going to need an OCTO mac pro

That was a very helpful comment. Thanks for sharing.

 

[zen.state]

A Mac Pro is not going to fly at browsing. It's going to be comparable to any other Mac from the last two years or so with simple tasks such as this.

Where it's going to fly is in encoding, ripping, or any processor-intensive task. Word processing, emailing, IMing, iTunesing, browsing, and many other tasks will feel no different.

this guy knows whats up