Some Questions on Mountain Lion

[AmazingHenry]

Recently, I purchased an black MacBook 2.16GHz running Lion. I installed Mountain Lion with MacPostFactor, and I'm not exactly happy with it. I'm having two big problems:

1. Speed + Fans
Before I installed ML, I was using Lion for a bit. Lion was fast and the fans didn't come on a lot. After I installed ML, the OS seemed a bit slower (even though I heard it would be faster) and the fans are always on. The only time they turn off is if I leave the Mac sitting for 2 or 3 minutes with all apps closed (not an exaggeration!). Any tips on cooling down the Mac and making the OS speedier?
EDIT: Turns out the fans were always on and the OS slow because Spotlight was indexing! It'd done now, and the fans are still on more than they were in Lion, but they aren't on all the time anymore. The speed is better too. Now iMessage is my main problem.

2. iMessage
One of my top reasons for installing ML was iMessage. However, it doesn't let me sign in. I spent at least an hour on the phone with Apple about this, and after talking with this one person for a long time, I was directed to a hardware department that doesn't work with Apple ID or iMessage (LOL!). I did learn one thing with the first person though; my software is likely too old. Is there possibly a hack to get it working? Maybe use the Mavericks version of Messages? REAL help is much appreciated.

I like ML, but if it continues to run the fans 100% of the time and iMessage, my top reason for upgrading, won't work, I may just go back to Lion. It ran better and without fans.

Thanks.

 

[keysofanxiety]

ML isn't supported on your Mac for good reason, because the performance is poor. On higher spec machines it does run faster than Lion did, much like 7 ran faster than XP — providing the hardware can handle it.

Beyond maxing RAM/installing an SSD, nothing you can reasonably do on the software side to improve performance.

 

[AmazingHenry]

ML isn't supported on your Mac for good reason, because the performance is poor. On higher spec machines it does run faster than Lion did.

Beyond maxing RAM/installing an SSD, nothing you can reasonably do on the software side to improve performance.

Performance got much better after Spotlight finished indexing, as my edit says. Thanks though.

 

[AmazingHenry]

Contacted Apple a second time, and this time they took my code and registered iMessage. They said to give it a few hours.

Everything in this thread is solved!

 

[redheeler]

ML isn't supported on your Mac for good reason, because the performance is poor. On higher spec machines it does run faster than Lion did, much like 7 ran faster than XP — providing the hardware can handle it.

In once sentence you say it isn't supported because of poor performance, and the next you say it runs faster than the OS that is supported?

Let me try to clear things up for anyone confused by this: Mountain Lion was not unsupported because of poor performance. It will consistently run faster than Lion. The real reason Apple dropped support is unclear; maybe wanting to optimize the OS for newer hardware, or maybe planned obsolescence reasons, or both.

 

[keysofanxiety]

In once sentence you say it isn't supported because of poor performance, and the next you say it runs faster than the OS that is supported?

Let me try to clear things up for anyone confused by this: Mountain Lion was not unsupported because of poor performance. It will consistently run faster than Lion. The real reason Apple dropped support is unclear; maybe wanting to optimize the OS for newer hardware, or maybe planned obsolescence reasons, or both.

Re-read. I said on their machine. Otherwise it's a faster OS.

ML does not run faster than Lion if you're running it on a black MacBook with an Intel GMA 950 with 64MB VRAM, 3GB DDR2 667MHz RAM, T7400 C2D, 1.5Gb/s SATA, and all the rest of it. I don't think you appreciate just how slow those MacBooks are.

The hardware can't aptly handle the slightly faster animations or anything else that comes with the OS. That's why it wasn't supported for that machine in the first instance. Will it run? Barely. Will it run faster than Lion did? Not in a month of Sundays.

On practically any other Mac that is supported, Mountain Lion will run quicker. There will always be a cut off point where a faster OS will run slower on some machines due to hardware bottlenecks. I likened it to XP/7 but ironically Lion/ML is just as apt an example.

 

[redheeler]

ML does not run faster than Lion if you're running it on a black MacBook with an Intel GMA 950 with 64MB VRAM, 3GB DDR2 667MHz RAM, T7400 C2D, 1.5Gb/s SATA, and all the rest of it. I don't think you appreciate just how slow those MacBooks are.

I own a white MacBook with similar specifications. If good performance is what you're after, not running as current an OS as possible, Snow Leopard will roast both Lion and Mountain Lion. I'll admit I have yet to try anything newer than 10.6.8 on this hardware.

The hardware can't aptly handle the slightly faster animations or anything else that comes with the OS. That's why it wasn't supported for that machine in the first instance. Will it run? Barely. Will it run faster than Lion did? Not in a month of Sundays.

On practically any other Mac that is supported, Mountain Lion will run quicker. There will always be a cut off point where a faster OS will run slower on some machines due to hardware bottlenecks. I likened it to XP/7 but ironically Lion/ML is just as apt an example.

You're very much mistaken on this. I have a Late 2006 iMac 6,1; yes it's quite a bit better than the MacBook, but also unsupported by Mountain Lion. My first impression was that Mountain Lion ran noticeably faster doing tasks like browsing in Safari.

There is not some new acceleration technology introduced on the 2007+ supported Macs that Mountain Lion could suddenly take advantage of whereas Lion could not. The optimizations made in ML can be felt on unsupported hardware as well, and other owners of unsupported Macs have reported similar results.

 

[Isamilis]

I tried every version from SL, even tried installing SL in late 2011 MBP (which is not officially supported). I observe, the newer OS the slower it is. The test using benchmark may be only slightly difference, but you should try with many opened applications (which is common case in daily usage) which will show noticeable slower performance.
Obviously, some version could not compared head to head, because of incompatibility of the new HW to old OS, which make the performance of new OS in new HW *seems* faster than the old OS in the old HW. The performance difference is even clearer in the non-SSD machine..