After a year and a half owning one of the first Unibody MacBooks, i feel its time for a little polishing!
I have been considering a new HDD (probably a WD Scorpio Blue 500GB) along with a 4GB upgrade from 2GB provided by Crucial. However, I've been reading articles on SSDs and how the performance is unmatched. Considering the lowering prices, and the approxiamte equal price value of HDD/Ram and SSD, which path should I take that would increase the performace significantly?
I know the main question would be, well what do you use you're MacBook for. Primarly listening to music, surfing the internet, using iPhoto (for viewing and editing, iMovie (for the obvious movie editing I do a couple times a year), GarageBand (a unsigned musician that just loves recording and playing around), and the obvious student tools (office and iwork).
For one thing, games perform terribly. And they used to work quite well! I played through all of Mirror's Edge on this machine and everything was silky smooth. Same with COD5 *and* 6, though I do realize those games were very well optimized and designed from the start to have high frame rates. I also played through Dead Space on this.. the performance wasn't as great as on the other titles mentioned but it was absolutely playable and fun. Now, when I run Amnesia: The Dark Descent or Starcraft II, the performance is absolutely terrible. In Starcraft II I get less than 10 FPS and in both games, I noticed a strange effect. The performance fluctuates. It will run smoothly for about 2 seconds, then the frame rate goes to slideshow-level for about 2 or 3 seconds, then back to smooth, back to bad, ad infinitum.
I did what anyone would try as a first step and killed all apps, especially windowed apps but also background apps that shouldn't really make a difference normally..................
Well anyway, I got this MBP about 3 or 4 weeks ago. It runs great so far, but when I play a game, it will run fine, then about 10 to 15 minutes after I start, the performance will drop below 50% of what it was, then 10 minutes later, it seems to speed up again.
I've also noticed it seems to kick up performance again once the fan comes on.
So is this normal or some odd coincidence. Also, is there anyway I could prevent this period of low performance from happening.
Below are the specs to my Macbook pro and current version of the OS. I've been thinking about upgrading my OS but wondering if this will slow down my system. The only reason why I am considering to upgrade is because I want to purchase the Roxio Toast 10 Titanium and noticed its requires 10.5. Is it worth me to upgrade? If so how do I go about...I'm new to the macworld so I assume just go to the app store and ask for the cds to upgrade to the latest version?
System Version:Mac OS X 10.4.11 (8S2167) Kernel Version:Darwin 8.11.1 Boot Volume:Macintosh HD Capacity is 111.47 GB Available 65.88 GB
Model Name:MacBook Pro 15" Model Identifier:MacBookPro2,2 Processor Name:Intel Core 2 Duo Processor Speed:2.16 GHz Number Of Processors:1 Total Number Of Cores:2 L2 Cache (per processor):4 MB Memory:1 GB Bus Speed:667 MHz Boot ROM Version:MBP22.00A5.B07 SMC Version:1.12f5
I bought my first macbook a 13" white 1.83 ghz core 2 duo with 1gb ram and 60gb hard drive. Im trying to get myself over to the mac world so I bought this to see if I like it or not so far im loving it. My question is Will I see significant improvement in performance by upgraded the ram and hard drive?
I just installed 8 GB Crucial memory for my 13" MacBook Pro (Late-2011; 2.8 Ghz). I immediately noticed scrolling on safari was jumpy or skipping. It is like this in other applications as well. Even zooming in/out of pdf's and using iphoto. I only purchased this laptop in Feb, and this bothers me. I tested using the Geekbench app. Every benchmark was about equal or much higher except for Processor Integer Performance, more specifically "Image Decompress multi-threaded scalar." It went from 138.3 down to 134.3 Mpixels/sec. Do I have lemon memory? I would almost rather go back to the 4 GB if this laggy performance is a continual issue. One of the things I love about Mac's is now becoming irritating.
i'm planning on upgrading from my older MBP to a 15" unibody. i'm going back and forth whether or not i want the anti glare screen or not. does anyone have one? how are the colors compared with the glossy?
Just ordered 2 x 2GB memory for my MacBook.I did replace the hard drive when I bought it, but did not have the right screwdriver, so ended up ruining the screws.So can some one please tell me what screw drivers i need to succesfully do this upgrade?
I needed to upgrade this unit in order to increase performance with VMWARE Fusion as I needed to use a few Windows 7 features and Applications... and although Mac OS is OK... I have to recognize that some features of Windows 7 are better and I need some only windows applications.
So I researched online the option of upgrading memory and HD. I read mixed opinions and experiences with non Apple Memory. But took the chance and during a recent trip to the US I purchased the Kingston upgrade kit... installed it... and so far no problems. I got a very noticeable increase in startup and working performance with Windows 7 and Fusion. Unfortunately I lost my notes regarding performance readings... sorry.
I was very intrigued with the Hybrid Seagate 500GB Momentus XT. Also read a lot of mixed experiences. I also picked up a unit during my trip to the US but waited to install it when I got back to Spain. I just installed it and made some simple timings to check the performance......................
I just got a Early 2011 Macbook Pro 15" i7 that has a broken scissor for the "x" key (I still have the black "x" key itself.  Would the scissors from an late 2007 Macbook Pro 15" be compatible (I've got an old dead keyboard for it that had coffee spilled on it)?Â
I own a 900 MHz G3 ibook (v2.3) with 256 MB of ram running 10.2.8. It's been good to me, but over the years it's performance has started to decrease. Most applications load up and run fine, but web browsers can become a little slow when I have multiple windows or tabs open. What should I do to get rid of this problem? Upgrade the memory to 640MB of ram? Update the OS to 10.4?
I have a fairly old imac (it's about three years old) and although I've upgraded the ram, it's feeling a bit sluggish now. Do you think I would experience any performance benefit from upgrading to snow leopard? It still seems like a great machine so can't really justify upgrading to the new imacs.
I recently had to upgrade my OS to 10.6 (then to 10.6.8 via update). After the upgrade fro 10.5 though my computer had been running slow, especially safari. I haven't do anything different besides running the update. The only new program(s) I have is Diablo 3 which I know tkes up a lot of processing power, but that wouldn't explain the overall, extreme drop in speed when I'm not playing it.
I need some advice on whether a hardware update will actually improve my video performance or not. Currently I am using a mac mini snow leopard server 2009 model hooked via mini display port to hdmi adapter to my lg 37 LED LCD TV. The mac mini has a intel x25 m 80 gb bootdrive. 2 external fw 800 drives used as video storage. Mostly I use boxee eyetv sat all controlled via appleremote - sofacontrol.
Altogether a great setup. With big mkv files in full hd the picture sometimes is choppy. Would a upgrade to the new 2010 mac mini server with direct hdmi port and 320M graphics actually improve the video quality - graphics performance? or should I stick to my current setup? (I bought the current server cheap from the uk)
Is the white one the same size as the 13" aluminum that now went pro?Pretty much, I want to know if I buy a case for the original 13" Metal uMB from InCase, will it fit on this plastic one? They don't have blue for this, but they have blue for the original aluminum one.
The default Cirrus Logic driver for BootCamp outputs at 64dB. It makes no sense why they would put a cap on it since the driver outputs at 74dB in OSX. I have modified the driver and removed the volume cap so it now outputs louder in Windows than OSX!
Volume in Windows Before: 64dB
Volume in Windows After: 80dB
You can get the driver at: [URL] (Windows 7/Vista 32+64 Bit Driver)
It should work with any of the following Cirrus Logic chips: CDB4206 CS4206A CDB4207
It really helps with YouTube videos that have horrible volume or if you like to have music that fills the whole house.
Let me know if you want the XP driver with the volume uncapped so I can work on it as well.
I had water spilled on my macbook, now my battery will not charge. Everything else works fine except the battery will not accept a charge. When the AC power is plugged in for the first time after removing the battery it blinks green ONCE and then does not turn on again. When I remove the battery entirely the AC power steadily blinks green. If the battery is removed the macbook will not power on. I am hoping this has happened to someone else before, and does not mean I need to replace the logic board.
I'm thinking of getting the Macbook 2.0 ghz model for the family room. I'm wondering about how good and loud the sound quality is from the new Macbook. Kids like to watch slingbox and when I heard the Macbook at store, it didn't sound so great or loud enough. But it could be the high ambient sound of the store.
Just weeks after buying my new unibody MacBook Pro in late December 2008, I noticed a few dust specks. I was in Shanghai (where there were no Apple Stores), so I waited a few weeks until I was supposed to go to Sydney.
When I arrived in Sydney, I booked a Genius Bar appointment. After the Genius inspected the screen and attempted to wipe the screen with some iKlear, he told me that he would check if there were any new screens and that if there were, he would replace it today.
So, I waited for about four hours for the repair, then came at the time he told me to collect it. I waited for another two hours, as the Genius also found out that my AirPort Card was faulty, so they were going to replace that as well.
It was about ten o'clock at night when I got back my MBP with a new screen. I thought everything was all right, until I found out that the person who repaired my screen had misaligned the top and bottom, so the bottom stuck out 2mm, or rather, the screen was sunk back 2mm. I couldn't go back to the store the next day, since I was bound to go back to Shanghai early next morning since I had school on Monday (I'm a student).
After about two weeks with the new screen, I noticed that the hinge had gotten noticeably looser, and when I moved it, it wobbled back and forth for a few seconds. Then, a week from then on, I noticed a dust speck in the lower left corner. I also had one in the center of the screen. The summer holidays were in two months, so I decided to just hold on for a little longer.
Since the summer holidays have rolled around, I'm going back to Sydney in July. Do you think that Apple would replace my screen the second time?
EDIT: I also found out that my MBP has some type of problem. It is extremely dependent on the battery, and I have to plug in the charger, or it shuts down instantly (or in a few minutes). After the crash, the battery lights would blink on and off (all of the lights). I'd have to remove the battery cover, pull out the battery, put back the battery, close the battery cover and plug in the charger so that the lights would revert back to the normal lights.
I went to a dealer in Shanghai about it and they told me that it might be the battery's problem, so I got a new battery for testing out, but then the computer shut down after about one hour of usage. I'm almost definitely sure that it is the logic board's problem, and do you think that Apple would replace my logic board for free? (I have never dropped my MBP, or have any reason for it to suddenly turn faulty.)
Installing the RC of Windows 7 on my Macbook and everything works perfectly fine however it takes ages to start up. The screen will stay at a black screen with a single blinking white cursor for around a minute when trying to start up the system. This is a windows download straight from MSDN so the windows operating system is clean and nothing fishy is going on.
Anyone else have this issue and/or found a way around it?
I have a ~2 month old 13" MacBook Pro (specs in sig). Several hours ago, I reapplied thermal paste to my old (pre-unibody) white MacBook and I am THRILLED with the results. I have a thread about it here: [URL] My white MB runs so cool, that I prefer using it, rather than my MBP.
I would replace the stock thermal paste with Arctic Silver Ceramique, but I am concerned about my warranty possibly being voided. Another reason that I wouldn't do this to my MBP is that my controlling mom will not let me do this to my new computer. If I can get any evidence from any of you that this will not adversely affect my computer or my warranty, I may be able to convince her to allow me to reapply the thermal paste.
Ive been looking for one, but each one i find i find atleast one comment saying that its bad with the macbook. So i would just like to know a good hard drive that isnt gonna have problems with my mb, oh yeah and a 500 gb one.
So i have the mid 2007 (i think) non unibody white macbook.
Yesterday after some normal usage i noticed the battery had only 30 minutes left even though it had 94% left, also the Service battery Now message had appeared
This was odd cause even though my mac is quite old a few days before the battery was lasting a normal 4-5 hour charge.
after leaving it charging over night after trying to recalibrate the battery(i dont think it actually ran all the way down as it lasted minutes while not on battery power even though it was 99%), resetting the pram, nvram and SMC, the battery now reports 20 hours of life left, but the "Replace now" message came on.
now obviously i would be ok with 20 hours of life left, but its had 20 hours left for 30 minutes an hasnt decreased
Ive googled and searched the forums but couldnt find an answer ...
after a lot of thinking I ended up getting a new Aluminum Macbook! First Mac ever, so yay me!Anyway, when I booted into windows the first time I put in the Leopard install disk and everything went fine. When i booted back into windows i noticed "SMBus controller" and "Coproccesser" were not installed correctly. I looked at the Boot Disk DVD, ran "NvidiaChipset.exe", and after a reboot everything was great!
Then I ran window Experience index and my HDD is getting a pathetic score of 2.0. Just wondering if anyone else has this issue and how/if they got it working again.
