Leopard issues what to do?

Question

Level 1

8 points

Leopard issues what to do?

Hello,

I'm facing several issues since I brought my first Macbook Pro five months ago. The system is slow, I have several applications hangs and crashes, which most of the people say that is not normal.

I update frequently and and only have two beta versions of apps, however most of my frequently use apps show uncommon behavior like:
- Firefox and Fireworks keeps crashing often, my dock is often slow and stops on the middle of the fish eye (I only have 18 items on my dock), hot corners stop working and inclusive Spaces.app, most of the times I only have the option to reboot, 'cause the menu don't load correctly.

In a normal day of I have Thunderbird, Firefox, Fireworks, Adium, Things and iTunes or Quicktime playing.

What you do you recommend me to do? Should I reinstall Leopard? What may be causing this?

Thank you all for your help.

Macbook Pro Legacy, Mac OS X (10.5.6)

Posted on Feb 18, 2009 2:59 PM

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Answer 1

Feb 18, 2009 3:19 PM in response to kimostep

Do you a) have enough RAM, and b) enough empty space on your hard disk? Look in Activity Monitor to see how much RAM you are using when you have all these things running - you should have a moderate amount of overhead to be on the safe side. And you hard disk should have around 15% empty. Both having too little RAM for the number of things running at once, and too little free space, can cause all sorts of problems.

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Answer 2

2point5

Level 3

973 points

Feb 18, 2009 3:23 PM in response to kimostep

kimostep,

I would recommend some maintenance as a first step.

How much disk space do you have left? You would be best advised to have at least 10-15% free otherwise performance issues will develop.

Drag out your Leopard DVD, inset it and reboot. Hold down the C key at the start up screen chime.
Run Disk Utilities and then Verify/Repair your disk
Repair Permissions

Remove the DVD from the drive and re-boot normally. Check to see how your Mac performs.

Chris

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Answer 3

kimostep Author

Level 1

8 points

Feb 18, 2009 3:34 PM in response to kimostep

Hello,

Thank you Roger and 2point5. I have 21gb free and I use 1.67gb of RAM. It may be the RAM, however don't explain some issues when the applications are running alone, like Fireworks to crash.

Can a reinstall of Leopard help? What the difference between the Disk Utility and the CD for checking permissions?

Thank you

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Answer 4

2point5

Level 3

973 points

Feb 18, 2009 4:08 PM in response to kimostep

Can a reinstall of Leopard help?

If there is a RAM problem, as suggested by Roger, then you need to eliminate that possibility. Perhaps run the Apple Hardware Test from the Installation DVD to check that all is OK.

What the difference between the Disk Utility and the CD for checking permissions?

Might be worth reading the following articles:
[The Repair functions of Disk Utility: what's it all about?|http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/durepairfns.html]
[Questions about Disk Utility|http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=607431]

These articles may also be of interest:
[Macintosh OS X Routine Maintenance|http://www.macattorney.com/ts.html]
[Essential Mac Maintenance: Get set up|http://www.macworld.com/article/133671/2008/06/macmaintenance1.html]
[Essential Mac Maintenance: Rev up your routines|http://www.macworld.com/article/133730/2008/06/maintenance_routines.ht ml]
[Mac OS X speed FAQ|http://www.macmaps.com/Macosxspeed.html] and
[Maintaining OS X|http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/maintainingmacosx.html] for information.

Chris

Message was edited by: 2point5

Message was edited by: 2point5

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