Why does my MacPro run so slow?

Everything?

What about after safe boot and deleting all the cache your browsers and mail create?

And try cloning and test the clone.

6GB RAM should be 'okay' for basics but all depends what you are requiring it to do.

You can also use Activity Monitor to look for problems such as excessive CPU usage and other issues.

Displaying all Processes Hierarchically, click on the %-CPU column. Anything using more than a few percent is suspect.

I am running Safari in 10.6.8 on a 2009 MacPro 2.93 four-core.

Safai is using at most 0.4 percent of the CPU. At the moment, I have 5 tabs open. BUT -- I am using "Click-to-Flash" or rather its follow-on ClicktoPlugin to suppress the automatic playing of Flash Videos.

open about this mac and expand the view , make sure your RAM hasnt failed.

Please read this whole message before doing anything.

This procedure is a test, not a solution. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.

Step 1

The purpose of this step is to determine whether the problem is localized to your user account.

Enable guest logins and log in as Guest. For instructions, launch the System Preferences application, select Help from the menu bar, and enter “Set up a guest account” (without the quotes) in the search box.

While logged in as Guest, you won’t have access to any of your personal files or settings. Applications will behave as if you were running them for the first time. Don’t be alarmed by this; it’s normal. If you need any passwords or other personal data in order to complete the test, memorize, print, or write them down before you begin.

As Guest, test. Same problem(s)?

After testing, log out of the guest account and, in your own account, disable it if you wish. Any files you created in the guest account will be deleted automatically when you log out of it.

Step 2

The purpose of this step is to determine whether the problem is caused by third-party system modifications that load automatically at startup or login.

Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed for the test, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards. Boot in safe mode and log in to the account with the problem. The instructions provided by Apple are as follows:

• Be sure your Mac is shut down.
• Press the power button.
• Immediately after you hear the startup tone, hold the Shift key. The Shift key should be held as soon as possible after the startup tone, but not before the tone.
• Release the Shift key when you see the gray Apple icon and the progress indicator (looks like a spinning gear).

Safe mode is much slower to boot and run than normal, and some things won’t work at all, including wireless networking on some Macs.

The login screen appears even if you usually log in automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.

Test while in safe mode. Same problem(s)?

After testing, reboot as usual (i.e., not in safe mode.) Post the results of steps 1 and 2.

Hi, Linc,

I just found this post and did what you recommended here to deal with a slow running Macbook Pro--I logged in as a guest and things worked much better (did the safe boot just for the heck of it and things worked much better then too). Thank you for the information!!!

It's apparent that the problem is with my user account, so I'm wondering if you can help me with what I can do now to remedy the problem?? How can I make things run faster while I'm logged in?

Thanks!!!

And you deleted all the Safari history, cache, previews, even bookmarks has its own cache folder - all of that is

~/Library/Caches but not in just one, there are three subfolders for Safari (organized?) Metadata / com.safari... /

you can do some from inside Safari but not all - this is one of those things that I do regularly, and use 3rd party CCleaner or other tool.

Safari and Chrome do get large out of control disk caches. Setting history and remembered sites to a day or 20MB, not 1-2GB, would be nice.

Safe Boot handles system caches - in the past Applejack was tool of choice and needed at times to handle externsion cache, fonts, and others.

Cloning a sytem does not copy temp files and folders or caches so it performs similar to Safe Boot only more so but retains user cache.

Keep the boot drive with as much free space as possible - hard to do on laptops but there are upgrades possible such as an SSD or larger hard drive or both.