I have an MacBook air that is about a year and a half old and gets mostly internet use and light office tasks. I’m used to PC’s and doing “clean up” tasks on them - clearing out history, cookies, disc fragmenting, running a anti virus software, etc. But honestly, I’ve never really done anything with my Mac.
It seems to be running a bit sluggish - especially with internet tasks/connecting. Could be our internet at home, but I figure there must be SOMETHING I could/should do as maintenance on the Mac.
Please don’t scold me if I should have doing this on a regular basis! Just educate me. Are there simple “clean up” tasks I can do???
One good practice once in a while is to repair disk permissions…especially after installing/uninstalling updates/new software. However, I don’t find the need to run that nearly as often as running defrag on PCs. Running an anti-virus software is prudent.
Clearing out history and cookies is platform neutral and is up to personal preference.
As for the sluggishness, I would check your internet connection first as that’s IME the most likely cause on Macs.
I remembered that our cable/internet company had some type of upgrade the last week or so - I unplugged our modem and replugged and thinks seem much better. Still should know though, if there is any regular maintenance I should do.
The disk performance is slower when this has a lot of data (above 50% of the disk capacity - I guess) because it takes more time to seek data blocks on the outer cylinders and more RAM is used. If you have a close to full disk then you can off load data not frequently used to a secondary USB disk.
I just went through this a few weeks ago. My start-up disc on my MacBook Air was full (I’ve had mine about 15 months) because I had a LOT of home video on it that I hadn’t gotten around to transferring to a different medium. But the computer was running relatively slow to what it normally runs. Once I freed up some space (I now have only about 50% of my start-up disc full) by transferring that stuff, it is running much better.
I was always told you don’t need to defragment, etc. with a Mac, so I never have.
^^Thanks for that. I have plenty of room - a good 2/3 space left. Since rebooting the wireless earlier I haven’t had any trouble - hopefully that did the trick!
Sometimes, I have to periodically reboot some wireless routers due to buggy firmware, crappy quality of hardware to begin with, or if the router got overheated*.
Possible factors include accumulated dust blocking ventilation ports, placement in areas lacking ventilation or prone to high heat, etc.
Are there simple “clean up” tasks I can do???