It could be time to say goodbye to my iMac ...

[.Simon]

... I think the time is near for my 2008 24" IMac. :-(

I installed Windows 7 last night so I could play some games without any issues, I went go boot back into OSX today and a strange loading bar appears at the bottom of the screen on start up ... It'll stay there for a few minutes before loading back into OSX but it's very very slow.
I've deleted the Partition now to see if it fixes the problem ..

Also, the Internet has suddenly stopped working - nothing at all!

I've noticed that my Mac has started to slow down recently, thankfully I have everything on time machine so I'm currently resorting back to a back up from a few days back to see if that helps.

If it doesn't then I may just invest into a MacBook Pro instead of replacing the hard disk - id sell the iMac for spares or whatever anyone wants it for!

Any ideas?

 

[MaLicE]

the issue is you installed winblows 7 on it!

 

[wozzaa]

Lets be honest 7 is very good. Don't care how blinkered the fanboys are. 7 is a very good OS end of.

Anyway, before dumping the system due to a £30 hard drive failing. Why don't you try and reinstall OSX from a fresh install. Do a full format of the disk. Just like windows OSX can get slower over time. Even though most mac users say it doesn't.

It isn't that hard to replace the drive in an iMac anyway. Only thing you really need is a strong suction cup so you can remove the screen. Then it's quite easy.

 

[Adam.]

Applecare?

 

[.Simon]

I wiped the hard drive last night and reinstalled from my back up - the Internet seems to work now but it's very slow.

No Apple Care though as it's nearly 4 years old! :-(

I have an iTunes Library of over 120 GB so I'm very tempted to put that onto another external drive to free up some space.

Thanks god for Time Machine though!

 

[Darren S]

Lets be honest 7 is very good. Don't care how blinkered the fanboys are. 7 is a very good OS end of.

Anyway, before dumping the system due to a £30 hard drive failing. Why don't you try and reinstall OSX from a fresh install. Do a full format of the disk. Just like windows OSX can get slower over time. Even though most mac users say it doesn't.

It isn't that hard to replace the drive in an iMac anyway. Only thing you really need is a strong suction cup so you can remove the screen. Then it's quite easy.

Lol - spoken like a true PC user! Things like 'slow downs' don't bother us as we normally find the issue within a couple of minutes. It's not as forgiving or informative from the Mac OS point of view. "Problem? What problem? We're still shiny - there's no problem here..... Move on."

I wiped the hard drive last night and reinstalled from my back up - the Internet seems to work now but it's very slow.

No Apple Care though as it's nearly 4 years old! :-(

I have an iTunes Library of over 120 GB so I'm very tempted to put that onto another external drive to free up some space.

Thanks god for Time Machine though!

Erm, that would have an impact. I know a lot of people flame iTunes for being resource hungry - but I use it on Win7. That said, my library is only around 7GB and it's not particularly quick on my i7-based system. Jain's is around 60GB on her MacBook and that has had a massive performance impact on it. Personally, I don't know how she puts up with it - it would do my head in.

Don't be blinkered by the backup working brilliant for you, either. We have the same at work with people not understanding why System Restore on Windows simply reintroduces the issues they were having only a few hours ago. A backup will only be as good as what you want it to be. Backup with crap in it and it will restore with crap in it. I can count literally on one hand the amount of times I've restored a Windows OS in 19 years - reformatting for me is 99.9% of the time the better option. That way you eliminate any software issue and the only fault that can be left must lie with the hardware layer.

D.

 

[.Simon]

Thanks Darren.

It is very tempting to just reformat and start again, however I'm just so worried about losing all of my music, photos etc.

Is it possible to reformat and then just copy across all of the music etc from the time machine back up?

 

[.Simon]

I've just reformatted the hard disk and it seems that all my old programs and files have automatically been reinstalled again without me even using a back up!

Seems to be working a lot faster now though which is good.

Ive reserved a 15" MBP from Best-buy, just not sure wether to go and get it!

 

[jenic]

A new i7 MBP will be a huge improvement over your old c2d imac in terms of performance. Whether you need that is entirely up to you.

Shame you got the imac working well again, I was hoping you'd be selling it cheap

 

[.Simon]

Well, it will be up for sale if I get the MBP! ;-)

Make me an offer

 

[.Simon]

Well, I've gone and got one!

My god this thing is fast!

 

[Revels]

Lol. I like your style. 'My iMac is a bit slow, f**k it, lets spend £1500 on a MBP'

Spend about £50 on a passport HD portable thingy and stick all your music on there. It means iTunes take a little bit longer on start up but other than that, there's no difference.

 

[.Simon]

Thanks Dan!

Well I've been contemplating getting one for a while now .. ideal time I guess! I think it's the right decision tbh!

I've got a few external Disks with photos on etc, I've been looking at getting a Network Drive? Saw a 1Tb one today for about £100 in BestBuy. Could that work? That way I guess my Apple TV could also take music off of it? (or would I need to Jail Break that?)

 

[Revels]

AppleTV takes it from iTunes. But your iTunes library can be on an external drive, doesn't matter that it's networked.

 

[.Simon]

Thanks mate, I'll take a look.

 

[spirez]

Try this:

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/11582/onyx

 

[.Simon]

Thanks mate. I tried that a few days back, didn't really make much difference though.

Once I've got all of my files off of the 24" I'll do a complete wipe and reinstall and then sell. If there's any interest PM me!

 

[karm]

Have you repaired the permissions and repaired the disk?

 

[.Simon]

I did do yep before I reinstalled OSX. I also ran a defrag a few days back.

It seems a lot faster now - I'm going to take everything off of it tomorrow once I've got a new external network drive for my iTunes library.