SBS Technical Services

How To Speed Up Your Mactintosh

• Optimize the Finder:
  • 1. Without any applications open, click on Edit.
  • 2. Scroll down and click on Preferences.
  • 3. Click on the Views tab.
  • 4. Choose List from the pull down menu on the upper right side.
  • 5. Uncheck the box next to "Calculate folder sizes."
• Desktop Pictures:
  • 1. Click on the Apple in the upper left hand corner.
  • 2. Scroll down to control panels and then choose Appearance.
  • 3. Click on the Desktop tab.
  • 4. Under Picture: choose the "Center on Screen" option.
• Avoid Virtual Memory*:
  • 1. Click on the Apple.
  • 2. Scroll down to Control Panels--> Memory.
  • 3. Under the Virtual Memory section put the radio dial next to Off.
    
    *NOTE: If your Mac begins to run task slowly or tells you there is not enough memory, you do not have enough RAM. Re-enable virtual memory until you can obtain more RAM.
• Speed Up Your Startup*:
  • 1. Click on the Apple.
  • 2. Scroll down to Control Panels.
  • 3. Hold down the Command and Option keys while clicking on Memory.
  • 4. Under the Startup Memory Tests section put the radio dial next to Off.
    
    *NOTE: If your computer ever seems to have problems, you may want to turn on the memory test for one startup so that your system can be scanned for problems.

• Window Views:
  • 1. Click on the Finder icon in the dock.
  • 2. Make the view size changes you want.
  • 3. Immediately close the window.
  • 4. Settings should remain the same there after when opening windows.
  • 5. Uncheck the box next to "Calculate folder sizes."
• Minimizing Windows to Dock*:
  • 1. Hold down the Control key and click on the line that splits the dock in two and choose Minimize Using Scale Effect.
    
    *NOTE: Genie is the default and can slow things down.
• Prebinding*:
  • 1. Open the Terminal program.
  • 2. Type "sudo update_prebinding -root /".
    
    *NOTE: Prebinding, in general terms, reassociates programs with their library files so that the program loads faster.