Tips to Boost Your Old Macbook’s Speed

Sooner or later, there will come a time when your Mac does not seem to be running as smoothly as it used to. Fortunately, you are neither the first nor the last to face this type of problem. 

So, take your time, and before trying to get rid of your old laptop, test the following optimizations tips. Maybe it is not all due to hardware and the reason for your Mac slowing down is software related. Continue reading and find out what you can do to give your Mac extra speed.

Take care of your hard drive

Cleaning the junk files that have accumulated can be a bit problematic if you decide to do that manually. On the other hand, a cleanup utility tool automates the process. You can follow this link and read more about CleanMyMac X – a great tool that can help you free up disk space on a Macbook.

That being said, CleanMyMac X has a variety of functions, to fight with the mess in your system. It is not only able to dispose of junk files but also gives information on how often specific apps are used. Maybe, some of them are barely touched. 

Another great thing this app gives you is system security. It can detect malware, which sometimes is responsible for the disappearance of free space on your hard drive. Also, with built-in apps updater and memory optimization tools, your Mac will always have the latest version of the software and will never run out of memory.

Speed up startup of your system

Tips to Boost Your Old Macbook’s Speed

If you are installing many apps, during some time, your system may gain slower boot time at some point. This may be caused due to newly installed apps that by default are set to run automatically when your system boots or restarts. 

This means that memory resources and CPU power used for the core operation need to be shared with those applications. Not surprisingly, this results in slower boot times or even delays in loading your system. 

To prevent that against happening, simply go to MenuSystem PreferencesUser & Groups Login Items and disable all unwanted applications from automatic launch during startup. Do not be scared, the list might be quite long, but the fewer programs left, the better results you will get.

Tidy up your desktop

Tips to Boost Your Old Macbook’s Speed

If your desktop is overwhelmed with a bunch of icons, it can dramatically slow down its speed. For instance, if your Windows user friends can have as many icons on their desktops as they want, things in the Mac operating system are quite different. The Mac graphical system handles every icon located on the desktop as a separate window and the more items you have, the more power resources are needed. 

So, take your time and remove all the unused icons if you do not want to face beachball on the screen ever again. By the way, not all icons may be displayed on the desktop. So you should look in the Desktop folder too, for any hidden icons as well.

Clear cache

Every time you use a program, it creates cache files. They are stored in a specific folder on your hard drive and are required to speed up the application processing time. However, despite being small in size, these files can accumulate fast, taking your space, not by megabytes, but gigabytes. That is one of the reasons why you want to delete them. Do not worry, it is safe to do so. Also, you do not need to do that very often, because bigger amounts could accumulate over a longer period. 

There is another reason to get rid of them too. Cache files store the latest settings you used in a program. If you encounter any strange activity of the app or misbehavior, deleting its cache files will remove the last used data and likely solve existing issues. The easiest way to reach cache files is by using keyboard shortcut Command + Shift + G.

Distribute RAM wisely

Tips to Boost Your Old Macbook’s Speed

If you are using an older generation, Mac, it is likely to have less memory. It means that you are really close to running out of it. And the more applications you open at one time, the less memory is left to handle for both your Mac OS and programs normal operation. For instance, the more browser tabs you have opened the slower your system works. Add to that photo editing program, the media player and your computer start running sluggish and not as enjoyable to use. 

To avoid that, try to launch Activity Monitor to see which apps are using the most resources and complete them. Also, try to better distribute your activities so that the most resource-intensive programs are not run at the same time. Though, if you still lack memory the only option left might be adding more RAM to your system.

Author

Sumit is a Tech and Gadget freak and loves writing about Android and iOS, his favourite past time is playing video games.

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