Let's speed up my old and crusty MBP (mid-2010)

[Fingolfin269]

I did the standard memory increase (now 8GB) and SSD install a year or two ago. Seems like it's starting to slow down now. Is basically wiping everything and starting fresh basically the only thing left to do or are there other options? For the record, I have never wiped this thing in the 6 years I've owned it. Even when I installed the SSD it was a copy of the original HD.

(One other note... if the best course of action is to start fresh then I may need some help. I understand the process very well on the Windows side but have never done that with a Mac. Not sure I have any of the original discs but might be able to find them.)

 

[Eug]

Which SSD? How much space left? Did you activate TRIM?

 

[Fingolfin269]

Which SSD? How much space left? Did you activate TRIM?

Crucial M550. I'll have to check the space when I get home but I'd guess it has ~30% free space. I don't recall activating TRIM. Seems like I remember being told back when I installed the SSD that it wasn't really necessary on the Mac or maybe it couldn't be supported. If there is something I need to do on that front let me know and I can certainly do so.

 

[nerp]

There's a way to force it. I forget the command but it's something you do in the terminal window. Crap I wish I could remember.

Sadly, the 2010 MBPs are pretty much at the end of the road. Mine became unbearable even with an SSD and 8GB ram. Bought a ThinkPad x260 and I'm never looking back.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Just did the ram/SSD upgrade to my housemates 2010 13". I wouldn't want to do anything CPU intensive with it, but for general office use and web surfing, it's still pretty fine.

We had a 256GB M550 in it, which was not a very noticeable upgrade from the original hard drive for some reason? But going from the M550 (which was always like 85% full) to a half empty 480GB drive seemed to help a lot.

I'm also suspicious I never had the partition aligned quite correctly on the smaller SSD. So maybe the cloning tool you use to migrate matters.

A clean install never hurts. Computers don't get slower, they just feel slower because of workflow creep. So if you really aren't doing anything now that you didn't used to, then your computer probably just needs an enema.

 

[freeskier93]

What version of OS X?

Assuming a decently new version, clean installs are simple. Boot into recovery (command+r on boot up) and you can choose install OS X which will do a fresh install of the current version.

As far as trim, I got tired of keeping track of enabling it. Haven't bothered with it in a number of years.

EDIT: Looks like Apple is now supporting third party TRIM support, all you have to do is "sudo trimforce enable" in the terminal. Wouldn't hurt to enable it.

 

[Fingolfin269]

Thanks for the tips guys. Some answers...

I'm up to OSX El Capitan. (10.11.6)
23% of the drive is free. (59 GB out of 255 GB)

If freeing up more space will make a big difference then I can probably wipe a bunch of photos and movies, in which case I would probably just wipe it and start from scratch. To be honest the main function of this now is web surfing when I want a physical keyboard.

 

[Childs]

If you have the 2010 MBP with i7 it should still be fine, especially with 8GB and an SSD. Heck, I still use an older one stock with a Core 2 Duo in the lab when I connect to serial devices, and still seems like it would be fine for general usage. Whats slow?

 

[Eug]

I'm running a 2.26 GHz Core 2 Duo from 2009 with Samsung 840 EVO SSD and 4 GB RAM and it's OK for what I need it for, which is relatively light usage. In fact, using the installer hack, I just installed macOS Sierra on it too.

However it does feel slow, especially since my iPhone 7 Plus is smoother and snappier in just about every way, including (or especially?) web surfing.

 

[Fingolfin269]

Mine is mid-2010 but has a Core 2 Duo, not an i7. To be honest, the main thing I use it for now is web browsing and that even seems a little more sluggish now.

Basically progression was along the lines of:

2014/mid: Slow
2014/late: Upgraded Ram / Installed SSD (w/o TRIM) = Much Faster
2014 - Now: Slower than 2014/late but not nearly as slow as before the upgrades.

I notice it even in my web browser when it's just trying to load pages. Just seems a little more sluggish, especially when opening multiples at once.

 

[Eug]

I've found web pages have become more complicated and memory intensive over time. On older machines they can really bog things down. I read that a tech journalist went back to the original iPhone launch and saw that the NY Times front page loading took about 10 seconds at that time. So he took that original iPhone and tried to do the same thing in 2016 and it took over 3 minutes because the page was that much more complicated.

I don't know if turning on TRIM will help you significantly but theoretically it should. Just make sure to back up first.

BTW, off topic but I'm back on 10.11. Unfortunately some of my software is not 10.12 compatible.

 

[jimbob200521]

I have a 2010 Macbook unibody with a 2.4ghz C2D and 4gb of RAM. I use it mainly for internet in the morning before work and it's just more convenient than going to my game room and booting my main PC. All I ever do is browse a few web pages and watch youtube videos. If it was my main machine the speed would drive me nuts but as a computer used for occasional internet browsing, albeit a bit slow, it's very usable. Also just upgraded to Sierra and am debating a RAM upgrade to 8gb but I'm not sure how much it would help.