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1. bedmaker - Member

   You know when a person buys a car and all they know is how to drive it and that it needs petrol - I am the equivalent with computers.
   No idea whats going on under the bonnet.
   So I splashed out on a Macbook pro at the start of this year because they never go wrong....

   Suddenly last night it started going very slow and freezing up. I've had a google, ironically on my clanking old PC, and there is lots of talk of directories, rebooting etc.

   Bearing in mind the car analogy above, asking me to verify my permissions is like asking someone to change a fuel filter when they don't know where the filter is

   Any recommendations? Good idiots guides? Should I just take it to the shop and bend over?
   Thanks

   Posted 6 months ago #
2. clubber - Member

   Just goes to show...

   Anyway, take it to your local Apple worship emporium (aka Apple Store) - they're very helpful IME (with my old iPhone) and will try and sort you out. Make sure you book an appointment (online) before you go though.

   Posted 6 months ago #
3. Jamie - Member

   If you are indeed an idiot, then take it to your local Apple shop. As you are still in warranty. Otherwise, with the scant info you have given, it is going to be hard to diagnose the problem,....and probably for you to follow any instructions

   Posted 6 months ago #
4. Drac - Moderator

   Genius is your answer like they say. Book an appointment pop along and some young sprite will sort it out in seconds.

   Posted 6 months ago #
5. bedmaker - Member

   Thanks chaps, 'twas pretty much what I was thinking

   Posted 6 months ago #
6. prezet - Member

   OK, this is something you can simply do yourself, to check permissions:

   On the dock at the bottom, click the icon to the far left, the smily face aka 'Finder'.
   A window will appear, in the left hand column, select 'Applications'
   Scroll down to a folder called 'Utilities', in there will be an icon called 'Disk Utility'. Double click it to launch the application.
   A new window will appear. In the left hand column you should see an icon for your hard drive called 'Macintosh HD'
   Click it once to highlight it
   In the right hand side of the window, across the top, there are 4 tabs, click the one that says 'First Aid'
   Now, at the bottom there should be a button called 'Repair Disk Permissions'
   Click that, and let it's churn away - it'll fix any permissions problems.
   At the end it'll give you a report of any issues it's fixed.

   Once that's done. Restart the machine.

   Posted 6 months ago #
7. Drac - Moderator

   Ooh Oooh!

   Going to test that on mine now, new to Macs too by about 2 weeks.

   Posted 6 months ago #
8. tails - Member

   You need to verify permissions?? Personally I would just repair the permissions, either way to do both go to

   Applications folder > Utilities Folder > Disk Utility > Click on your hard drive (it will say something like 260GB ST > Then you can click Verify/Repair disk.

   Posted 6 months ago #
9. tails - Member

   beaten to it!

   Posted 6 months ago #
10. MrSmith - Member

    do the above but use the internet to search for an app called applejack.
    download and install it (it's free)
    you then have to start the mac up in single user mode (google for the key combination to do this)
    it will look like the matrix has taken over your computer but once it has done it's stuff the mac will be a lot snappier. run it periodically or after a software update.

    Posted 6 months ago #
11. prezet - Member

    Another good app to install is Cocktail

    Basically a full suite of maintenance bits wrapped up in a nice GUI. It costs $19 for a single user license. But is great as you can set it up to periodically do all this stuff for you.

    Posted 6 months ago #
12. bedmaker - Member

    *UPDATE*

    Have got as far as clicking disc utility about 5 minutes ago and waiting while the beach ball of doom decides what to do next...

    Posted 6 months ago #
13. Drac - Moderator

    Blimey that's fixed my browser playing silly buggers, cheers chaps. I thought it was just being slow because of a poor network.

    Posted 6 months ago #
14. prezet - Member

    bedmaker - ok, sounds like it's hung. Force a hard restart. Press and hold the power key until the machine shuts down. Give it 20 seconds then start it up again.

    Once the machine finishes booting up, don't open any applications - just go through the process above.

    Posted 6 months ago #
15. Jamie - Member

    If you want to rule out hardware issues, have a read of this: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1509

    Posted 6 months ago #
16. retro83 - Member

    bedmaker - Member

    *UPDATE*

    Have got as far as clicking disc utility about 5 minutes ago and waiting while the beach ball of doom decides what to do next...

    At a guess I'd say HD is dying/dead or some software is looped and causing everything to page out.

    Don't bother repairing permissions, it's not really a maintenance option in that way*. And if the disk is dying it will make the situation worse, as it is disk intensive.

    I'd be rebooting it, and if it's still slow, taking it to a genius, given you aren't in a position to clone the disk before taking further action.

    * it fixes very specific problems, which very rarely occur.

    Posted 6 months ago #
17. bedmaker - Member

    still spinning after force quit

    need to step away before the hammer comes out. Thanks for the help guys.

    Posted 6 months ago #
18. MrSmith - Member

    startup from the OSX software cd and run disk utility from there.

    Posted 6 months ago #
19. bedmaker - Member

    Good news!

    Mac is now fine after a wee trip to my local computer man along with my PC which was also gubbed.

    Turns out the main problem on both was Trusteer Rapport (Bank safety software) which had caused havoc and corrupted everything.
    If you have it, my PC man advises getting rid of it if you can.

    I also had big files (films) on the desktop which I didn't realise was a bad thing - now I know!

    Posted 5 months ago #

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