Tidy up mac

randombar

Hi Lads, heading off on a world tour tomorrow, bringing my mac, just wondering any tidying up I can do, kinda like a refrag, set up the battery again etc?
Thanks
Gary

pvik00

You don't really need to defrag, the OS does that for you upon accessing files large enough to make use of it.
The only time you'll see significantly improved performance after a complete defrag is if your HD is full of large files, such as you're into video or heavy audio stream cutting/editing.

I'd say the best you can do is to get rid of anything you don't need and ensure that your HD has at least 10% headroom.

You also might want to repair permissions, run the periodic scripts, clear caches and probably do an fsck in single-user mode.

If any of these sound unfamiliar just let me know.

randombar

Ya I have app delete, how can I check what programs I have installed and not using much, I know there's must be a program like sw removal out there for this, no way windows could have something better

and ya none of that is familiar I'm sorry, any chance you could explain further

pvik00

Sure.

I think the best if you get rid of those applications you know you're not using. Simply drop them to the Trash (and remove the corresponding .plist files and entries in ~/Library/Application support. Your AppDelete will do that for you, anyway).
When I said however, to get rid of anything you don't need I didn't really thought about apps, but rather things like:
- music you don't listen to
- video or picture's you never look at
- installers of applications
- anything you downloaded and don't need any more.
You might as well archive them before you delete it all.

Here's what you'll have to do for maintenance (It helps if you're familiar with Terminal, as all the below have to be typed in there):

1) Repair permissions. This will ask you for your password and will run for a goooood while.

sudo diskutil repairpermissions /

2) Periodic scripts
sudo periodic monthly weekly daily

3) fsck is more complicated, you have to reboot your machine in single-user mode (Command+S when you hear the boot sound), and when you see the prompt just enter:

/sbin/fsck -fy

reboot if it went all OK. This is where you can screw up things if you don't pay attention.

4) Applejack will do most of the maintenance for you in Autopliot mode. Once installed it also requires you to reboot in single user mode.
Download it here:
http://applejack.sourceforge.net/

pvik00

If you want to free up more space you also might want to get rid of languages you never use and corresponding localization from apps.
Delocalizer: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/9281
or Monolingual http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/7758/monolingual (use this only if you really know what you're doing)

Deleting printer drivers you don't use can also save you a few Gigs.

As for FileVault, it really does give you some increased chance of keeping your data safe if your laptop gets stolen but a few things still apply, just so that you see the big picture:

1) FileVault stores all your data under your home directory in one obfuscated file, that changes constantly. It will obviously be a large file and prone to corruption. If it gets corrupted, you will loose all data. Been there already.

2) If you do any media processing and store anything under your home it will slow down things considerably.

3) Unless protect your firmware with a password it is totally useless on it's own. Anyone can boot into single user mode...

silvine

Onyx is a handy app for doing some of the above.