MacFormat UK – June 2019

FEATURE Speed up your Mac

22 | MACFORMAT | JUNE 2019

Restart your Mac

Restarting flushes cache files and

frees up memory. You should restart

regularly, but if you haven’t done it

for a while, do it now – it could make

a significant difference to the

performance of your Mac.

Restart in safe mode

Starting up in safe mode performs

some checks and prevents login items

loading. It can be a useful way of

isolating problems. Start up your Mac

and hold ß until you see the login

window; full help is at bit.ly/mfsafemd.

Reset permissions

Doing this for your user account’s

Home folder can solve a number of

problems and may improve your

Mac’s performance. Apple lists some

scenarios and full instructions to reset

permissions at bit.ly/mfrstprm.

Before you dive deeper

Image credit: Bombich Software

Before

you get

started

Make sure your valuable

data is protected before

you speed up your Mac

he thought of a speedier,

more responsive Mac that

feels almost like a new

machine is an exciting one.

But don’t get too carried away and

jump straight into the tips for giving

your beloved Mac a boost. It’s crucial

that you prepare your computer for the

performance leap ahead. Just as you

wouldn’t try to sprint 100m without

warming up first, nor should you go

straight to the meat of how to speed

up your Mac. Here’s what to do first...

Back up your Mac!

Yeah, we know. Boring. But backing

up is essential. Many of the tips here

involve burrowing fairly deep into your

Mac’s software innards. And although

the tips are safe, there’s always the

chance that you could lose data along

the way. So, back up your Mac before

you start. If you have a regular backup

routine, run it. But don’t leave it there.

Ideally you should have two separate

copies of your Mac’s data. The best

way to make the second copy is to

clone your entire startup drive using

a tool like SuperDuper (shirt-pocket.

com). Make the clone bootable and, if

the worst happens, you can start up

from it and restore your Mac to where

it was before you started.

If you don’t already have a regular

backup schedule, take the opportunity

to start one. At the very least, set up

Time Machine (bit.ly/mftmmc) to make

a backup of your startup disk.

Disconnect external drives

As we said, data loss is unlikely, but

disconnecting all external drives

will ensure they are protected.

T

You wouldn’t try to

sprint 100m without

warming up first

Clone your

startup disk

SuperDuper enables you to

create a bootable clone of your

Mac’s startup disk. That function

is free to use. Give it plenty of

time to complete the task:

it could take several

Carbon Copy Cloner is a great tool for backing up your entire hard disk. hours.