Help me deslugify my Mac mini

[davester]

I have a 2009 Mac mini/2gb with two 1tb owc firewire external drives hooked up to the TV as an HTPC. It runs eyetv 100% of the time and I usually use safari to get Netflix or view shows on network sites, megavideo, etc. Also, my son occasionally uses it for games. The problem is that this thing gets very sluggish, with frequent spinning beachballs. I hate to have to reboot every time I use it, which is every 2 to 3 days. I'm wondering how to get rid of the sluggishness. Would bumping the ram do anything for me in this application or would a small SSD boot drive make things better?

[guitarist]

Only 2 GB RAM installed, for the burdens you're using it for? Maximum RAM is super-easy to achieve on a Mini, and super cheap, too. 8 GB RAM for less than $50!! Shame on you! Get that OWC page open, and get your trigger finger ready! You can improve your Mini's performance, with that as an easy step.

Other things, too, you can look into. Some suggestions will appear here, I'm sure. But I suspect some of us will vote for a RAM install as a no-brainer for someone in your position.

[silvarios]

guitarist wrote: Maximum RAM is super-easy to achieve on a Mini, and super cheap, too.

Not super easy. I believe the 2009 mini is the old style with the putty knife cracking requirement.

[sekker]

putty knife cracking - not a big deal.

[Grumpyguy]

I have the 2010 Mini, which was very easy to upgrade ram-wise.

In another thread, I noted that when I originally upgraded from 2GB to 4GB, I didn't see much of a difference. When I bumped it up to 8GB, the Mini was able to take anything I threw at it.

I seldom get the beach ball anymore unless I have 50 tabs open in Seamonkey (which then eats all available memory), a bunch of pictures open in preview, iTunes, and iPhoto running, and haven't rebooted in ages.

BTW, the 2010 Mini is hands down the best Mac I've ever owned. Small, quiet, and powerful. Yes, I'd love to the the Core iWhatever the new Mini has, but the C2D is plenty powerful for me.

[silvarios]

sekker wrote:
putty knife cracking - not a big deal.

iFixit lists as moderate. I would concur. It isn't impossible, but far from "super-easy".

[michaelb]

i 'd guess flash. are you running that? can you check activity monitor to see if it is a problem.

[gabester]

I second both the RAM upgrade (it's not hard unless you've never done it before and then it's only a little daunting) as well as using process monitor to get a handle on what's running that may be sucking up your cycles (although I'm going to go with VM paging as the primary culprit due to limited RAM.)
g=

[Black]

I have the same mini, also with 2 GB RAM.
I have absolutely no sluggishness, but then I don't drive it very hard-- I only use it for surfing and video.

It came with 1 GB and I added the second.
It's neither easy or hard. Will need a tutorial-- it's not self-explanatory.


Per Everymac, you'll need a firmware update if you want to go to 8 GB:

Standard RAM: 1 GB, 2 GB* Maximum RAM: 8 GB*
Details: *By default, 1 GB is installed as a single module (MB463LL/A) and 2 GB is installed as two 1 GB modules (MB464LL/A). Officially, this model is capable of supporting 4 GB of RAM, but as first reported by MacminiColo, this model unofficially can use 8 GB of RAM after applying EFI Firmware Update 1.2.

The 2 1GB chips that are in there now will have to go in the Free Monday pile.

[davester]

How do I evaluate activity monitor? Page in/out ratio was about 1:1, some mem free though not a lot. Also, I noticed python using a lot of real mem but little CPU. What is that about?

Also, nobody said anything pos or neg about a SSD. Would that help the situation much or not?