It is a well-established fact that OS X spends a great deal of energy indexing the hard drive after installing the OS. Any test that doesn't acknowledge that fact or confirm that they waited until indexing was complete is somewhat questionable.
There is also disc encryption which can take days to complete. I don't know what kind of resource drain this in on the system but if minimal it's still not a positive for the battery. One nice thing about ML over Lion for users like me and irnchriz is that we can use FireVault2 (CoreStorage) our additional internal drives by Option-clicking on the drive in the Finder sidebar and choose encrypt, instead of using Terminal to do it manually.
edit: 1) For those that do want to use Terminal for this task this tutorial explains it pretty well. You can use it to check to see the status of your encryption process.
2) One of the problems I had with File Vault is that with Leopard and SL Apple only encrypted Home Folder (~/me), not the boot drive. For me, this was great because I use OptiBay and ahve mad my 1TB HDD my Home Folder use the Advanced Options in System Preferences » Users (showing below). With Lion and ML File Vault 2 will encrypt your boot drive which kept my Home Folder, the 1TB HDD, completely unencrypted.
Now to get around this issue I just used Terminal to manually encrypt that drive. However, there is another challenge for me since my entire external drive is my Home Folder. If I go to log in it can't because my home folder is still locked. I needed to have another account that was on that boot drive so I could log in, unlock the 2nd drive containing my Home Folder, log out and then re-log in with my regular account. I created a script to do this automatically but it was still not an elegant solution.
I've sense found this site that contains a script that will unlock your additional drives first specifically for this type of issue.
I understand this all seems like a pain to do but when you have an 80GB SSD that you want for booting and launching apps fast but want to use a 1TB drive for all your media, especially content that gets written repeatedly you want that to be your primary drive. It's unfortunate that 1) Apple goes halfway in supporting this feature, and 2) they didn't use something like this in their RMBP.
It is a well-established fact that OS X spends a great deal of energy indexing the hard drive after installing the OS. Any test that doesn't acknowledge that fact or confirm that they waited until indexing was complete is somewhat questionable.
So, I have to leave it alone for half a day after the installation until indexing is finished?
All Windows PCs need that when come out of the box for the first time. Don't always like it, but think of it as a nature of the beast
So, I have to leave it alone for half a day after the installation until indexing is finished?
All Windows PCs need that when come out of the box for the first time. Don't always like it, but think of it as a nature of the beast
How about Mac mini?
I'm not sure of what you're asking. He's not saying you have to leave your computer alone, he's saying that it's working on additional tasks in the background that are a drain on resources so don't expect to get the same performance from the device while these tasks are being performed.
I'm not sure of what you're asking. He's not saying you have to leave your computer alone, he's saying that it's working on additional tasks in the background that are a drain on resources so don't expect to get the same performance from the device while these tasks are being performed.
I mean are those tasks just a once-only after ML installation, then things go back to normal and no additional drain? OR are they going to do it again and again the background and drain the battery?
So, I have to leave it alone for half a day after the installation until indexing is finished?
All Windows PCs need that when come out of the box for the first time. Don't always like it, but think of it as a nature of the beast
How about Mac mini?
No one ever suggested that you have to leave your computer alone for half a day after installation. You simply need to understand that there are things that need to be done and that the computer will be doing some background tasks while you are doing other things and these background tasks can affect battery life. So it is not surprising that you get a reduced battery life the first day or two.
1. Indexing of the hard drive.
2. Disk encryption (if you turn that on)
3. Time Machine backups
Now, if you install a new OS and then immediately throw the computer in your briefcase for an overseas trip, this might cause you a problem. But it would be rather foolish to do that, anyway.
As for Windows, if you choose to use an inferior OS with more limited capabilities, that's your choice.
I mean are those tasks just a once-only after ML installation, then things go back to normal and no additional drain? OR are they going to do it again and again the background and drain the battery?
One time after installation of the OS. There will be tiny amounts of time later (for example, every time you create a new file, it has to be indexed). I guess if you copied over a few thousand files all at once, you might notice more indexing going on, but under normal use, you won't notice it after the initial period
One time after installation of the OS. There will be tiny amounts of time later (for example, every time you create a new file, it has to be indexed). I guess if you copied over a few thousand files all at once, you might notice more indexing going on, but under normal use, you won't notice it after the initial period
Got it, thanks.
Still, you don't have to see red everytime someone says 'Windows'.
Some times I wonder if you guys collectively understand what you are doing? In my TEENS, we used to have to do a clean install of Winblows... So if you are doing this I should never hear you posting a bad remark about Micro-soft.
[...]
However I can't stress the how interesting is it to see 'long time users' post hatred thoughts about competitors and then explain how they needed to do the same thing with their machine.
So collectively here windows gets trashed, and it is horrible, but then I read posts (and experience), about the same (or worse) problems with OSX.
You are conflating two different things. No one in their right mind would claim that OS X (or any other Apple product) doesn't have the potential to have problems. Apple has the Genius Bar for a reason. The difference is how common, how frequent, and how troublesome issues are across the different OSes. To say that OS X has some flaws equates to what Window users experience is disingenuous. Even when Windows is working optimally it's still a bigger pain in the ass than the newly released Mac OS not being as efficient as the previous Mac OS version.
Do you think Windows is collectively a more efficient OS to use over Mac OS? I don't, and I use both daily. There is even testing by AnandTech that show that Windows gets less battery life than Mac OS on the exact same system. I'd like to see some tests to see if even with the ML battery issue affecting some users if it's still not better than Windows.
Totally agree with this comment. I bought the MBP non retina last month deliberately and have no issues at all on battery life after upgrade to ML. I have used the MBP on same routines and still getting exactly 7 hours or more.
What everyone on this thread is doing is missing a simple hardware change. A retina display on a MBP is also brand new and there is limited data on its overall performance, of course it saves power with flash memory but the big but is ML exploits features like power nap, graphics etc that EAT up power. ML runs flawlessly and I have hammered it.
Look at the whole Apple package and if dissatisfied go change back to your old windows laptop, other than a Vaio good luck if you get more than 2 hours.
Stop the whining on this thread it's says more about the writers than any perceived problem with ML. Apple will solve issues with RETINA MBP soon, as always!
I'm always a late-comer to OS releases myself. I upgraded to Leopard when SL was released and upgraded to SL just about 3/4's of the way into the OS's lifecycle. I usually do it about half-way in to give it time to work out the kinks. ML looks like another great OS X release and I'll probably upgrade later on but for now I'm happy with Lion.
I suspect this will be blown out of proportion like most Apple "scandals" do.
You are right there. Anything negative that can be dug up or manufactured is blown up as far as possible. I've pretty much given up on the Apple Support blog, it is filled with trolls, probably paid ones, pumping in as much fud as possible which is a shame as many newbies go there assuming it is all gospel. I wish Apple would monitor and edit that system.
I've been having freezing issues like that too (system frozen, mouse still moves). I've had two of those instances so far with Mountain Lion -- never had any freezing issues with Lion. I've also noticed that SystemUIServer has crashed on me at least 3 times since installing Mountain Lion. Or at least I think that it's crashing. The Menu bar shows a spinning wheel and won't respond when I hover the mouse over it -- I go to Activity Monitor to find SystemUIServer taking up about 54% CPU. I hit Force Quit, the process restarts itself, then all is well.
Again, an annoying problem I never had with Lion.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sflocal
My 2009 i7 iMac had its first system freeze ever. I'm about 3-days into ML. However, mine is the reverse. The mouse and keyboard stopped responding, but it seemed the machine itself kept running. I considered that the BT keyboard and mouse may have lost the connection, but it still remained unresponsive after I plugged in my original iMac wired keyboard.
I ended up doing a clean re-install of ML instead of upgrading from Lion. I like clean systems. Other than that, been a solid update. I am looking forward to 10.8.1 to address these and other potential issues that I'm reading with other people.
I upgraded my 2011 MBA the day after the ML release. Clean-install too. Been working just fine with the exception of the battery life taking a hit. Fortunately, I leave it plugged in the entire time at work so I'm not impacted by it really.
Let's get these fixes in Apple.
On the page that I pointed to is this statement:
If your Mac appears to be running normally but isn't responding, force the computer to shut down by pressing and holding the power button for 10 seconds. Note: You will lose any unsaved work in any open applications.
On the iMac, one is then instructed to pull the power cord, wait 15 seconds, reconnect the power cord, wait 5 seconds and then restart the computer. This resets the system management controller.
<span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:12px;line-height:18px;">If your Mac appears to be running normally but isn't responding, force the computer to shut down by pressing and holding the power button for 10 seconds. </span>
<strong style="font-size:12px;color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;line-height:18px;">Note</strong>
<span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:12px;line-height:18px;">: You will lose any unsaved work in any open applications.</span>
<span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:12px;line-height:18px;">On the iMac, one is then instructed to pull the power cord, wait 15 seconds, reconnect the power cord, wait 5 seconds and then restart the computer. This resets the system management controller.</span>
<span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif;font-size:12px;line-height:18px;">All the best.</span>
Note: Portable computers that have a battery you should not remove on your own include MacBook Pro (Early 2009) and later, all models of MacBook Air, and MacBook (Late 2009).
Shut down the computer.
Plug in the MagSafe power adapter to a power source, connecting it to the Mac if its not already connected.
On the built-in keyboard, press the (left side) Shift-Control-Option keys and the power button at the same time.
Release all the keys and the power button at the same time.
Press the power button to turn on the computer.
Note: The LED on the MagSafe power adapter may change states or temporarily turn off when you reset the SMC.
You are conflating two different things. No one in their right mind would claim that OS X (or any other Apple product) doesn't have the potential to have problems. Apple has the Genius Bar for a reason. The difference is how common, how frequent, and how troublesome issues are across the different OSes. To say that OS X has some flaws equates to what Window users experience is disingenuous. Even when Windows is working optimally it's still a bigger pain in the ass than the newly released Mac OS not being as efficient as the previous Mac OS version.
Do you think Windows is collectively a more efficient OS to use over Mac OS? I don't, and I use both daily. There is even testing by AnandTech that show that Windows gets less battery life than Mac OS on the exact same system. I'd like to see some tests to see if even with the ML battery issue affecting some users if it's still not better than Windows.
With regards to the battery life I don't think it's quite fair to make a broad statement on OS X vs Windows battery life based on a system using solely Apple's drivers. Most of the gap in the battery life is probably due to their drivers with a little being due to Windows.
With regards to upgrades: Windows 8 upgrade has been exceptionally fast for me and nice to warn me about issues with specific programs. 10.8 however just disabled them when they weren't compatible. I wasn't aware of any advanced warning on that(correct me if I'm wrong).
With regards to the battery life I don't think it's quite fair to make a broad statement on OS X vs Windows battery life based on a system using solely Apple's drivers. Most of the gap in the battery life is probably due to their drivers with a little being due to Windows.
Sure I can. There are measured tests that show a distinct difference in battery life using the same HW. You can argue that Apple's BootCamp drivers aren't as good as their Mac OS drivers but that's part of the reason why Macs perform better. Apple designs their PCs and OS so they have control over how the power is managed. They also have a very small number of products to test for compared to all major OEMs and MS. I'm not sure why you would discount this. It's this advantage that makes Macs that much better than the competition. You've also only mentioned drivers without any mention of how the Windows itself could simply be less efficient than Mac OS.
You are right there. Anything negative that can be dug up or manufactured is blown up as far as possible. I've pretty much given up on the Apple Support blog, it is filled with trolls, probably paid ones, pumping in as much fud as possible which is a shame as many newbies go there assuming it is all gospel. I wish Apple would monitor and edit that system.
The other problem with the Apple Support Forums is the nature of the messages. Let's say that there are 5,000 messages on a particular problem. Of those:
500 are messages from people who experienced the problem (but see below *)
3,000 are from people who don't have the problem
500 are from people calling the first group trolls
100 are from people trying to help the first group
900 are from people simply posting that Apple six
* Of the 500 messages from people who experienced the problem:
400 are from a group of 10 people who posted 40 times each. Of those 10, 8 of them screwed up their system with various hacks and only 2 have a real problem
50 are from people who see it as an opportunity to make Apple look bad so they simply pretend to have the problem
50 are from paid shills
So, out of millions of devices sold and 5,000 Apple Support messages, two people actually have a problem.
I have found it to slow down my machine considerably. Not all the time, but there are long pauses at times when everything seems to be running in molases.
Mail seems to be part of it taking longer to do many tasks and inexplicably chewing up cpu usage.
Then there is the memory issue. I have to run Free Memory a LOT more often than before ( great utility - you should all have it) - and this brings the system to a halt.
Perhaps some of the power usage is do to thrashing.
Sorry folks but I don't seem to have any issues at all. I'm running MacBook Air that I bought just 2 weeks before the WWDC (no free upgrade for me). I do wonder though if the Power Nap feature has something to do with it but aware this is only available to newer kit so probably not.
Comments
There is also disc encryption which can take days to complete. I don't know what kind of resource drain this in on the system but if minimal it's still not a positive for the battery. One nice thing about ML over Lion for users like me and irnchriz is that we can use FireVault2 (CoreStorage) our additional internal drives by Option-clicking on the drive in the Finder sidebar and choose encrypt, instead of using Terminal to do it manually.
edit: 1) For those that do want to use Terminal for this task this tutorial explains it pretty well. You can use it to check to see the status of your encryption process.
2) One of the problems I had with File Vault is that with Leopard and SL Apple only encrypted Home Folder (~/me), not the boot drive. For me, this was great because I use OptiBay and ahve mad my 1TB HDD my Home Folder use the Advanced Options in System Preferences » Users (showing below). With Lion and ML File Vault 2 will encrypt your boot drive which kept my Home Folder, the 1TB HDD, completely unencrypted.
Now to get around this issue I just used Terminal to manually encrypt that drive. However, there is another challenge for me since my entire external drive is my Home Folder. If I go to log in it can't because my home folder is still locked. I needed to have another account that was on that boot drive so I could log in, unlock the 2nd drive containing my Home Folder, log out and then re-log in with my regular account. I created a script to do this automatically but it was still not an elegant solution.
I've sense found this site that contains a script that will unlock your additional drives first specifically for this type of issue.
I understand this all seems like a pain to do but when you have an 80GB SSD that you want for booting and launching apps fast but want to use a 1TB drive for all your media, especially content that gets written repeatedly you want that to be your primary drive. It's unfortunate that 1) Apple goes halfway in supporting this feature, and 2) they didn't use something like this in their RMBP.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta
It is a well-established fact that OS X spends a great deal of energy indexing the hard drive after installing the OS. Any test that doesn't acknowledge that fact or confirm that they waited until indexing was complete is somewhat questionable.
So, I have to leave it alone for half a day after the installation until indexing is finished?
All Windows PCs need that when come out of the box for the first time. Don't always like it, but think of it as a nature of the beast
How about Mac mini?
I'm not sure of what you're asking. He's not saying you have to leave your computer alone, he's saying that it's working on additional tasks in the background that are a drain on resources so don't expect to get the same performance from the device while these tasks are being performed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
I'm not sure of what you're asking. He's not saying you have to leave your computer alone, he's saying that it's working on additional tasks in the background that are a drain on resources so don't expect to get the same performance from the device while these tasks are being performed.
I mean are those tasks just a once-only after ML installation, then things go back to normal and no additional drain? OR are they going to do it again and again the background and drain the battery?
No one ever suggested that you have to leave your computer alone for half a day after installation. You simply need to understand that there are things that need to be done and that the computer will be doing some background tasks while you are doing other things and these background tasks can affect battery life. So it is not surprising that you get a reduced battery life the first day or two.
1. Indexing of the hard drive.
2. Disk encryption (if you turn that on)
3. Time Machine backups
Now, if you install a new OS and then immediately throw the computer in your briefcase for an overseas trip, this might cause you a problem. But it would be rather foolish to do that, anyway.
As for Windows, if you choose to use an inferior OS with more limited capabilities, that's your choice.
One time after installation of the OS. There will be tiny amounts of time later (for example, every time you create a new file, it has to be indexed). I guess if you copied over a few thousand files all at once, you might notice more indexing going on, but under normal use, you won't notice it after the initial period
Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta
One time after installation of the OS. There will be tiny amounts of time later (for example, every time you create a new file, it has to be indexed). I guess if you copied over a few thousand files all at once, you might notice more indexing going on, but under normal use, you won't notice it after the initial period
Got it, thanks.
Still, you don't have to see red everytime someone says 'Windows'.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sflocal
Let's get these fixes in Apple.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }Mountain Lion SP 1 - coming to an IMac near you.
#next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }
You are conflating two different things. No one in their right mind would claim that OS X (or any other Apple product) doesn't have the potential to have problems. Apple has the Genius Bar for a reason. The difference is how common, how frequent, and how troublesome issues are across the different OSes. To say that OS X has some flaws equates to what Window users experience is disingenuous. Even when Windows is working optimally it's still a bigger pain in the ass than the newly released Mac OS not being as efficient as the previous Mac OS version.
Do you think Windows is collectively a more efficient OS to use over Mac OS? I don't, and I use both daily. There is even testing by AnandTech that show that Windows gets less battery life than Mac OS on the exact same system. I'd like to see some tests to see if even with the ML battery issue affecting some users if it's still not better than Windows.
What everyone on this thread is doing is missing a simple hardware change. A retina display on a MBP is also brand new and there is limited data on its overall performance, of course it saves power with flash memory but the big but is ML exploits features like power nap, graphics etc that EAT up power. ML runs flawlessly and I have hammered it.
Look at the whole Apple package and if dissatisfied go change back to your old windows laptop, other than a Vaio good luck if you get more than 2 hours.
Stop the whining on this thread it's says more about the writers than any perceived problem with ML. Apple will solve issues with RETINA MBP soon, as always!
You are right there. Anything negative that can be dug up or manufactured is blown up as far as possible. I've pretty much given up on the Apple Support blog, it is filled with trolls, probably paid ones, pumping in as much fud as possible which is a shame as many newbies go there assuming it is all gospel. I wish Apple would monitor and edit that system.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mazda 3s
I've been having freezing issues like that too (system frozen, mouse still moves). I've had two of those instances so far with Mountain Lion -- never had any freezing issues with Lion. I've also noticed that SystemUIServer has crashed on me at least 3 times since installing Mountain Lion. Or at least I think that it's crashing. The Menu bar shows a spinning wheel and won't respond when I hover the mouse over it -- I go to Activity Monitor to find SystemUIServer taking up about 54% CPU. I hit Force Quit, the process restarts itself, then all is well.
Again, an annoying problem I never had with Lion.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sflocal
My 2009 i7 iMac had its first system freeze ever. I'm about 3-days into ML. However, mine is the reverse. The mouse and keyboard stopped responding, but it seemed the machine itself kept running. I considered that the BT keyboard and mouse may have lost the connection, but it still remained unresponsive after I plugged in my original iMac wired keyboard.
I ended up doing a clean re-install of ML instead of upgrading from Lion. I like clean systems. Other than that, been a solid update. I am looking forward to 10.8.1 to address these and other potential issues that I'm reading with other people.
I upgraded my 2011 MBA the day after the ML release. Clean-install too. Been working just fine with the exception of the battery life taking a hit. Fortunately, I leave it plugged in the entire time at work so I'm not impacted by it really.
Let's get these fixes in Apple.
On the page that I pointed to is this statement:
If your Mac appears to be running normally but isn't responding, force the computer to shut down by pressing and holding the power button for 10 seconds. Note: You will lose any unsaved work in any open applications.
On the iMac, one is then instructed to pull the power cord, wait 15 seconds, reconnect the power cord, wait 5 seconds and then restart the computer. This resets the system management controller.
All the best.
I use a 17" early 2011 MacBook Pro and battery life has been the same, if not slightly better than Lion. Worked find the developer previews as well.
There is also this from the SMC support page: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
Note: Portable computers that have a battery you should not remove on your own include MacBook Pro (Early 2009) and later, all models of MacBook Air, and MacBook (Late 2009).
Note: The LED on the MagSafe power adapter may change states or temporarily turn off when you reset the SMC.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
You are conflating two different things. No one in their right mind would claim that OS X (or any other Apple product) doesn't have the potential to have problems. Apple has the Genius Bar for a reason. The difference is how common, how frequent, and how troublesome issues are across the different OSes. To say that OS X has some flaws equates to what Window users experience is disingenuous. Even when Windows is working optimally it's still a bigger pain in the ass than the newly released Mac OS not being as efficient as the previous Mac OS version.
Do you think Windows is collectively a more efficient OS to use over Mac OS? I don't, and I use both daily. There is even testing by AnandTech that show that Windows gets less battery life than Mac OS on the exact same system. I'd like to see some tests to see if even with the ML battery issue affecting some users if it's still not better than Windows.
With regards to the battery life I don't think it's quite fair to make a broad statement on OS X vs Windows battery life based on a system using solely Apple's drivers. Most of the gap in the battery life is probably due to their drivers with a little being due to Windows.
With regards to upgrades: Windows 8 upgrade has been exceptionally fast for me and nice to warn me about issues with specific programs. 10.8 however just disabled them when they weren't compatible. I wasn't aware of any advanced warning on that(correct me if I'm wrong).
Sure I can. There are measured tests that show a distinct difference in battery life using the same HW. You can argue that Apple's BootCamp drivers aren't as good as their Mac OS drivers but that's part of the reason why Macs perform better. Apple designs their PCs and OS so they have control over how the power is managed. They also have a very small number of products to test for compared to all major OEMs and MS. I'm not sure why you would discount this. It's this advantage that makes Macs that much better than the competition. You've also only mentioned drivers without any mention of how the Windows itself could simply be less efficient than Mac OS.
The other problem with the Apple Support Forums is the nature of the messages. Let's say that there are 5,000 messages on a particular problem. Of those:
500 are messages from people who experienced the problem (but see below *)
3,000 are from people who don't have the problem
500 are from people calling the first group trolls
100 are from people trying to help the first group
900 are from people simply posting that Apple six
* Of the 500 messages from people who experienced the problem:
400 are from a group of 10 people who posted 40 times each. Of those 10, 8 of them screwed up their system with various hacks and only 2 have a real problem
50 are from people who see it as an opportunity to make Apple look bad so they simply pretend to have the problem
50 are from paid shills
So, out of millions of devices sold and 5,000 Apple Support messages, two people actually have a problem.
I have found it to slow down my machine considerably. Not all the time, but there are long pauses at times when everything seems to be running in molases.
Mail seems to be part of it taking longer to do many tasks and inexplicably chewing up cpu usage.
Then there is the memory issue. I have to run Free Memory a LOT more often than before ( great utility - you should all have it) - and this brings the system to a halt.
Perhaps some of the power usage is do to thrashing.
Battery life is already bad on my mid 2009 MBP with Lion. I am lucky to get 2 hours of service (using lowest power settings, integrated GPU, etc..)
Apple didn't think my 77% health battery had degraded enough in June to fix it before my AppleCare ran out and now I am stuck.
I am definitely going to wait for this to be cleared up before I upgrade.
Sorry folks but I don't seem to have any issues at all. I'm running MacBook Air that I bought just 2 weeks before the WWDC (no free upgrade for me). I do wonder though if the Power Nap feature has something to do with it but aware this is only available to newer kit so probably not.