Optimizing a MacBook
Hey everyone! I just got a MacBook, I was wondering what some of you guys do to optimize your Mac for djing shows, things like settings, software, or hardware? I have a gig coming up and I want to be as prepared as possible. All advise would be great 
The system itself is pretty much optimised. It comes down to don’t have a bunch of apps open you don’t need, keep at least 15% of your hard drive free. If you are on 10.7 or 10.8 it is recommended to have at least 4gb of ram for it to run fluently.
My only recommendation is that if you are using a USB hub to make sure it’s a powered one (as in plug it to the wall) and have your soundcard plugged directly to the computer, not through the hub.
Thank you! I have two powered 15" speakers. Would you recommend getting a soundcard and plugging in xlr cables to the soundcard that is connected to the Mac? I don’t have a controller yet. But I do have a small mixer wich I don’t think is a soundcard right?
repair ur permissions at least once a month in disc utility
Disable the IR remote sensor and install the app called Caffiene. That’s it.
Thank you guys(gals) whats the caffeine app do?
Keeps the Mac display from going to sleep.
nothing. thats why i bought a macbook! but yes id get a soundcard rather than try to run the speakers off the 3.5mm jack socket
Or manually do it in the System Preferences under Energy Saver.
I don’t have a soundcard, but I have it hooked up to a mixer wich is hooked up to the speakers I don’t need a soundcard if I do it that way right?
That is not true. For traditional HDD, that percentage goes a lot higher. It’s because only the files at the beginning of the HDD run with optimal performance. Physical nature of the round shape of disk.
Buy the biggest disk available and keep at least 50% of it free. And to be clear: there is fragmentation on mac file system. You should defragment it once in a while.
This is a way more elaborate optimization than what you probably had in mind, but…
I replaced the internal DVD drive with an SSD. I use the SSD to run OS X and applications (Traktor, Illustrator, etc.) while storing the majority of my digital media on the internal HD. When I DJ a gig I move the majority of the music I expect to play from the HD onto the SSD.
The result is that when I perform at gigs my computer has to work ALOT less hard. Without the hard drive calling up any data there are no parts moving in my computer when I play. Essentially, I receive all the benefits of using an SSD vs a HD but still conserve space. It takes a lot of organization but makes a really big difference in performance. To be honest when I DJ I think quickly and am very decisive. I like my MacBook to be as snappy as I am.
Doesnt get as hot, less battery consumption, etc. etc.
I turn it on 
Yup. Buying SSD is one of the first things to consider when thinking of optimising MacBooks. Personally, I got rid of both the DVD and HDD drive. Power consumption, weight, etc, etc. Never used the CDs, anyway…
I like this! Thanks for the help
My Apple SuperDisk drives keep dying. In 4 or 5 Macbooks and Pros, I’ve had 2 or 3 dead SuperDrives……one of them straight from the store. So, I just gave up on them. The last one has been broken since about a month after I got the computer, and it was never worth the time it’d take to have Apple replace it, so I just got a $20 USB external for when I rip DVDs or the few times I need to burn a CD. I’ve thought about getting an external blu-ray drive, but IDK where “we” are in ripping blu-ray movies……and with the exception of records, I hate physical media.
I have a fast (6Gb/s) 120GB SSD in place of the hard drive and a not so fast (3Gb/s) 240GB SSD in a Data Doubler (in place of the Optical drive)……and it’s awesome. The second was a recent addition, but it’s nice to actually have plentiful storage on the computer. I held off because apparently 2011 MBPs can’t run 6GB/s drives reliably in place of the optical drive, and I wasn’t sure about the speed difference. Apparently, it’s not really an issue.
Hard Drives are for archive storage. With RAM being cheap (16GB of ram for this computer was only $100, though Apple doesn’t sell it) and processors being fast enough, SSDs are the biggest upgrade you can make. I have spent like $600 upgrading this MBP (the fast SSD was around $300 on its own when I got it), but it’s totally worth it. I’ll never boot a spinning hard drive again.
As far as other things, Bartender is an app that helps clean up your menu bar (removes stuff you don’t need while still providing access to it if you need it) and I find that iStat Menus is worth the resources it takes to display CPU temperature, processor/ram usage, a better clock, and a better battery gauge.
Either Alfred or Quicksilver is IMO essential. Both of them are more useful and more powerful than the Dock. I honestly don’t remember the last time I did anything with my (auto-hidden and tiny) dock. I’d disable it if it weren’t engrained into the OS. I use Alfred with the PowerPack, and it’s probably made the biggest difference in my use of computers since switching away from Windows back in 2004.
If you’re a terminal junkie, dvtm is awesome……though it has nothing to do with music stuff.
Also,
How to Disable Dashboard. All it does is waste resources.
And I turned off some of the eye candy (genie window minimization effect, bouncing dock icons, lights under dock icons for running apps), not so much to save resources as to make things snappier. Then again, I don’t remember the last time I minimized a window and I don’t use the Dock.
Other than that, the biggest thing is not applying software updates willy-nilly. Apple sometimes likes to change things and every now and then it breaks (or hinders) Audio applications………it’s worth waiting a few days before upgrading to see if your stuff is going to work.
Oh. And most of my trackpad gestures are turned off both for the normal trackpad and my wireless magic trackpad. I can’t figure out why Apple thinks it’s better to contort my hand rather than just using the keyboard.
Hell yeah, Caffeine is my most favourite App. Can’t live without it!
I tend to run into problems if my hard drive has less than 20% free space left. I also just added 16GB of RAM. I keep most other programs closed and turn off Bluetooth and WiFi if I don’t need it.
Files under 20mb gets defragged automatically.
Personally I never run into any performance issues while keeping 15-20% free. Anything that goes into a deck in a DJing software gets loaded into the RAM and keeping 50% free just to gain some ms worth of load time is IMO a big waste of money since the difference is negligible.
I didn’t you could do all this to make it better! Can all this be done on a MacBook 2, 1 with an upgraded ram to 4gb and have that Mac run just my DJ software? Or is it smarter to use my more current MacBook Pro and add an SSD with 8 gb ram, have it run my DJ software and production software? I’m just scared that the older Mac wont be reliable but then again it would only be used for djing. On the other hand I’m worried that using the Mac Pro, wich I also need for ableton, and for school would be too risky to also use it to dj