I have a desktop app accessing a remote database. Users in one location are complaining about speed. The least powerful computer on their LAN is:
iMac
1.83 gig intel core 2 duo
1 gig ram
Running 10.6.8
Not sure if other apps are running, but I would say at minimum they always have a browser window open (Firefox or Safari). This location tends to leave the Xojo app always open - even over weekends.
I have remotely logged into another computer in that location with the following specs:
2.66 gig intel core 2 duo
4 gb ram
Running 10.6.8
which seems to run the Xojo app pretty well.
Speedtest shows the following results (on the computer I am able to remotely log into):
Download: 3.05 Mbit
Upload: 2.21 Mbit
Ping latency: 42 msec.
(These download speeds seems a little slow to me for broadband. I have standard cable tv internet in my office running at around 18 Mbit download).
In the Activity Monitor on my computer, my app is using 64 MB RAM and 148 MB Virtual Memory.
Would increasing RAM make an appreciable difference?
Any other areas I should be looking at which could affect performance?
Thanks.
Increasing RAM is always a good idea. The 1 GB iMac is a little lite in that department, IMO. I recommend a minimum of 2 GB on Mac OS X and Windows.
What you want to avoid is having the app page memory to and from the hard drive because it’s REALLY slow. If the machine is being used for other tasks than don’t be stingy on the RAM.
Solid State Drives will perform way getter than mechanical drives. I’m trying hard to replace all my drives with SSD’s.
Otherwise it’s a matter of security software or other background processes that might be getting in the way.
I think if they complain over speed, you need to figure out which tasks are slow and what they do.
Maybe they need a lot of requests, than the ping times are more relevant than the bandwidth.
if they download or upload a lot the bandwidth is more important.
Or maybe you do a lot of calculations which need a lot of CPU time?
Thanks. I will make sure they have a least 2 GB of RAM in each machine.
I did have an issue once where download speeds were slower over wired ethernet than wireless. It turned out to be a corrupted location setting in the Mac. I created a new location under System Preferences > Network and everything was running a top speed again. This was quite a headache to troubleshoot. I am asking their computer tech to try this on the machines that have slow download speeds compared to upload (such as the one I was able to speedtest above).