How to Maintain a Mac to Run Smoothly?

Generally, Mac’s have an excellent reputation as well-made computers that can last for a really long time. However, in order to make sure your Mac is able to run smoothly for as long as possible, you should keep it well-maintained so that its performance doesn’t begin to waver.

The good news is that it really isn’t that difficult to maintain a Mac, and here’s a list of what you should do:

• Regularly scan for viruses and malware

Although Mac’s have a better reputation than PCs when it comes to viruses and malware it is still important to scan them regularly for both. Many antivirus and malware apps nowadays will let you schedule scans, and you can just let them automatically run in the background.

• Remove apps you don’t need

Try to make sure that you completely uninstall any apps that you don’t need. Not only will this help prevent your storage from becoming too full and affecting your performance, but it will also make sure that there aren’t too many apps with services that run in the background.

• Use Disk Utility to check your hard drive

From time to time, you should use Disk Utility to verify your hard drive and repair it if necessary as well as to repair permissions. It will help prevent many issues and could let you know early on if your hard drive is nearing the end of its lifespan.

• Update OS X after waiting a few weeks

It is important to always keep your OS X up to date as each new patch rolls out important fixes for bugs and vulnerabilities. However, if you want to be safe you could wait a few weeks before updating, just in case there are any unforeseen kinks that need to be worked out in the new version.

• Find and delete ‘junk’ files

Essentially junk files are any unnecessary files that serve no purpose – including old logs and cache files, duplicate files, unused localizations for apps, and so on. Finding and deleting these files will free up space on your hard drive and make sure your Mac’s performance doesn’t suffer. To make it easier to find and delete junk files you should use software that automates it such as Movavi Mac Cleaner.

• Add more RAM if necessary

If you’ve done everything else but feel that your Mac is still a lot slower then it may have insufficient RAM. Try to open up the ‘Activity Monitor’ to check your RAM usage and if you can’t reduce it you may need to add more RAM to your Mac. It is best to get help if you aren’t familiar with doing so.

Make no mistake a properly maintained Mac will last for years and perform exceptionally well throughout that time. That in itself should be more than enough reason for you to make sure that you maintain your Mac – especially considering it is really not that difficult to do so.