Disk response slow in Tiger 10.4.7

[Jack W]

Ever since I installed Tiger 10.4.x, my disk activities have slowed down considerably:
• When booting, the partition icons are slow to appear on the screen, now taking around 10 seconds to appear instead of instantaneously
• Directory listings hesitate before appearing, usually taking twice as long or longer
• Applescript file copy routines are much slower (from one drive to another), now taking 2-3 times longer

SuperDuper! still seems very snappy.

Are there any preference settings that speed up these processes?

Thanks, Jack

[pendragon]

Jack,

I have heard that using Cocktail or Onyx to clean the Caches often works in such cases. But if that will fix your problem, I dunno. But it can't hurt.

You might also check your Activity Monitor and see if some application is (stuck) running in the background and hogging your processor.

And finally, a shut down and cold boot often puts things to right.

[tacit]

Have you checked your disks for directory damage using Disk First Aid or another program (such as DiskWarrior)? Have you repaired permissions? Both of these may help.

[Jack W]

Harv,

I brought in the big guns - high power Vac, 100MPH leaf blower, roto-rooter, et al
- OnyX 1.7.3 and did as you suggested - cleaned caches, maint utilities, optimized system, etc, etc, etc.
- Rebooted into single user mode and ran Applejack in auto mode (all except repair permissions - I find that to be interminably long in Applejack.)
- Rebooted system and did DU Repair Permissions.

What an improvement!    

Thanks for the advice.

- Jack

[pendragon]

Jack,

Glad to hear that all is again right with the world. Still, it's a good idea to do as Tacit suggested.