System Maintenance

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Basileus

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A few questions:

1. Coming from a Windows machine, I'm used to using a series of system tune ups, check-ups, and other utilities to keep the OS running at its best. Is there a need for similar regimens in OS X, and, if so, what do you all recommend?

2. Is adware/spyware software needed on a Mac?

3. How prevalent are Mac-specific viruses? Is a Mac antivirus program a good investment regardless?
 
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Honestly, if your machine is on all the time, you don't need anything. OS X will run every maintenance program it needs on its own.

If you don't, then running Onyx or Cocktail will make sure everything is done. You only need to run it every so often.
 
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Jordan

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schweb said:
Honestly, if your machine is on all the time, you don't need anything. OS X will run every maintenance program it needs on its own.

If you don't, then running Onyx or Cocktail will make sure everything is done. You only need to run it every so often.


Hi,

I'm fairly new to Macs as well and just started a general maintenance routine myself. I am curious if you guys thing I am going about it the right way.

I don't have my iBook on all the time so it doesn't run the cron scripts on its own as I understand. So, once a month I use MacJanitor to run the cron scripts and I us disk utility to repair permissions. Other than the odd Backup of my data that is all I do.

Is this enough?

Ciao,

Jordan
 
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You can buy AV software for the Mac, but as I understand it, all this does is stops you unwittingly passing on any viruses to those poor PC users.
 
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just please dont use norton products if you must use a virus app.
there are lots of apps for maintenance, if you go with onyx, be very careful.
 
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Macman said:
just please dont use norton products if you must use a virus app.
why?
Macman said:
there are lots of apps for maintenance, if you go with onyx, be very careful.
why? i use onyx sometimes. why do u suggest i shouldnt use it?
 
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Since the rise of OSX, Norton has been a terrible bit of software which just does horrible things to your computer resulting in making more problems than it solves. As for the anti virus software, it just slows your machine down.

!!! THEIR ARE NO VIRUSES FOR OSX !!!!

Onyx is a nice program but be careful with the clean up function for deleting DS files, system files and such. as this is not needed and can cause problems.

I think this is what Macman was also talking about ?
 
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yes, you have no idea how many new mac users get onyx, and get click happy and select everything, then I get a call "*woirried voice* my mac wont startup. what do I do?
onyx is a good app, great in fact, but not for beginners or new mac users, if you dont know what it does, leave it alone, pretend it doesnt exist.
 
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*SquALED*

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Owa Macman, I bought NAV when I got my iMac....Oh well, put it down to Mac Newbness and just thinking you need it after PCs for so long. I'll take your advice about onyx. So am I right in saying osx will maintain itself?? - Sq
 
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it will if its on 24/7 the cron jobs run at weird times

other than that use one of the programs mentioned
 
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Thud

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Mr Bobbins said:
!!! THEIR ARE NO VIRUSES FOR OSX !!!!


http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/0,2000061744,39164062,00.htm

"Ducklin said Opener disables Mac OS X's built in firewall, creates a back door so the malware author can control the computer remotely, locates any passwords stored on the hard drive and downloads a password cracker called JohnTheRipper.

According to Ducklin, Opener tries to spread by copying itself to any drive that is mounted to the infected computer. This could be a local drive, part of a local network or a remote computer.

Most worryingly, according to Ducklin, this could be the start of a spate of malware that uses Mac OS X’s scripting features against its users."
 
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*SquALED* said:
Owa Macman, I bought NAV when I got my iMac....Oh well, put it down to Mac Newbness and just thinking you need it after PCs for so long. I'll take your advice about onyx. So am I right in saying osx will maintain itself?? - Sq
if your mac is on 24/7 or at least betweebn 3 and 5 am, it will, the only thing it wont do is repair permissions, you have to do that using disk utility or an above mentioned app.
 
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meltbanana314

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Thud said:

The linked article *only* talks about the things this rootkit (not a virus) does to a person's computer, once it is on it, and doesn't discuss how it gets onto a computer in the first place other than by manually installing it (which you'd also need root access to do - which is disabled by default in OS X.)

It might be malicious, but unless it is possible/easy for folks to accidentally install it (like all of the Windows spyware/malware), it is not a threat, any more than than 'sudo rm -rf /' is.
 
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exactly. that sudo rm -rf/ thing is funny when someone miusinterprets something and tries to 'fix' a problem by doing this.
 
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dstyrk

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So what's the rant about DiskWarrior I've stumbled upon in various forums?

Claimed #1 in maintenance for you machine???
 
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dstyrk said:
So what's the rant about DiskWarrior I've stumbled upon in various forums?

Claimed #1 in maintenance for you machine???
disk warrior is morea repair tool, not maintenance. most users using disk warrior are using it incorrectly and Ive seen some major damage done to the point of erase and installs with no backups. the ONLY time DW should be used is after a crash, or power surge, or something causing your mac to shut down so that after it starts back up, things are missing, thats when you use disk warrior, no other time.
 
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Macman said:
the ONLY time DW should be used is after a crash, or power surge, or something causing your mac to shut down so that after it starts back up, things are missing, thats when you use disk warrior, no other time.

I'm afraid I don't entirely agree with your position on this. DiskWarrior, while indeed quite a useful repair/recovery tool, also has value as a "maintenance" tool, albeit an infrequent maintenance tool. DiskWarrior optimizes the HDD's directory, which can (and does) result in noticeable improvements in boot time, application launching, etc. - especially on machines that have seen extensive usage.

Granted, rebuilding with DW isn't something that should be done frequently (certainly nowhere near the frequency of traditional OS X "maintenance"), but I've personally never experienced any problems or adverse effects while using DiskWarrior on either of my machines.
 
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Thud said:
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/0,2000061744,39164062,00.htm

"Ducklin said Opener disables Mac OS X's built in firewall, creates a back door so the malware author can control the computer remotely, locates any passwords stored on the hard drive and downloads a password cracker called JohnTheRipper.

According to Ducklin, Opener tries to spread by copying itself to any drive that is mounted to the infected computer. This could be a local drive, part of a local network or a remote computer.

Most worryingly, according to Ducklin, this could be the start of a spate of malware that uses Mac OS X’s scripting features against its users."

This is old news and has already been patched:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/user-posts?id=145576

Sorry to disappoint you. :dummy:

I'm not saying that it's not possible for Viruses to be made for OSX, what I'm saying is, until their is it's just stupid to be running anti virus software on your mac as it's not going to work on a new virus anyway, it would have to be updated first.
 

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