I HATE APPLE

I had a single iMac for almost 12 years from 2007. But my replacement 2019 iMac has been sluggish for quite a while and frequently shuts down - at 4.5 years old.

you probably have a clogged fan. i know i've talked about this elsewhere on ilx...

My 2019 iMac has been ridiculously slow for a long time. I've owned Macs since the early 90s and in many ways this was the worst I've had -- it was taking more than 10 minutes to do a restart. Recently I set up an external SSD as a startup disk and the speed improvement has been enormous, it's like a completely different machine.

For the most part I followed the instructions here: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-250003583.

Thanks - I probably will try that. I’ve never been that satisfied with the Fusion Drive.

Fusion drive was a cool idea but i feel like it's kind of like a plug-in hybrid vehicle - half-step to the better type, better than the traditional model, but you also keep the problems of the old tech. Mine died in a power surge (i think? never quite figured it out) a few years ago and I replaced it with an SSD.

i have a Face ID phone for the first time and while the Face ID works great i'm finding it sort of weirdly awkward to just unlock my phone and start using it? i used to just hold the button and it would unlock to the home screen. Now i have to tap the screen (hard to do with one hand) or swipe up from the bottom (also kind of weird to do with one hand; you have to hold the phone nearer the bottom to do this than you'd ordinarily hold it). Once you do this you're dumped back into the app you were in before, which is seldom the one I want NOW. Has it always been like this? Anyway it feels like I need to swipe up like two or even three times just to get to my home screen. FAIL (or maybe i'll just get used to this in the end)

oh i forgot there's "raise to wake" which I do have turned on, though it often just doesn't work and you end up having to tap it anyway. or push the side button.

common complaint when going from touchid -> faceid

i’m sure i’m just being a fuddy duddy. they test this stuff to high heaven.

The latest thing I learned is that Apple will apparently not allow you to do firmware updates without an OEM drive. I have an aftermarket drive running Catalina, and I guess the only way to update beyond that is the reinstall an OEM Apple drive, do the firmware update, and then swap back in my current drive.

The Macbook is back and working, btw. Got that fresh i7 board smell.

I bought a 12" powerbook on eBay a few years ago that smelled like someone had poured human sweat on the fan

On the Lacie external SSD USB-C, it comes with this cable. Is this USB C? Anyone know what adapter I need to connect it to an iMac?

https://i.imgur.com/DLZW7GV.jpg

sorry for the huge image

yes that’s USB-C. pretty sure a 2019 iMac will support that but there’s a pretty easy way to check

Lol - thx. Indeed, I just needed to move further along the row of ports at the back of my iMac.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who puzzled over that cable

Recently I set up an external SSD as a startup disk and the speed improvement has been enormous, it's like a completely different machine.

Thanks so much for this tip, Brad C. I've just completely this process now - and the result is exactly as you say. It's an incredible speed improvement like a different machine.

(can you not use an internal ssd? an external ssd feels like even more dongley than macs usually are)

can't install one in an imac without taking it apart

You're welcome, Dr Drudge (Bob Six)! I'm still trying to get used to the improvement. I wish it had occurred to me earlier to research speed problems with the 2019 iMac, which appear to be widespread.

I don't like relying on an external SSD, especially since the cable that came with it is so short that I had to set it on top of some other external drives, but I can live with it.

I was happy that Migration Assistant supported my preferred arrangement of running applications from the SSD while continuing to store files on the internal HD. Music was the only app that needed my help to find its data.

can't install one in an imac without taking it apart

A lot of the frustration with my Face ID phone comes from a feeling of inconsistency, particularly when waking. Raise to wake in particular is unpredictable. Sometimes the action of raising the phone triggers it, but sometimes I guess the angle or speed of the raising isn't sufficient and it just sits there inert, and then you have to tap it. Turning off raise to wake entirely "fixes" this insofar as now I know I have to tap it, and that works every time. I still face the niggle that swipes from the bottom don't always register. This was never a problem with Touch ID.

While I'm complaining, the larger size of a 15 compared to an SE means that it is quite difficult to reach my thumb all the way across the keyboard. If I'm using my left hand, reaching the delete key is basically impossible. How do people do this? Do you turn the phone horizontally and type with both hands?

Yeah, I installed a new drive in an imac. It worked out fine but a year or two later there was an OS update and it wasn’t compatible with the drive I put in. There was a workaround and it was a huge pain in the ass that involved inputting a bunch of DOS stuff and yeah, never again. Apple stuff is way too fussy to be dicking around with. For me anyways.

I’m with tracer , the ergonomics of the modern phones are terrible. The old curved side phones were easier and more comfortable to hold and use

Another one. With Touch ID, you hold your phone over a contactless terminal with your finger resting on the button and the payment instantly goes through. With Face ID, you hold your phone over a contactless terminal and are then prompted to "double click" the side button, at which point the phone tries to use your face to verify the transaction, but you're not holding the phone at the right angle for that, you're holding it out flat in front of you, so it fails. I'm trying to get better at finding the ideal angle at which I can 1) tap my phone 2) double click the side button and 3) have the phone pointing at my fucking face.

Double click while looking at the phone, then drop it to pay

occasionally there are these rumors

https://www.macrumors.com/2021/03/04/when-will-apple-add-touch-id-to-the-iphone/

I still face the niggle that swipes from the bottom don't always register

do you have a case with a side that covers the end with the charging port? if so, a bottomless case can help with this.

I go bareback baby

Double click while looking at the phone, then drop it to pay

but I trigger the payment screen by dropping to pay

sounds like a skill issue

lol no doubt

pebkac

okay payment went smoother this time but still not as smooth as with Touch ID.

1. tap
2. double click side button
3. lift to face
4. tap again because phone is too far away from the machine after lifting to my fucking face

why not eliminate step 1 by setting a double click on the side button to open the wallet? well, because a) i have a default card set; what’s the point of that if i have to open the wallet and choose it every time but more to the point b) i’ve disabled that shortcut because when it’s enabled locking the screen takes like a full second to happen (because i guess it’s waiting to see if you’re going to click again)

You don’t have to trigger the phone payment screen by putting it next to the payment thing. You can do that beforehand

how? i used to just tap

this shit got me like Josh in Chicago

Just double tap the side button bro! Anytime anyplace

just tapping to pay with the default card and skipping touch/face id works only in certain situations https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212171 (basically just transit in the US, maybe different in the old country).

i'm confused though, why does it matter if locking takes a second to happen?

you can just hit the side button to lock the phone when the wallet's open

because a) i have a default card set
when you double-click the side button it defaults to your default card

I just double-click while holding the phone up, then tap it against the reader as others have mentioned

the convenience of not having to authenticate with your face is nice with Touch ID if you're just waving your phone at something and don't want to unlock it first, but for 90% of all unlocking/authorizing I prefer it so it's a compromise?

fwiw I just double-click my watch button and use that to pay for touch payments usually

I found it all gets incorporated into automated muscle memory after a couple of days, and I'd struggle to describe the steps.

hah, that too. I had to click around a fair bit to remember how it "just works" for me

why does it matter if locking takes a second to happen?

i guess it’s a choice between annoying delay on lock or annoying extra tap when paying

if you put it in your pocket it just locks nbd

A minor inconvenience compared to the hassle of counting out change.

why is it annoying? i don't get it. do you wait to confirm that it's locked? do you long for closure?

on every other iphone i’ve had the screen goes black quasi-instantly when i press the side button. i guess what’s going on, which i’m only now realising, is that i take a glance at it to kind of verify that it’s locked, so that i don’t butt-dial someone, and now that little glance takes a beat to happen. it doesn’t feel crisp

There’s a click speed setting under accessibility > side button. Is that set to something other than default?

no when double click for wallet (not for approving payment) is enabled at all it slows down the process of the screen locking. i mean whatever i’m sure i’ll get over it… if i can be bothered enabling it again… but i’ll probably just like grind my apple pay gymnastics a little more out of sheer stubbornness

It got worse multiple iOS versions back but I still hate how picking a spot in a line of text works. Like if I search for something on Google and inevitably have to add modifiers and pluses and minuses because search is broken now, tapping a spot highlights the entire string. Then it takes four more taps to get it to just a cursor in the right spot.