Just installed Ubuntu 12.04 64-bit on my ACER 5742 laptop. The performance is really slow.    While browsing pictures in Google, occasionally my system just freezes for about 5 seconds. Also, installing applications takes a lot of time. For example, installing "Skype" took me about 30 min or so.  In October, I installed earlier version of Ubuntu, and that version did not display any of these symptoms, so my laptop isn't to blame. And, my laptop's specs aren't that bad:  Model: Acer 5742g Processor: Intel Pentium P6200 2.13GHz (duo-core) Graphics Card: AMD Radeon HD6370M, 512 MB RAM/Memory: 6GB 1066Mhz Hard drive:: 500GB (5200 RPM)    I tried both a USB HDD and my 5200 RPM 500GB HDD.  I installed all the drivers that were displayed in Additional Drivers. But still, there is no improvement in performance.  Is it better to just install earlier version of Ubuntu or what?
What are your tips for improving overall system performance on ubuntu? Inspired by this  I realized that some default settings may be rather conservative on Ubuntu and that it's possible to tweak it with little or no risk if you wish to make it faster.  This is not meant to be application specific (e.g. make firefox load pages faster), but system wide.  Preferably 1 tip per answer, with enough detail for people to implement it.  A couple of mine would be:   Install  (via Software Center or sudo apt-get install preload); Change  value - "which controls the degree to which the kernel prefers to swap when it tries to free memory";   What are yours?  PS: Since this is not intended to have a unique answer but rather, several useful tips, I'm making this community wiki out-of-the-box.
Bash One Liner: copy template_*.txt to foo_*.txt? Say I have three files (template_*.txt):   template_x.txt template_y.txt template_z.txt   I want to copy them to three new files (foo_*.txt).    foo_x.txt  foo_y.txt  foo_z.txt   Is there some simple way to do that with one command, e.g.   cp --enableAwesomeness template_*.txt foo_*.txt I have the following diagram:    However, this looks a bit ugly, I would like a version that looks a little bit better. For example, size the last arrow such that the T_\phi is moved to the right.  This is the code which I am using to do this:  \begin{align*}   \xi \colon &amp;\lb \to \mathcal{L}(\hh)\\   &amp;\phi \mapsto T_\phi. \end{align*}   Where \lb and \hh just give the names for those spaces. Does anybody have a suggestion how I would improve the look of this function definition? Why doesn't Mac OS X source ~/.bashrc? Get table names using SELECT statement in MySQL recursion-consecutive numbers what is the number of subsets of the set {k∈N|1≤k≤n} with no two consecutive numbers? The answer says: $$a_n=a_{n-1}+a_{n-2}$$ with the starting conditions: $$a_0=1, a_1=2$$1. why does $a_1=2$? $$$$ 2. How does this recursion was created, I understand that if $a_n$ mean all the places with no consecutive numbers so, $a_{n-1}$ come from the fact that after the first place all those places satisfy this condition, but why there is need to "look" at what happen after the two places? Salesforce, Oracle and the Seven Dwarfs Over my time as a Salesforce developer, I've written some code which on occasion managed to surface Oracle plsql exceptions and curiously the error text contains the name of one of Disney's .  I've teased out Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Bashful and Sneezy. I'm sure the other two are not far away.   What is the underlying "thing" on the database platform that is named after a Dwarf? Why were these named after Dwarves?      java.sql.SQLException: ORA-30006: resource busy; acquire with WAIT   timeout expiredORA-06512: at "DOC.CAPEX", line 2200ORA-06512: at line   1: SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   cApex.update_sysmodstamp(?)}([       java.sql.SQLException: ORA-30006: resource busy; acquire with WAIT   timeout expiredORA-06512: at "GRUMPY.CAPEX", line 2563ORA-06512: at   line 1: SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   cApex.update_sysmodstamp(?)}([       java.sql.SQLException: ORA-30006: resource busy; acquire with WAIT   timeout expiredORA-06512: at "HAPPY.CAPEX", line 2715ORA-06512: at   line 1: SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   cApex.update_sysmodstamp(?)}([       java.sql.SQLException: ORA-30006: resource busy; acquire with WAIT   timeout expiredORA-06512: at "BASHFUL.CAPEX", line 2715ORA-06512: at   line 1: SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   cApex.update_sysmodstamp(?)}([       java.sql.SQLException: ORA-30006: resource busy; acquire with WAIT   timeout expiredORA-06512: at "SNEEZY.CAPEX", line 2718ORA-06512: at   line 1: SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   cApex.invalidate_agc(?,?)}([      Error: ORA-20000: ORA-06512: at "SNEEZY.SIMPORTLOOKUP", line 850   ORA-06512: at "SNEEZY.SIMPORTLOOKUP", line 823 ORA-06512: at line 1 :   SQLException while executing plsql statement: {call   sImportLookup.get_by_ext_id_text(?,?,?,?,?,?,?)}([ How to distribute objects in a circular pattern on a surface (Radial Array, Polar Array) How to create vertical and horizontal dotted lines in a matrix? I need to use a different version of circuitikz. How can I do that? Except when we use right to denote direction, what is the difference between these two terms?  Also, which one is the preferred construction between these two     Am I right?   or     Am I correct? When do you use POST and when do you use GET? Why is this match pattern unreachable when using non-literal patterns? Are there rules about using "that" to join two clauses? A3 pages within A4 doc Can I safely charge my laptop with a non-standard, third-party charger? I have a Toshiba Satellite laptop. My charger has stopped working.  I have access to a Lenovo charger. Can I use this charger on my laptop? PHP import Excel into database (xls & xlsx) What's the current state of LaTeX3 (2020)? There are a few questions on this forum asking about why Latex3 is taking so long to come out. However, all of these are from the early 2010s. I'm just wondering what the current state of the project is and whether it's ready (or nearly ready) for prime time? I know how to define a package or a class, but how do I make it available (to myself) at all times?  Say I have the package file commonstuff.sty (or myprettyclass.cls), that I want to be able to include in any .tex file I create on my computer. Where do I put it? Do I need to run some installer on it, or is it enough to keep it in a certain folder?  Note: I know I can just place it in the same folder as the .tex file, but that's not what I'm after here. I'm looking for a way to "install" the package centrally on my computer. How to make a GIS inventory? My office will be seeing a big change in its GIS section. This section has been operational since the 1980's and has a huge collection of GIS data (i.e., shapefiles, raster files, data, etc) but never been through any inventory. Now it will happen.   Is there any automated way to extract all the information about the GIS data (i.e., shapefile, arc-info coverage, layer file, *.mxd, gdb, raster file, and more) from a PC to an Excel file? The information may include date of creation, date last edited, folder or container name, etc. Rooting Stock Firmware - GSII with NFC