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Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

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Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#81

Post by veidr »

gnicholas wrote: post #14

Does this have a menubar widget? I miss MenuMeters, after it was killed by an OS update a while back. Would love to try it out, regardless!

One thing I recently discovered is that macOS has no capacity to deal with overflow of the "menu bar widget" area.

I had rotated my 27" 5K displays to portrait mode, which I find better for coding. That made the menu bar narrower. The widgets in the menu bar on the left side just don't appear when the frontmost app's menu is too wide.

Since I use iStat Menus for this purpose, which puts (in my configuration) 6 different widgets there, and have several others as well, lots of icons were simply inaccessible.

That is one argument for Pluto's approach here.

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#82

Post by dakull »

ivanmaeder wrote: post #74

On the subject of system performance on macOS… does anyone know of a decent app/tool for limiting CPU on different processes or programs? This might be less relevant on newer hardware, but I'm interested in limiting certain apps (e.g., Dropbox, OS tools) from heating up the computer and making the fans go crazy.

I like to use htop `brew install htop` and then play with nice (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nice_(Unix) for "bad" processes).

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#83

Post by lost_my_pwd »

ivanmaeder wrote: post #74

On the subject of system performance on macOS… does anyone know of a decent app/tool for limiting CPU on different processes or programs? This might be less relevant on newer hardware, but I'm interested in limiting certain apps (e.g., Dropbox, OS tools) from heating up the computer and making the fans go crazy.

Give AppPolice a try: https://github.com/AppPolice/AppPolice

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#84

Post by tomaskafka »

somebodynew wrote: post #78
sgt wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy, you just gave me another reason to want the Mac Mini M1. I have had two previous Mac Mini's (and one is actually still operational 24/7, despite being 12 years old). Such a brilliant little machine, and much better value than say an iMac as there are tons of good screens out there. I am wondering though whether it supports dual 4k screens at 60Hz. I don't think HDMI can do that, so it would have to be Display…

Apple says that the M1 Mac Mini supports: > One display with up to 6K resolution at 60Hz connected via Thunderbolt and one display with up to 4K resolution at 60Hz connected via HDMI 2.0 That is, it does support two 4K screens at 60 Hz. Note that this is in contrast to the M1 MacBooks which only support one external display in addition to the laptop display.

M1 Macbooks reportedly support also 4k/120hz, and 4k/144hz/hdr with DSC, so it's quite possible that Mini would too

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#85

Post by tomaskafka »

veidr wrote: post #81
gnicholas wrote: post #14

Does this have a menubar widget? I miss MenuMeters, after it was killed by an OS update a while back. Would love to try it out, regardless!

One thing I recently discovered is that macOS has no capacity to deal with overflow of the "menu bar widget" area. I had rotated my 27" 5K displays to portrait mode, which I find better for coding. That made the menu bar narrower. The widgets in the menu bar on the left side just don't appear when the frontmost app's menu is too wide. Since I use iStat Menus for this purpose, which puts (in my configuration) 6 differ…

Bartender app is great for that (and should have been sherlocked like 4 releases ago :))

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#87

Post by veidr »

tomaskafka wrote: post #85
veidr wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I recently discovered is that macOS has no capacity to deal with overflow of the "menu bar widget" area. I had rotated my 27" 5K displays to portrait mode, which I find better for coding. That made the menu bar narrower. The widgets in the menu bar on the left side just don't appear when the frontmost app's menu is too wide. Since I use iStat Menus for this purpose, which puts (in my configuration) 6 differ…

Bartender app is great for that (and should have been sherlocked like 4 releases ago :))

Oh, great point! I forgot about that app, and indeed it would have saved the day.

(Ultimately, I decided I wanted at least one of my monitors landscape anyway... I realized this the first time I wanted to watch a video program, ha ha.)

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#88

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

lupinglade wrote: post #54
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #46

Looks nice. I wish you luck. I have sworn off these things, after numerous issues with another one.

What issues did you have?

Crashes. HARD crashes. Random, frequent, mysterious. Worthless crash dumps.

Removing the utility immediately stopped them.

I tried the utility several times, over the last few years. Every time, as soon as I started using it, the crashes began.

I really wanted it to work, but it wasn't worth it.

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#89

Post by the_other »

fermienrico wrote: post #37
zero_ wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

never have luck with this stuff ;D

You can spend $10 :) It's like 2 coffees. Not that much and not a subscription :)

This dashboard won't cure the caffeine withdrawal headaches. I'll still need to buy the coffee.

Re: Show HN: Pluto – macOS system monitor app

#90

Post by rovr138 »

technotarek wrote: post #52

Slightly off topic, but fully related. Has anyone ever noticed that when your CPU is spiking on a Mac, simply opening Activity Monitor often brings it in check? Please tell me I haven’t fabricated this correlation! I’ve noticed it on several generations of MBA’s, with the 2020 Intel as the most recent.

If Activity Monitor runs with a higher priority/niceness, that could explain it
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