Internal SUS update check takes way too long

[Cem]

Anyone knows why software update check takes longer when it is pointing to the internal SUS? On some Macs I have seen this. But when I point them to Apple's public SUS it is snappier.

It kind of bothers me, as when I run Recon it takes longer.

Any ideas?

[jarednichols]

I'm guessing you've got a proxy.

[Cem]

no proxy

[jarednichols]

Huh. That's the only time I've seen this. How are you setting SUS? MCX or defaults? And what's your CatalogURL?

[Cem]

mcx
http://mysusserver.com:8088/index-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog

[Cem]

Apply Setting To: System Level Enforced
Domain: /Library/Preferences/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate
Key: CatalogURL

[Cem]

MCX works for other Macs as well as these slow ones.

[jarednichols]

Try this:

defaults write /var/root/Library/Preferences/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate CatalogURL http://mysusserver.com:8088/index-lion-snowleopard-leopard.merged-1.sucatalog

Then scan for updates again. I have a hunch.

[andrew_stenehje]

Jared~ That made it totally snappy for me... why does changing it for the root account make it faster?

[Cem]

no it didn't change anything...hmmm

[jarednichols]

Because many things run by the Casper Admin account are done with a sudo, which puts it into the Root context.

[andrew_stenehje]

It's interesting that it speeds it up when I'm running it as a regular (non-root) non-Casper user too though.

[jarednichols]

Were you going at the general catalog previously instead of the OS-specific on?

[andrew_stenehje]

I'm still pointing it to the general catalog... I didn't include the OS specific one in my path... just "index.sucatalog"

[Bauer]

I just tested this here and didn't see a marked improvement in times. After establishing a baseline, and after multiple reboots and tests, I saw *maybe* a couple second improvement from the baseline numbers after running the command.

Jared, was this a hunch or have you seen measured improvements in your testing?

[jarednichols]

If you're behind a proxy, setting it for root greatly improves things. For Cem, he wasn't behind a proxy so it didn't really do much in his case.

[Cem]

yeh some Macs takes up to 15-20 minutes. On some it just flies...

[Cem]

wow NetSUS is way too snappier!