Is my Page ins/outs ratio ok?

[Temujin]

My system has been running for 10 days straight. Doing video editing, playing games, surfing, downloading....well all kinds of stuff.
During this period my MBP has picked up 910372 ins and 1227516 outs.

In general my system feels a bit slow at times but it's not a constant nuisance. When it gets slow I occasionally get the spinning wheel of death for a period of 5 to 30 seconds.

Outs should never excede ins, right?
So this could be a bottle neck? (EDIT: typo)

I have 1.5 gigs of ram in my 1.83 Ghz MBP, would adding more ram change things?

 

[spicyapple]

Here's mine.

Dual 1.8GHz G5

 

[MalcolmJID]

Mine. I desperately need some more RAM

 

[smartalic34]

here's mine, with not really any lag:
also, why does it say 1,024 MB instead of 1 GB for my total RAM?

 

[Carguy172]

it says you have that much because that is how much you have its only math 512+512=1024

 

[smartalic34]

doesnt 1,024 MB = 1 GB? I guess it's just choosing 6 as opposed to half dozen of the other as the saying goes

 

[apfhex]

Outs should never excede ins, right?
So this is a sing of a bottle neck?

Well, it's fine if they do, but it *does* mean you are running out of physical memory at times, so yes it would be a bottleneck (especially if you have a slow hard drive).

 

[Temujin]

Well, it's fine if they do, but it *does* mean you are running out of physical memory at times, so yes it would be a bottleneck (especially if you have a slow hard drive).

I've got a 5400 rpm drive.

Would adding 512 mb ram really make that big of a difference, or should I go with a 7200 rpm drive instead?

 

[glib]

I've got a 5400 rpm drive.

Would adding 512 mb ram really make that big of a difference, or should I go with a 7200 rpm drive instead?

Think about it this way, your computer is running out of memory, so it's using virtual memory on your HD. This is a bottleneck because a hard drive so much slower than RAM. Now seeing as this is the problem, adding a faster drive isn't really the best way to deal with it. You'd still be running out of ram, and still going to the (still) much slower HD.

 

[EricNau]

doesnt 1,024 MB = 1 GB? I guess it's just choosing 6 as opposed to half dozen of the other as the saying goes

Not exactly.

1,024 MB = 1 Gibibyte (GiB)

1,000 MB = 1 Gigabyte (GB)

You actually have 1 Gibibyte (that's 1,024 Megabytes) of RAM, but many just say "Gigabyte" because it's easier and commonly accepted to mean 1,024 MB.

 

[lpmusix]

Not exactly.

1,024 MB = 1 Gibibyte (GiB)

1,000 MB = 1 Gigabyte (GB)

You actually have 1 Gibibyte (that's 1,024 Megabytes) of RAM, but many just say "Gigabyte" because it's easier and commonly accepted to mean 1,024 MB.

While 1Gibibyte may equal 1024MB, 1GB still 1024MB

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigabyte

"1,073,741,824 bytes"

Now lets do some math:
1,073,741,824 B / 1024 = 1 048 576 KB
1 048 576 KB / 1024 = 1024MB
1024MB / 1024 = 1GB

 

[Jiddick ExRex]

What on earth are you smoking? 1GB == 1024MB

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigabyte

"1,073,741,824 bytes"

Now lets do some math:
1,073,741,824 B / 1024 = 1 048 576 KB
1 048 576 KB / 1024 = 1024MB
1024MB / 1024 = 1GB

.....

You were saying?

He was saying this you poor demented fool

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibibyte

Since mega, giga and all that really is a poor and inaccurate way of describing binary bytes, a new name was invented so you didn't have to deal with the confusion of people not understanding why their new 160 GB harddisk only had 156 GB of space...

You link actually says that the gigabyte has two definitions. Both of you are of course right, I am merely elaborating.

 

[lpmusix]

He was saying this you poor demented fool

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibibyte

Since mega, giga and all that really is a poor and inaccurate way of describing binary bytes, a new name was invented so you didn't have to deal with the confusion of people not understanding why their new 160 GB harddisk only had 156 GB of space...

You link actually says that the gigabyte has two definitions. Both of you are of course right, I am merely elaborating.

Yes, I was reading over the stuff after i made the post and editted it accordingly...

 

[bousozoku]

Indeed, page-ins should exceed page-outs. However, people with Intel processors seem to display similar results. It may be that Rosetta is just too intense. I wonder if anyone with a Mac Pro and more than 2 GB of RAM has opposite results.

 

[Chundles]

Computers shouldn't be reporting capacity in GB because Giga is a prefix meaning units of 10^9. It's an SI unit and as such, using it for any other number (ie 1024MB) is incorrect and an inappropriate use of the unit.

Computers should either say 1GiB or start using SI units properly. For example, when you plug in an 80GB iPod, iTunes should either say you have a capacity of ~74.57GiB or it should say 80GB as both are equivalent but saying 74.57GB is wrong.

File sizes should be adjusted appropriately so that instead of 1KB = 1024 bytes, 1KB = 1000 bytes.

If this is too much for binary then it should say KiB, MiB, GiB, TiB etc.

SI units have a very strict application and currently computers are in the wrong.

 

[jhande]

See? MacRumors forums are not only fun but also educational - albeit embarrasingly so, sometimes. I'm a programmer, 'n have been since the early eighties, and have _never_ come across GiB.....

I just love waking up and learning something new... tks all

 

[bousozoku]

...
SI units have a very strict application and currently computers are in the wrong.

If people can't handle the difference, they shouldn't be using computers.

 

[Ish]

I'm learning something new here, too. I have a 1.67 GHz PowerBook with 512 MB of RAM. It's okay for ordinary use but when I use some Adobe apps it's slow. When I use an app such as Photo to Movie to make a DVD, it's achingly slow. Would that be caused by processor speed or does the attachment indicate a chronic shortage of RAM for such use?

I'm told that Dells have a light that comes on to indicate when the hard drive is being used. What's the equivalent for Macs? How can I tell whether the hard drive is being used or not? Forgive the ignorance!

 

[Chundles]

I'm learning something new here, too. I have a 1.67 GHz PowerBook with 512 MB of RAM. It's okay for ordinary use but when I use some Adobe apps it's slow. When I use an app such as Photo to Movie to make a DVD, it's achingly slow. Would that be caused by processor speed or does the attachment indicate a chronic shortage of RAM for such use?

I'm told that Dells have a light that comes on to indicate when the hard drive is being used. What's the equivalent for Macs? How can I tell whether the hard drive is being used or not? Forgive the ignorance!

Why do you need a light to know if the HDD is being used? If you're working on something that's writing or reading from the HDD then you know it's working.

Anything to do with encoding video is slow on a G4 no matter what the speed. The speed increases Steve announced with the switch to Intel might not be noticeable in all applications but they are spot on when it comes to video encoding. A MacBook encodes video at ~5x to 6x as fast as my iBook.

 

[Ish]

Why do you need a light to know if the HDD is being used? If you're working on something that's writing or reading from the HDD then you know it's working.

Anything to do with encoding video is slow on a G4 no matter what the speed. The speed increases Steve announced with the switch to Intel might not be noticeable in all applications but they are spot on when it comes to video encoding. A MacBook encodes video at ~5x to 6x as fast as my iBook.

Hi Chundles, that was quick! The reason I wanted to know is so that I could tell whether or not the hard drive was being used to process the video. If it was, then some extra RAM might help matters.

I didn't know about it always being slow on a G4. I don't really want to buy extra RAM for this machine as it is currently on its third logic board, the last two having lasted only about 3 months each. After what you have told me, I shall look forward to a MacBook Pro! I wasn't really bothered before.

 

[Greebazoid]

See? MacRumors forums are not only fun but also educational - albeit embarrasingly so, sometimes. I'm a programmer, 'n have been since the early eighties, and have _never_ come across GiB.....

think thats embarrasing.. I'm a specialist in the Dat storage industry (ex EMC) - and I've never heard of any Gi/Mi/Ti...

who'd have thought - old dogs can learn new tricks.

 

[Temujin]

Think about it this way, your computer is running out of memory, so it's using virtual memory on your HD. This is a bottleneck because a hard drive so much slower than RAM. Now seeing as this is the problem, adding a faster drive isn't really the best way to deal with it. You'd still be running out of ram, and still going to the (still) much slower HD.

Cool, thanks for striating that out. I guess enabling dual channel mode by getting an additional 1 GB stick might improve speed too.