Resolved MacBook Pro RAM issue

[di1in]

This is my situation. I have a 2010 MBP 15" with 4 GB RAM. I suffer frequent slow downs of my system.

When I checked my page out there are 460k page outs for 2.3million page ins. Upon installing FreeMemory and checking out my RAM it seems that at bootup i get a maximum of 1.8gb ram.

Is this normal or is my system using too much RAM? How much free ram do you usually get upon boot.

 

[iThinkergoiMac]

What OS are you using? What apps are launching on startup? What kind of slowdowns are you getting?

 

[di1in]

What OS are you using? What apps are launching on startup? What kind of slowdowns are you getting?

I am using Lion, 10.7.3.

Apps launched on startup:

• Messages
• Mail
• Calendar
• Chrome Browser
• iTunes
• Finder
• Caffiene
• gfxCardSwitcher
• smcFanControl
• Google Drive
• FreeMemory

o Stops responding for a few seconds while changing tabs or windows.
o Occasional beachball when mouse is on topmost system nav bar.

During the first few months of using this mac my pageouts were 0 unless I had fired up VMWare Fusion. Now the pageouts are higher than than what I get when using VMWare fusion.

 

[flatfoot]

Upgrade the RAM to 8GB. It's relatively inexpensive and should solve your problems.

 

[alphaod]

First, get of rid of "FreeMemory"; that doesn't do anything, except force page outs and causes your computer to be closer than it needs to be when managing it's own RAM.

Next, upgrade to 8GB of RAM; a very cheap upgrade these days.

 

[GGJstudios]

When I checked my page out there are 460k page outs for 2.3million page ins. Upon installing FreeMemory and checking out my RAM it seems that at bootup i get a maximum of 1.8gb ram.

You don't need FreeMemory, and I recommend you uninstall it. Free memory is only part of the picture. Inactive memory is also available to apps that need it.

To determine if you can benefit from more RAM, launch Activity Monitor and click the System Memory tab at the bottom to check your page outs. Page outs are cumulative since your last restart, so the best way to check is to restart your computer and track page outs under your normal workload (the apps, browser pages and documents you normally would have open). If your page outs are significant (say 1GB or more) under normal use, you may benefit from more RAM. If your page outs are zero or very low during normal use, you probably won't see any performance improvement from adding RAM.

Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor

There is no meaningful correlation between page outs and page ins. You will always have page ins, but you may not ever have page outs. Also, you can run for weeks or months, accumulating page ins, then go through a period of intense activity for only a few minutes which produces page outs. No ratio between the two is useful. The only thing that indicates a need for more RAM is the presence of significant page outs during normal workload, regardless of the page ins.

For slow performance issues: Performance Tips For Mac OS X

 

[2ndchancephones]

I was suffering the same thing and went from 4 gig to 8 gig and WOW...what a difference. I did it myself and it took about 5 minutes.

 

[di1in]

Upgrade the RAM to 8GB. It's relatively inexpensive and should solve your problems.

First, get of rid of "FreeMemory"; that doesn't do anything, except force page outs and causes your computer to be closer than it needs to be when managing it's own RAM.

Next, upgrade to 8GB of RAM; a very cheap upgrade these days.

I was suffering the same thing and went from 4 gig to 8 gig and WOW...what a difference. I did it myself and it took about 5 minutes.

You don't need FreeMemory, and I recommend you uninstall it. Free memory is only part of the picture. Inactive memory is also available to apps that need it.

To determine if you can benefit from more RAM, launch Activity Monitor and click the System Memory tab at the bottom to check your page outs. Page outs are cumulative since your last restart, so the best way to check is to restart your computer and track page outs under your normal workload (the apps, browser pages and documents you normally would have open). If your page outs are significant (say 1GB or more) under normal use, you may benefit from more RAM. If your page outs are zero or very low during normal use, you probably won't see any performance improvement from adding RAM.

Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor

There is no meaningful correlation between page outs and page ins. You will always have page ins, but you may not ever have page outs. Also, you can run for weeks or months, accumulating page ins, then go through a period of intense activity for only a few minutes which produces page outs. No ratio between the two is useful. The only thing that indicates a need for more RAM is the presence of significant page outs during normal workload, regardless of the page ins.

For slow performance issues: Performance Tips For Mac OS X

Thanks for all the info, definitely moving to 8gig now - got 1 gb of page outs with 8 hours of work today.

 

[Astroboy907]

Thanks for all the info, definitely moving to 8gig now - got 1 gb of page outs with 8 hours of work today.

That's not too bad actually- I get 2gb or so running my normal load. Sometimes 3..

A few things you can try to reduce the current ram used -

Do a pram reset, this will clear outbsome of the files in the ram. Make sure you have everything open saved!

Uncheck reopen windows at startup if you are in lion (it will ask when you shutdown). This just adds work to the CPU at startup and adds files to the ram at the start of the day also.. do make sure to save files!!

Might not help a ton, but it should help a bit

 

[Ccrew]

Do a pram reset, this will clear outbsome of the files in the ram. Make sure you have everything open saved!

Umm, no need to do a PRAM reset, simply rebooting the computer will serve the same function.

 

[Astroboy907]

Umm, no need to do a PRAM reset, simply rebooting the computer will serve the same function.

Ah. I though it was better to force it

 

[GGJstudios]

Do a pram reset, this will clear outbsome of the files in the ram.

No, it doesn't. Rebooting clears all RAM contents, but it's not necessary. Mac OS X manages memory without user interference.

Mac OS X: What's stored in PRAM
When to reset NVRAM or PRAM​

 

[Ccrew]

No, it doesn't. Rebooting clears all RAM contents, but it's not necessary. Mac OS X manages memory without user interference.

Mac OS X: What's stored in PRAM
When to reset NVRAM or PRAM​

Well, he's half right, as he'll have to reboot to clear PRAM, and then the ram will be clear

 

[GGJstudios]

Well, he's half right, as he'll have to reboot to clear PRAM, and then the ram will be clear

Well, as you know, the rebooting clears the RAM contents, even if you don't reset NVRAM. And the statement that resetting PRAM "will clear outbsome of the files in the ram" is erroneous, since RAM contents are not in the form of complete files, and you can't clear part of RAM without clearing it all.

 

[Astroboy907]

Well, as you know, the rebooting clears the RAM contents, even if you don't reset NVRAM. And the statement that resetting PRAM "will clear outbsome of the files in the ram" is erroneous, since RAM contents are not in the form of complete files, and you can't clear part of RAM without clearing it all.

Well, it would clear out all of the RAM, and then at startup it would be filled again. So, technically speaking only some of the files as, basically, the RAM is never empty except for after a shutdown.
And my typo... thats what I get for commenting from a phone

 

[Ccrew]

Well, as you know, the rebooting clears the RAM contents, even if you don't reset NVRAM. And the statement that resetting PRAM "will clear outbsome of the files in the ram" is erroneous, since RAM contents are not in the form of complete files, and you can't clear part of RAM without clearing it all.

Dude, you're taking me too seriously

 

[di1in]

I went ahead and installed 8GB of Transcend RAM.

The system is definitely faster, no beach balls, and I can even switch smoothly between apps (Mail, Chrome, iCal) when there's a big game like civ5 running in the bg.