Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

brentg33

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 5, 2007
594
5
I just upgraded from Lion. I noticed that mds was using 200 - 300 MB of ram. Is this normal? I dont remember being that high in Lion. I reindexed spotlight and its stayed right about there. I then restarted and it immediately jumped to about 80 - 90 mb. is this normal?
 

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
I just upgraded from Lion. I noticed that mds was using 200 - 300 MB of ram. Is this normal? I dont remember being that high in Lion. I reindexed spotlight and its stayed right about there. I then restarted and it immediately jumped to about 80 - 90 mb. is this normal?
It's likely that it's not finished indexing. If a drive is constantly active or your CPU utilization is high (possibly with increased temps and fan speed) when you're not running any major apps, you can check to see if Spotlight is indexing by looking at the Menu Bar icon:
attachment.php
(not indexing)
attachment.php
(indexing) (pulsing dot)​
When it's indexing, you may also see increased CPU and RAM usage by the mds and mdworker processes in Activity Monitor.

Just let it finish the process and it should return to normal. If it doesn't appear to be indexing, try re-indexing your drive: Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes

If that fails to index, enter the following command in Terminal:
sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/your drive name"​
 

brentg33

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 5, 2007
594
5
Thanks. I ll take a look for the dot. The process bar under spotlight was finished however after I re indexed
 

brentg33

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 5, 2007
594
5
while i havent been home yet to see any updates on how its running. Generally, when the system (MDS) is not indexing, what is its normal RAM usage?
 

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
while i havent been home yet to see any updates on how its running. Generally, when the system (MDS) is not indexing, what is its normal RAM usage?
It will vary, but mine is currently at 174MB of real mem usage, so yours isn't way out of line.
 

brentg33

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 5, 2007
594
5
just started from sleep the whole day and already up to 173mb, appears completely done indexing. i guess its just the "i just upgraded, rather than clean instal of moutain lion worries" thanks again.....i guess i really dont remember how much ram it was using before.
 

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
just started from sleep the whole day and already up to 173mb, appears completely done indexing. i guess its just the "i just upgraded, rather than clean instal of moutain lion worries" thanks again.....i guess i really dont remember how much ram it was using before.
Glad you got it sorted out.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.