Do I need more ram?

[eyedoc_00]

I have noticed my G5 iMac rev B has been acting very sluggish lately. I have 1GB of memory (1 stick of DDR SDRAM with speed of PC 3200U-30330.)
The programs that I run all the time are safari, mail, the dock and dashboard. All the other programs I only open when I am using them. I looked at the activity monitor and it shows that I have more page outs vs. page ins. Page outs are 442612 and page in are 436314.
Should/Do I need more ram?

I went to crucial's web site to look at ram. They have 1GB of DDR PC3200 for $89.99. Can I get this and use it in my other DIMM slot or do I need to buy matched pairs. They offer a 2GB kit (1GB X 2) for $179.99.

Is it difficult to add ram to the iMac G5?

Thank you for all your help.

 

[clevin]

no u don't
safari, mail.app, dashboard shouldn't be asking for more than 1G RAM. maybe its time to repair ur disk and permission, and do some system cleaning.

 

[bigandy]

You don't need to match pairs in the iMac.

2Gb total will be more than enough, but a repair permissions may go just as well.

The iMac's memory isn't difficult to replace.

 

[MacNut]

You can never have to much ram.

 

[Angrist]

You can never have to much ram.

Amen to that.

Some other thoughts ...
I've personally never seen much benefit to the "repair permissions" fix.
Is you machine on all the time? or do you sleep/shutdown overnight? There are maintenance scripts that run at 4am daily, weekly and monthly, assuming that the machine is on at that time. Get a utility (tinkertool, or onyx are good) and run these.

Also, if you've got a copy of diskwarrior (or know someone that does) run the directory optimization routine, it'll help speed things up.

 

[eyedoc_00]

no u don't
safari, mail.app, dashboard shouldn't be asking for more than 1G RAM. maybe its time to repair ur disk and permission, and do some system cleaning.

I repair permissions any time I do a software update.
What kind of system cleanning do you recommned?

Amen to that.

Some other thoughts ...
I've personally never seen much benefit to the "repair permissions" fix.
Is you machine on all the time? or do you sleep/shutdown overnight? There are maintenance scripts that run at 4am daily, weekly and monthly, assuming that the machine is on at that time. Get a utility (tinkertool, or onyx are good) and run these.

Also, if you've got a copy of diskwarrior (or know someone that does) run the directory optimization routine, it'll help speed things up.

The computer is on 24/7 with putting the monitor to sleep at night. The only time I shut down is when I will be gone for more then 1 night.

Attached is a picture form the activity monitor? Any thoughts?

 

[72930]

Try restarting now, tell us how the speed is...

 

[CanadaRAM]

clevin, what are you talking about? The OP's PageOuts are as high as their PageIns. No matter whether you think their application load should be under 1 Gb, the evidence is that they are regularly exceeding the physical memory.

eyedoc:
Your PageOuts should be under 10% of your PageIns, even better under 5%

Yours are at almost 100%. Whatever it is you are doing with your machine, it's causing massive swapping to the hard drive because you are exceeding your RAM. Another 1 Gb module would be a good investment.

Adding RAM is not that hard. You lay the machine face down on a clean non-marring surface (towel on a desk is fine) undo three screws at the bottom edge of the machine (they are captured screws, they don't come all the way out. Then you lift up the back of the case, stand and all, and it hinges up from the top edge. The RAM sockets are immediately available. The only tricky bit is to get the tangs on the top edge of the back of the case, engaged properly with the case at the top. It helps to have someone to gently squeeze it into place as you hinge it back flat again. It may take several tries to get it.

 

[eyedoc_00]

clevin, what are you talking about? The OP's PageOuts are as high as their PageIns. No matter whether you think their application load should be under 1 Gb, the evidence is that they are regularly exceeding the physical memory.

eyedoc:
Your PageOuts should be under 10% of your PageIns, even better under 5%

Yours are at almost 100%. Whatever it is you are doing with your machine, it's causing massive swapping to the hard drive because you are exceeding your RAM. Another 1 Gb module would be a good investment.

Adding RAM is not that hard. You lay the machine face down on a clean non-marring surface (towel on a desk is fine) undo three screws at the bottom edge of the machine (they are captured screws, they don't come all the way out. Then you lift up the back of the case, stand and all, and it hinges up from the top edge. The RAM sockets are immediately available. The only tricky bit is to get the tangs on the top edge of the back of the case, engaged properly with the case at the top. It helps to have someone to gently squeeze it into place as you hinge it back flat again. It may take several tries to get it.

Thank you. What could be the cause. It has only been acting this way for a month. Before that it seem to run just fine.

As for the ram, can I just get a 2nd 1GB stick or do I need to buy 2 new 1 GB sticks? described my ram situaton in the opening thread.

 

[MacNut]

One stick is all you need, they are interchangeable.

Safari is taking a lot more memory then it should. It is pulling 2 gb of VM and that is why you are slowing down.

 

[eyedoc_00]

One stick is all you need, they are interchangeable.

Safari is taking a lot more memory then it should. It is pulling 2 gb of VM and that is why you are slowing down.

Any idea why safari would be taking 2GB of VM? What can I do about that besides more ram?

Thanks

 

[decksnap]

Safari may take large chunks of RAM like that if you are using sites that use AJAX like the Forum Spy. Sometimes though Safari's ram usage will just go up and up if you've had it open for a few days. I would just quit and relaunch Safari when you start noticing a problem.

Pageouts or not, 1 Gb should be plenty for the things you are doing. More than plenty. Though I can't help but think Apple is abusing the ram usage lately. iTunes shouldn't take up that much ram just to play music.

 

[eyedoc_00]

Safari may take large chunks of RAM like that if you are using sites that use AJAX like the Forum Spy. Sometimes though Safari's ram usage will just go up and up if you've had it open for a few days. I would just quit and relaunch Safari when you start noticing a problem.

Pageouts or not, 1 Gb should be plenty for the things you are doing. More than plenty. Though I can't help but think Apple is abusing the ram usage lately. iTunes shouldn't take up that much ram just to play music.

I do quit safari when I notice my ram is almost all used up. But it does not take long for it tojump up again. Thanks

 

[Angrist]

Take a screen of ALL processes in the activity monitor, there are a lot of things that run as root or windowserver that could be eating memory too.

Also .. widgets are HUGE memory hogs, if you use them OK, but if you don't, then remove them from Dashboard.

 

[clevin]

clevin, what are you talking about? The OP's PageOuts are as high as their PageIns. No matter whether you think their application load should be under 1 Gb, the evidence is that they are regularly exceeding the physical memory.

eyedoc:
Your PageOuts should be under 10% of your PageIns, even better under 5%

Yours are at almost 100%. Whatever it is you are doing with your machine, it's causing massive swapping to the hard drive because you are exceeding your RAM. Another 1 Gb module would be a good investment.

Adding RAM is not that hard. You lay the machine face down on a clean non-marring surface (towel on a desk is fine) undo three screws at the bottom edge of the machine (they are captured screws, they don't come all the way out. Then you lift up the back of the case, stand and all, and it hinges up from the top edge. The RAM sockets are immediately available. The only tricky bit is to get the tangs on the top edge of the back of the case, engaged properly with the case at the top. It helps to have someone to gently squeeze it into place as you hinge it back flat again. It may take several tries to get it.

well, analysis this

yes, his system resource is unusually drained considering the apps OP uses, so the problem is not to add more ram to fill the unusual defects, rather, he should be doing system cleaning so that his ram can be utilized normally and effectively.

OP, i would suggest u use OnyX (if it has PPC ver), clean all caches, and restart twice. post back if that don't solve anything, then we can talk about other possibilities.

edit, OnyX is here: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582

 

[eyedoc_00]

well, analysis this

yes, his system resource is unusually drained considering the apps OP uses, so the problem is not to add more ram to fill the unusual defects, rather, he should be doing system cleaning so that his ram can be utilized normally and effectively.

OP, i would suggest u use OnyX (if it has PPC ver), clean all caches, and restart twice. post back if that don't solve anything, then we can talk about other possibilities.

edit, OnyX is here: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582

Thanks. I do have PPC version. I will try OnyX and will report back.

 

[eyedoc_00]

Take a screen of ALL processes in the activity monitor, there are a lot of things that run as root or windowserver that could be eating memory too.

Also .. widgets are HUGE memory hogs, if you use them OK, but if you don't, then remove them from Dashboard.

I did post a screen shot of all the processes a little earlier in the thread.

 

[Angrist]

I did post a screen shot of all the processes a little earlier in the thread.

Not quite, look at the dropdown at the top, it's only showing "my processes" there's an option for "all processes" that shows you things that are owned by the system.

 

[eyedoc_00]

Not quite, look at the dropdown at the top, it's only showing "my processes" there's an option for "all processes" that shows you things that are owned by the system.

Sorry. attached are all the processes.

 

[ElectricSheep]

Safari notoriously leaks memory, and will consume more the longer you use it.

The latest development versions of Safari (called WebKit) fix a large number of these leaks, but they are still there...

I recomment using WebKit, a different web browser, of keep tabs on Safari's memory usage, quitting and relaunching it when it gets high.

 

[eyedoc_00]

Safari notoriously leaks memory, and will consume more the longer you use it.

The latest development versions of Safari (called WebKit) fix a large number of these leaks, but they are still there...

I recomment using WebKit, a different web browser, of keep tabs on Safari's memory usage, quitting and relaunching it when it gets high.

Thank you.

 

[eyedoc_00]

edit, OnyX is here: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582[/QUOTE]

Ok. installed OnyX. First, when it asked to verify start up volume it comes up with the following error.


Second, I ran all the maintenance steps and cleaned all the caches. I also restarted the computer twice. That freed up a lot of memory. I will now see how long this lasts.

 

[eyedoc_00]

edit, OnyX is here: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11582[/QUOTE]

Ok. installed OnyX. First, when it asked to verify start up volume it comes up with the following error.



Second, I ran all the maintenance steps and cleaned all the caches. I also restarted the computer twice. That freed up a lot of memory. I will now see how long this lasts.

 

[dukebound85]

wow why does my process pmTool takes up 132mb of ram while his only takes up like 1mb? also I have kernal_task using 268mb. why are thse two so high. i notice they get bigger as i leave my macbook on

i think they are memory leaks....how can i "plug" it up

 

[zephead]

wow why does my process pmTool takes up 132mb of ram while his only takes up like 1mb? also I have kernal_task using 268mb. why are thse two so high. i notice they get bigger as i leave my macbook on

i think they are memory leaks....how can i "plug" it up

pmTool is part of Activity Monitor, and kernel_task is the top level process in the OS, since it's the parent process of launchd, which is the parent process of everything else. I find that pmTool takes up a lot of memory when Activity Monitor is running for long periods of time, but closing and re-opening it should do the trick. As far as I know, the only thing to do about kernel_task is to restart.