Hello again,
The one other issue that I've had with my new machine since I bought it is how it handles RAM. I realize that this might be a better fit for the Mac OS Forum, but the MBP section gets more traffic and I don't think the people who post here are any less knowledgeable about the software side of things. So, I hope no one minds terribly that I'm bringing this up here.
Basically, my computer was unusable with the stock 4GB if I wanted to have both Aperture and Firefox open at the same time. Beachballs were constant and at one point I had amassed 8GB (!) of swap. More RAM seemed like the obvious solution, so I bought and installed an 8GB kit which still feels insufficient. As you can see from the screenshot, WindowServer is occupying an insane 3.07GB, followed by Firefox with 1.01 and the Simplified Chinese Input Method (SCIM) at 990MB.
My impression is that for the most part, only 1st-party apps run in 64-bit, and the benefit of allowing these applications to address more RAM is questionable at best for most userswhy is an input method eating up 1/8 of my total memory? What is WindowServer doing with over 3GB? This is an issue because if I open anything else RAM-intensive (i.e. Aperture), the new program will find itself starved for memory and take a performance hit. Before anyone mentions it, I did run a search for similar problems and found 3 threads, none of which turned up satisfactory answers. So, I humbly pose the question of what, if anything I can do to stop the RAM-devouring madness.
Thank you, human supercomputer.
P.S. The numbers are courtesy of iStat Menus 3.
The one other issue that I've had with my new machine since I bought it is how it handles RAM. I realize that this might be a better fit for the Mac OS Forum, but the MBP section gets more traffic and I don't think the people who post here are any less knowledgeable about the software side of things. So, I hope no one minds terribly that I'm bringing this up here.
Basically, my computer was unusable with the stock 4GB if I wanted to have both Aperture and Firefox open at the same time. Beachballs were constant and at one point I had amassed 8GB (!) of swap. More RAM seemed like the obvious solution, so I bought and installed an 8GB kit which still feels insufficient. As you can see from the screenshot, WindowServer is occupying an insane 3.07GB, followed by Firefox with 1.01 and the Simplified Chinese Input Method (SCIM) at 990MB.
My impression is that for the most part, only 1st-party apps run in 64-bit, and the benefit of allowing these applications to address more RAM is questionable at best for most userswhy is an input method eating up 1/8 of my total memory? What is WindowServer doing with over 3GB? This is an issue because if I open anything else RAM-intensive (i.e. Aperture), the new program will find itself starved for memory and take a performance hit. Before anyone mentions it, I did run a search for similar problems and found 3 threads, none of which turned up satisfactory answers. So, I humbly pose the question of what, if anything I can do to stop the RAM-devouring madness.
Thank you, human supercomputer.
P.S. The numbers are courtesy of iStat Menus 3.
