I have an early 2008 MacBook with 2 GB of memory. Ever since I installed Snow Leopard, my memory has been constantly used up, even if I didn't have any applications open. Usually, at the most I will have 300 MB free, but it often drops to about 60. The computer runs fine and does not seem slow. When I restart my computer that will increase to about 1.5 GB, but as soon as I start opening and closing applications, it begins to all be wired, active, or inactive. Is this a problem and is there a way to fix it? Thanks.
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Memory Always Used Up
- Thread starter tnsmart
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mrchinchilla
macrumors 6502
Switch the "My processes" menu to "All processes", is it possibly mds using the most memory? Or kernel_task?
And a lack of free memory doesn't indicate that you're using it all. OS X just handles memory differently; the inactive memory for example is a good thing, it has recent memory from closed applications at its disposal.
And a lack of free memory doesn't indicate that you're using it all. OS X just handles memory differently; the inactive memory for example is a good thing, it has recent memory from closed applications at its disposal.
plinden
macrumors 601
Inactive is memory that's assigned but is available to other processes when necessary. It's wired + active that shows how much is in use. So you have almost half your RAM available there.
You also have very low Page outs, so you're not running low on RAM.
That said, my MBP does have more active + wired memory used under SL than under Leopard, but I'm not yet concerned about it. Remember, in modern OSs unused RAM is wasted RAM.
You also have very low Page outs, so you're not running low on RAM.
That said, my MBP does have more active + wired memory used under SL than under Leopard, but I'm not yet concerned about it. Remember, in modern OSs unused RAM is wasted RAM.
You've only got a shortage of RAM if you have a huge amount of Page Outs. You only have 13.4 MB of Page Outs so you're fine.
Thanks for the replies.
The kernal_task and mds processes are the two that use up the most, but it doesn't seem like too much.
What would be an excessive amount of Page outs?
The kernal_task and mds processes are the two that use up the most, but it doesn't seem like too much.
What would be an excessive amount of Page outs?
