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RAM Issue: Paging Out (rMBP - 8GB of RAM)
- Thread starter locoboi187
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Update on the situation:
Running this baby for 24 hours+ without a restart and going strong. Smooth, but sometimes UI lag in Mission Control (Integrated GPU + Retina = Eh at times). Although exiting Chrome fixed the problem. Had a little page out but everything is performing the way it is. However, it only paged out when I opened Chrome. I believe Chrome development is still working on its issues presented in the Retina Macbook Pro. If I switch to the discrete card, there is absolutely no lag, but thats a battery drainer. So any lag that occurs is from the UI and caused by the integrated GPU. 8GB of RAM is plenty, for me at least. I will NOT be getting the 16GB of RAM version.
Edit: By the way, I think this OS gets faster over time, or is that just me? When I say overtime, I don't mean keeping it on without a restart, I just mean overtime from when I bought it. Gotta say, I can't go back to Windows, as much as I love to order parts to build desktops and OC the hell out of them
Running this baby for 24 hours+ without a restart and going strong. Smooth, but sometimes UI lag in Mission Control (Integrated GPU + Retina = Eh at times). Although exiting Chrome fixed the problem. Had a little page out but everything is performing the way it is. However, it only paged out when I opened Chrome. I believe Chrome development is still working on its issues presented in the Retina Macbook Pro. If I switch to the discrete card, there is absolutely no lag, but thats a battery drainer. So any lag that occurs is from the UI and caused by the integrated GPU. 8GB of RAM is plenty, for me at least. I will NOT be getting the 16GB of RAM version.
Edit: By the way, I think this OS gets faster over time, or is that just me? When I say overtime, I don't mean keeping it on without a restart, I just mean overtime from when I bought it. Gotta say, I can't go back to Windows, as much as I love to order parts to build desktops and OC the hell out of them
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similar case
hi, my case is quite similar so instead of creating a new discussion, if you don't mind, I'll ask my question here.
After reading this thread, I watched my Activity Monitor for a couple days. It works usually with quite a bit of Inactive RAM, but my problem seems to be with the Page Outs. If I leave the computer on for a day it accumulates to several GB.
Especially after a 'standby' with Firefox running, it gets worse and I have to get a restart. This happens more when I have RAM intensive software like Lightroom or Photoshop open. But even without them the problem exists. Even if i use Chrome instead of Firefox.
Last night I took a snapshot of AMonitor with LR busy converting some photos. Frequently it went over 150% CPU usage. Safari, Firefox and LR seem to get to over 1GB real ram need. Normal?
I could be suspicious of LR or Photoshop, but if this happens without them running, then something else might be wrong. Any ideas? Need more RAM?
Thanks
Specs: MBP Mac OS X 10.6.8, 2 GHz i7, 4GB RAM
Edit: for some reason my screenshot on Flickr does not show up with 'insert image'. Perhaps you can follow the link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/inca/8105007344/
hi, my case is quite similar so instead of creating a new discussion, if you don't mind, I'll ask my question here.
After reading this thread, I watched my Activity Monitor for a couple days. It works usually with quite a bit of Inactive RAM, but my problem seems to be with the Page Outs. If I leave the computer on for a day it accumulates to several GB.
Especially after a 'standby' with Firefox running, it gets worse and I have to get a restart. This happens more when I have RAM intensive software like Lightroom or Photoshop open. But even without them the problem exists. Even if i use Chrome instead of Firefox.
Last night I took a snapshot of AMonitor with LR busy converting some photos. Frequently it went over 150% CPU usage. Safari, Firefox and LR seem to get to over 1GB real ram need. Normal?
I could be suspicious of LR or Photoshop, but if this happens without them running, then something else might be wrong. Any ideas? Need more RAM?
Thanks
Specs: MBP Mac OS X 10.6.8, 2 GHz i7, 4GB RAM
Edit: for some reason my screenshot on Flickr does not show up with 'insert image'. Perhaps you can follow the link:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/inca/8105007344/
I have huge problems with paging out. I have 6GB of page-outs and its only been 24 hours since last restart. It causes lots of beach-balling and serious slowdown.
I am actually thinking that an SSD (which rMBP has) will solve the problem, as these random read page-outs will be orders of magnitude faster.
Still it would be nice if OSX just used memory when its available. I have 3GB inactive RAM and a 5.7GB pagefile.
(Early 2011 17" MBP, 8GB RAM, 500GB 7200rpm)
I am actually thinking that an SSD (which rMBP has) will solve the problem, as these random read page-outs will be orders of magnitude faster.
Still it would be nice if OSX just used memory when its available. I have 3GB inactive RAM and a 5.7GB pagefile.
(Early 2011 17" MBP, 8GB RAM, 500GB 7200rpm)
Browsers are inherently prone to some memory leakage. More leakage occurs with more windows and tabs in use.
Photo conversion is a RAM intensive task.
Your situation includes both factors.
So, it is possible that you actually need more RAM given the manner in which you're using your system.
Munkery,
today i have been working on Chrome with about 15 pages open. Mostly e-mail and surfing and one page with Grooveshark music page.
It has been running smoothly.
Then I launched Lightroom 4. The next 2-3 mins I noticed lag and slow down thanks to the jumps in the music. I ran the Activity Monitor to see the Page Outs increase steadily to 480MB with me just watching and doing no action. (don't know if it started from zero, I caught up at around 300MB). It all stopped after a while and now again it's all smooth and Page Outs stagnant as I am typing this and listening to music.
Does it take that long for Lightroom to start up? Do you think this indicates a problem with Lightroom, or that running both Chrome with 15 pages AND Lightroom, with even its startup, overruns my RAM?
I would think 4GB should be enough, for I had been suggested that 2 GB was enough for LR but if I wanted smoother run, I should go for 4GB when I bought the laptop.
Technically, are high Page Outs strictly due to RAM? Could it be some other settings I have that causes this?
today i have been working on Chrome with about 15 pages open. Mostly e-mail and surfing and one page with Grooveshark music page.
It has been running smoothly.
Then I launched Lightroom 4. The next 2-3 mins I noticed lag and slow down thanks to the jumps in the music. I ran the Activity Monitor to see the Page Outs increase steadily to 480MB with me just watching and doing no action. (don't know if it started from zero, I caught up at around 300MB). It all stopped after a while and now again it's all smooth and Page Outs stagnant as I am typing this and listening to music.
Does it take that long for Lightroom to start up? Do you think this indicates a problem with Lightroom, or that running both Chrome with 15 pages AND Lightroom, with even its startup, overruns my RAM?
I would think 4GB should be enough, for I had been suggested that 2 GB was enough for LR but if I wanted smoother run, I should go for 4GB when I bought the laptop.
Technically, are high Page Outs strictly due to RAM? Could it be some other settings I have that causes this?
The page outs that occurred once LR was open are due to inactive memory being converted to free memory that is then allocated to LR. Some of the inactive memory was still flagged as potentially needed so it was moved to virtual memory page in the swap file.
If only this type of paging is occurring, then more RAM may not be necessary. But, it sounds like the amount of paging is creating performance issues when this occurs. I typically have less paging than your experiencing in those types of scenarios. Also, I suspect paging is occurring more readily while converting photos considering the paging that occurs just from opening LR given your browser usage.
Paging due to 15 browser pages open combined with running an app performing a RAM intensive task most likely would be alleviated by increasing the amount of RAM.
If only this type of paging is occurring, then more RAM may not be necessary. But, it sounds like the amount of paging is creating performance issues when this occurs. I typically have less paging than your experiencing in those types of scenarios. Also, I suspect paging is occurring more readily while converting photos considering the paging that occurs just from opening LR given your browser usage.
Paging due to 15 browser pages open combined with running an app performing a RAM intensive task most likely would be alleviated by increasing the amount of RAM.
thanks Munkery...
I will look into getting more RAM. I don't know how much more the MBP has space for but I will learn.
I also consider replacing my DVD drive with an SSD or a hybrid drive to carry my programs in there and gain more speed. Any experience in that? Is it only for start up of programs or does it also help the RAM to work better?
I will look into getting more RAM. I don't know how much more the MBP has space for but I will learn.
I also consider replacing my DVD drive with an SSD or a hybrid drive to carry my programs in there and gain more speed. Any experience in that? Is it only for start up of programs or does it also help the RAM to work better?
Or maybe having less than 15 pages open in Chrome when running RAM intensive tasks like LR or PS
Personally, I think upgrading to an SSD is the most significant upgrade that you can do to a laptop to increase performance.
This doesn't have a huge direct impact if your activities are RAM intensive. If you need more RAM, then you need more RAM; an SSD won't be a solution.
But, I find an SSD can reduce paging in situation that include opening another app because of the faster read/write speeds of the drive allowing inactive memory to be moved to virtual memory pages on the hard disk much faster and more efficiently.
I have noticed reduced paging with an SSD when opening another app when multitasking but not much difference while performing a continuously RAM intensive tasks.
Me too!
I own an early 2011 15" MBP with 8GB RAM running ML. It initially came with 4GB and lagged a lot when swapping--hence the upgrade. But I noticed recently that even with 8GB RAM, my page outs can total more than 50% of my (several GB of) page ins. It looks like even 8GB isn't enough. I think the upgrade to ML is partly responsible.
That said, I still don't see any noticeable lag except with some game loads. When there's no game running, though, everything's smooth. I guess swapping occurs only (hopefully) while a large chunk of RAM has been swallowed by the game. This might be true of others as well.
I own an early 2011 15" MBP with 8GB RAM running ML. It initially came with 4GB and lagged a lot when swapping--hence the upgrade. But I noticed recently that even with 8GB RAM, my page outs can total more than 50% of my (several GB of) page ins. It looks like even 8GB isn't enough. I think the upgrade to ML is partly responsible.
That said, I still don't see any noticeable lag except with some game loads. When there's no game running, though, everything's smooth. I guess swapping occurs only (hopefully) while a large chunk of RAM has been swallowed by the game. This might be true of others as well.
Update on the situation:
Running this baby for 24 hours+ without a restart and going strong. Smooth, but sometimes UI lag in Mission Control (Integrated GPU + Retina = Eh at times). Although exiting Chrome fixed the problem. Had a little page out but everything is performing the way it is. However, it only paged out when I opened Chrome. I believe Chrome development is still working on its issues presented in the Retina Macbook Pro. If I switch to the discrete card, there is absolutely no lag, but thats a battery drainer. So any lag that occurs is from the UI and caused by the integrated GPU. 8GB of RAM is plenty, for me at least. I will NOT be getting the 16GB of RAM version.
Edit: By the way, I think this OS gets faster over time, or is that just me? When I say overtime, I don't mean keeping it on without a restart, I just mean overtime from when I bought it. Gotta say, I can't go back to Windows, as much as I love to order parts to build desktops and OC the hell out of them
did you do something to correct your problem? i just sat down to my MBPr with 8GB of RAM to find I have 1.94GB of page outs with just one tab of safari running and iTunes running. 30 minutes ago i had 3.3MB of page outs. i don't see any app sucking RAM
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Hit "All Processes" rather than just "My Processes" on top to find out what is going on and we can start from there.
Hit "All Processes" rather than just "My Processes" on top to find out what is going on and we can start from there.
here's where it's at now:
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it just seemed really odd for it to jump from 3.3MB to almost 2GBs in less than 30 minutes. i didn't have anything running in iTunes. the safari page was just on macrumors. i was away from the laptop (nobody was around to mess with it)
I'm not obsessed with the stats just curious to what it means. MBPr is running great. No lag or what not
I'm not obsessed with the stats just curious to what it means. MBPr is running great. No lag or what not
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I mean from what I've noticed, I get page outs too. However, I also have a couple GB RAM free and some inactive. On top of that, I don't get any lag and I usually won't question anything until my system performance feels any less than the day I bought it.
I recommend that you avoid using Sophos, as it could actually increase your Mac's vulnerability, as described here and here. You don't need any 3rd party antivirus app to keep a Mac malware-free, as long as you practice safe computing, as described in the following link.
If you still want to run antivirus for some reason, ClamXav (which is free) is one of the best choices, since it isn't a resource hog, detects both Mac and Windows malware and doesn't run with elevated privileges.