in Activity Monitor what used to show my 4GB of ram is now showing 3.75GB WTF!!! anyone else have the same issue?
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Snow Leopard lost 250MB of Ram
- Thread starter ikos
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The 9400M uses 256MB of your Mac's RAM, it's not dedicated memory. That's shown under activity monitor now. However, I believe the 9600M is dedicated memory and not shared (15" & 17" MBP, user switchtable graphics cards), but I could be wrong.
Thats what I figured too, but I am not using my 9400M at the moment. So if i'm on my 9600M with its 256 MB of dedicated ram it shouldn't take that away.
I'm not sure how the switching works with the 9600M, but your MBP boots up with it, correct? Meaning you don't have to switch to it when you boot up
Correct. My 9600M is the default card, so I'm not switching at any point. So if that is the reason why its 256 MB less it should not be taking that ram away. I could totally understand that when the 9400M is on, but not with the 9600M because it had dedicated ram.
(I'm not some guru or anything - just an idea)
I'm assuming the 256MB is allocated by the kernel at bootup no matter what graphics card you are on, so it's ready if you do decide to switch to the 9400M. I don't think it would be possible to allocate a specific amount of memory after bootup (I could be easily wrong).
Because as it was already said - the 9400M allocates 256MB of the system's physical memory as VRAM (video ram).
1) Are you on a notebook with shared memory? That could be it.
2) Macworld had an article about Snow Leopard's "new math." I don't think this is the case with your issue, but SL is now taking, 250,000,000,000 bytes and calling it 250 gigabytes instead of 238.3 gigabytes. Your hard drive is still the same size, it's just the difference between counting as 1024 vs. 1000.
2) Macworld had an article about Snow Leopard's "new math." I don't think this is the case with your issue, but SL is now taking, 250,000,000,000 bytes and calling it 250 gigabytes instead of 238.3 gigabytes. Your hard drive is still the same size, it's just the difference between counting as 1024 vs. 1000.
an answer
Whereas Leopard would show the total amount of memory you had installed, Snow Leopard only shows the amount that the OS is able to access.
For example, I have 4 GB in my 2007 macbook. However, it's only able to access about 3 GB. In Leopard, it showed 4...in snow leopard it now shows 3.
I'm almost certain that if you were still in leopard and added up the used memory and free memory, it would total the same amount as SL is currently showing you have.
Whereas Leopard would show the total amount of memory you had installed, Snow Leopard only shows the amount that the OS is able to access.
For example, I have 4 GB in my 2007 macbook. However, it's only able to access about 3 GB. In Leopard, it showed 4...in snow leopard it now shows 3.
I'm almost certain that if you were still in leopard and added up the used memory and free memory, it would total the same amount as SL is currently showing you have.
I think this was changed to show the 9400M's use of the system memory. If you go to about this mac, it will still show 4GB but the activity monitor shows what is actually available for system use other than the gfx card.
Same thing here, dont think its 9400M
I have a late 08 unibody with the 9400M and the 9600M GT when I switch to the GT Activity Monitor still shows 3.75GB!!??
I wonder what is going on here?
I have a late 08 unibody with the 9400M and the 9600M GT when I switch to the GT Activity Monitor still shows 3.75GB!!??
I wonder what is going on here?
I have a late 08 unibody with the 9400M and the 9600M GT when I switch to the GT Activity Monitor still shows 3.75GB!!??
I wonder what is going on here?
+1
I noticed this as well. Could be allocated to the GPU now?
Check Activity Monitor
No, you need to check the Activity Monitor. Not "About this Mac": that just tells you how much is installed, the AM informs you how that installed memory is used.
nope... no issues with me
09 unibody.
No, you need to check the Activity Monitor. Not "About this Mac": that just tells you how much is installed, the AM informs you how that installed memory is used.
I'm taking an educated guess that even if you have a MBP with the 9600M and 9400M, the 256MB is held for the 9400M specifically for OpenCL. Even though you can't use both chips for general use, OpenCL can access both chips.
There was even an article on this here - https://www.macrumors.com/2009/08/30/opencl-benchmarks-and-support-for-both-macbook-pro-gpus/
There was even an article on this here - https://www.macrumors.com/2009/08/30/opencl-benchmarks-and-support-for-both-macbook-pro-gpus/