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Snow Leopard Memory Issue

R

ravoras

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 10, 2009
7
0
In my system profiler I see, 4GB of RAM on my MacBook, however in my activity monitor it only shows me 3GB, and I feel immensely cheated!

Can anyone tell me where this 1GB is missing? And what is it doing? If anyone needs more information please let me know.

Thanks.
 
Not sure if this is the problem or not, but SL may be running in 32-bit mode. If you run activity monitor, are any apps running in 64-bits?
 
how very confusing. can you please post a picture of activity monitor showing the 3GB usage?

i wonder if the shared memory with the GPU is taking up the RAM or something?

its a C2D IIRC it should be fine with 4GB. but maybe the limit is 3GB.
 
DoFoT9 said:
how very confusing. can you please post a picture of activity monitor showing the 3GB usage?

i wonder if the shared memory with the GPU is taking up the RAM or something?

its a C2D IIRC it should be fine with 4GB. but maybe the limit is 3GB.
Click to expand...

16lu
 
Ok yeah, so the system is running in 64 bit and this screenshot should show a whole bunch of apps running in 64 bit.

Apart from that the system profiler clearly shows 4GB of ram, but the activity monitor only shows 3GB. this mac has a GMA950 which only uses 64MB of graphics memory at most ... sooooooo???
 

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ravoras said:
Ok yeah, so the system is running in 64 bit and this screenshot should show a whole bunch of apps running in 64 bit.

Apart from that the system profiler clearly shows 4GB of ram, but the activity monitor only shows 3GB. this mac has a GMA950 which only uses 64MB of graphics memory at most ... sooooooo???
Click to expand...

seems like activity monitor is just being silly. have you tried restarting the computer?
 
DoFoT9 said:
i was thinking that too. ill check with mactracker i think there is one model of C2D laptop macs that supported 3GB only. but that contradicts with what system profiler says!
Click to expand...

I have that same MB 2006 2GHz C2D ... About this Mac shows 4GB, but it can only use 3.3GB.

It still doesn't explain why Act Mon shows 3.0GB, though ... :confused:
 
I don't think its always been like that. As far as I recall I don't think I have seen this problem before. But it may have always been like that and maybe I just never noticed.

Either way the MacBook is Late 2006. Hopefully that shouldn't matter (crossed fingers). Its still a C2D, with 4GB RAM, and a GMA950 which only uses 64MB of VRAM.
 
r.j.s said:
Yes, that's right, but if you put in 4GB, it should show 3.3GB ...
Click to expand...
should do. but i guess not in this case :(

ravoras said:
I don't think its always been like that. As far as I recall I don't think I have seen this problem before. But it may have always been like that and maybe I just never noticed.

Either way the MacBook is Late 2006. Hopefully that shouldn't matter (crossed fingers). Its still a C2D, with 4GB RAM, and a GMA950 which only uses 64MB of VRAM.
Click to expand...
maybe you hadnt always noticed it? or maybe it actually has changed! no way to tell i guess.
 
OP, the isn't really anything you can do about it since that MB can only handle an absolute max of 3.3GB.
 
Yes :( I just used MacTracker and it turns out that this thing can only use 3GB at most. Thats really unfortunate. Either way thanks a lot for everyone who wrote!

I guess I just never noted this 'issue' before.

On a side note, can anyone tell me why this is a limitation despite the system being 64bit etc? And is there a way to fix it and use all my memory, without buying a new Mac!

Cheers all!
 
ravoras said:
On a side note, can anyone tell me why this is a limitation despite the system being 64bit etc? And is there a way to fix it and use all my memory, without buying a new Mac!

Cheers all!
Click to expand...

the limitation lies with the chipset i.e. hardware. the software can most certainly handle more then 3GB, but the hardware cannot :( no way to modify it either!
 
DoFoT9 said:
what computer is that? 256MB is being used by the GPU?
Click to expand...

Regardless of which GPU I use (discreet or integrated) activity monitor always shows 3.75gb. I never see 4gb, even though that's what correctly shows up in about this mac.

While not an answer, I just figured its one of those oddities that OSX has.
 
maflynn said:
Regardless of which GPU I use (discreet or integrated) activity monitor always shows 3.75gb. I never see 4gb, even though that's what correctly shows up in about this mac.

While not an answer, I just figured its one of those oddities that OSX has.
Click to expand...

i find it interesting too. i wonder if they know that its happening?
 
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