So What Happened To The Legendary Mac Story ? (MBP hanging)

[augustya]

Long before I started owning a MacBook I was smitten by these Legendary stories...that I used to hear about Mac that a Mac never...never...ever gets hanged !

Was it just a Myth ?? I don't know ? I am forced to think other wise... the reason being my experience today and some days back. Today I had multiple activities going on my Macbook, was watching Youtube Videos, some other Videos as well on a Flash Enabled website, couple of more websites open, 2-3 word Documents open aswell and I was trying to copy paste from one word doc to another and when I did tried pasting, the spinning Disc kind of thing appears...just like the sand clock that appears for something is processing in window so that spinning disc appeared and just kept on spinning for about 5 minutes meaning the word.doc did not finish its task and the paste command was not executed, finally I hd to force quit the word APP and reopen it. Only then it got working...And the state of awestruck which I was in, finally got shattered to make me believe that yes ! Even a Mac does hang !! Also I had to restart Firefox also once, even that had stopped responding so I had to force quit that aswell...

By the way on a more serious note do you guys think it was because of no RAM to execute the Task, I have a rMBP 13" with a i5 processor and 8 GB RAM. iStat Menus RAM reading Said I had key 50 MB of RAM left when my word document got hanged. So do you guys think was this because of shortage of available RAM to execute that task, or was it one isolated incident which has a lot to do with the WORD APP and not the entire RAM in general...

 

[GGJstudios]

Long before I started owning a MacBook I was smitten by these Legendary stories...that I used to hear about Mac that a Mac never...never...ever gets hanged !

Was it just a Myth ??

Of course it was a myth, and I don't know where you heard that. Any computer can have problems, and any computer can be maxed out to the point where it becomes unresponsive.

Check Activity Monitor to see what processes are consuming system resources, and check your RAM usage. Be sure to change "My Processes" to "All Processes".

As far as a Word document is concerned, your problem could stem from a corrupt font or document.

 

[augustya]

Of course it was a myth, and I don't know where you heard that. Any computer can have problems.

Any Music Perfomance especially these DJ's that use a computer they have to have a MAC, the other day I was at one of the other music shows, all the lights on the stage there, were controlled by a software on the Mac....So if such a reliability is entrusted on the Mac, getting hanged is that not betraying of that trust

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Be sure to change "My Processes" to "All Processes".

Where to do this ? I mean where in Activity Monitor ? And what will it do ?

 

[GGJstudios]

Any Music Perfomance especially these DJ's that use a computer they have to have a MAC, the other day I was at one of the other music shows, all the lights on the stage there, were controlled by a software on the Mac....So if such a reliability is entrusted on the Mac, getting hanged is that not betraying of that trust

You're attempting to attribute specific problems that you're having to Macs in general, which is flawed reasoning. You simply need to troubleshoot your own specific problems and find a resolution, rather than trying to blame Macs in general for your specific issues.

Where to do this ? I mean where in Activity Monitor ? And what will it do ?

This is further evidence of the fact that you're not qualified to blame Mac products for your problems, since you apparently aren't as familiar with your Mac as you need to be. Activity Monitor is an app in your /Applications/Utilities folder, that enables you to check the current status of the various components of your system.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Where to do this ? I mean where in Activity Monitor ? And what will it do ?

In Mavericks it is under the VIEW Menu Bar item.
And it will show all running processes on your Mac. It makes it easier to trouble shoot.

If you do not have OS X 10.9 Mavericks:

Using Activity Monitor to show you CPU and RAM usage​

To edit your thread title to a descriptive one, to get a knowledgable audience and help making the thread easier to find for people looking for the same information, just click on the

button on the bottom right of your original post and then click the

button below your message.

 

[augustya]

lol ! @simsaladimbamba who edited my thread's title ? Was it you ? No but I don't wanna change the thread title your sign does not say you moderate this section ?

 

[bobr1952]

In my experience, the beauty of the Activity Monitor is that you can usually identify the problem process and kill it there. If it is an important process like Finder, it will restart and (hopefully) no longer be a problem child.

 

[GGJstudios]

lol ! @simsaladimbamba who edited my thread's title ? Was it you ? No but I don't wanna change the thread title your sign does not say you moderate this section ?

A moderator changed your thread title to make it less ambiguous. Using a thread title that describes the problem you're having will enable you to get better responses.

From the Forum FAQ:

Thread title. Use a thread title that indicates the subject of the thread, not a generic title such as "Need help", so that people who might know the answer will read your thread.

 

[augustya]

Ok so coming back to my concern, by any chance is it also a RAM issue ? Did it fall short of available RAM but I guess 8 GB of RAM should not be such a concerning issue !! Isn't that good enough ?

 

[Shrink]

lol ! @simsaladimbamba who edited my thread's title ? Was it you ? No but I don't wanna change the thread title your sign does not say you moderate this section ?

Members of the Moderation Team have the designation "Moderator" under their username.

Similarly, Administrators have the word "Administrator" under their username, and Editors have the Word "Editor" under their username.

 

[GGJstudios]

Ok so coming back to my concern, by any chance is it also a RAM issue ? Did it fall short of available RAM but I guess 8 GB of RAM should not be such a concerning issue !! Isn't that good enough ?

That's why you need to look at Activity Monitor, to determine if RAM was an issue. Simply guessing without checking facts is a poor way to approach troubleshooting.

 

[augustya]

Yeah but that's what I am saying when my Word DOc Got Hanged the RAM reading said 50MB of only free RAM available so what could that mean ?

 

[GGJstudios]

Yeah but that's what I am saying when my Word DOc Got Hanged the RAM reading said 50MB of only free RAM available so what could that mean ?

If you still had free RAM available at the time Word was hanging, it's very likely RAM wasn't the problem.

 

[Robisan]

I apologize -- I don't want to divert this thread but I just looked at Activity Monitor for the first time and I have a (hopefully) quick question. What is the "file cache" and how do I see it? Is there a way to clear it? Thx.

(Right now I have two apps and the system using ~3.7gb of App Memory and ~3.3gb of File Cache. With Wired Memory using ~0.9gb, my 8gb is essentially full with just Firefox and Thunderbird running!?)

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Yeah but that's what I am saying when my Word DOc Got Hanged the RAM reading said 50MB of only free RAM available so what could that mean ?

You only mentioned iStat Menus yet. Have you looked at Activity Monitor yet?

We can ask this all night if you want to evade the answer.

"How to maximise your MacRumors troubleshooting experience" created by mad jew in 2006​

 

[GGJstudios]

I apologize -- I don't want to divert this thread but I just looked at Activity Monitor for the first time and I have a (hopefully) quick question. What is the "file cache" and how do I see it? Is there a way to clear it? Thx.

(Right now I have two apps and the system using ~3.7gb of App Memory and ~3.3gb of File Cache. With Wired Memory using ~0.9gb, my 8gb is essentially full with just Firefox and Thunderbird running!?)

Your system will manage memory without your interference. Caches exist to improve performance, not degrade it, so unless there's a specific problem with a specific cache, it's not advisable to clear them. Just let OS X manage itself.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

I apologize -- I don't want to divert this thread but I just looked at Activity Monitor for the first time and I have a (hopefully) quick question. What is the "file cache" and how do I see it? Is there a way to clear it? Thx.

(Right now I have two apps and the system using ~3.7gb of App Memory and ~3.3gb of File Cache. With Wired Memory using ~0.9gb, my 8gb is essentially full with just Firefox and Thunderbird running!?)

File Cache is Inactive Memory: http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/67031/isnt-inactive-memory-a-waste-of-resources/67048#67048

 

[Robisan]

File Cache is Inactive Memory: http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/67031/isnt-inactive-memory-a-waste-of-resources/67048#67048

Ok makes sense, thx. Sorry for the interruption.

 

[yjchua95]

Yeah but that's what I am saying when my Word DOc Got Hanged the RAM reading said 50MB of only free RAM available so what could that mean ?

50MB of free RAM isn't much. It means that only 0.6% of your memory is unused.

However, for a more accurate description, will you just go open up Activity Monitor, for crying out loud, and check how much swap you've used? And the app memory as well?

Take a look at my screenshot. Although 'Memory Used' shows 5.07GB, actually only 1.64GB is used by apps.

Meanwhile, 'Swap Used' is 0MB because I still have plenty of RAM left.

If your 'Swap Used' isn't much, you still have enough RAM. Also, if the Memory Pressure remains green, it's fine.

 

[augustya]

50MB of free RAM isn't much. It means that only 0.6% of your memory is unused.

However, for a more accurate description, will you just go open up Activity Monitor, for crying out loud, and check how much swap you've used? And the app memory as well?

Take a look at my screenshot. Although 'Memory Used' shows 5.07GB, actually only 1.64GB is used by apps.

Meanwhile, 'Swap Used' is 0MB because I still have plenty of RAM left.

If your 'Swap Used' isn't much, you still have enough RAM. Also, if the Memory Pressure remains green, it's fine.

Thanks ! For the explanation !!