Unplugging USB-C Monitor causes memory usage?

[redshovel]

I have an ongoing issue whenever I unplug my usb monitor or login from wake that both the 'WindowServer' and 'loginwindow' process double in memory size usage - and will just grow to gigabytes in size until I restart.
What is the reason for this?

 

[bartvk]

No reason of course, probably a bug. I've had some troubles with this as well, so when connecting or disconnecting, I keep the laptop lid open.

So I avoid clamshell mode. If I do this, I have no trouble whatsoever.

 

[chabig]

I have an ongoing issue whenever I unplug my usb monitor or login from wake that both the 'WindowServer' and 'loginwindow' process double in memory size usage - and will just grow to gigabytes in size until I restart.
What is the reason for this?

Are you experiencing any problems? If not, then just forget about it and get on with doing with whatever you were doing. Too many people go looking for trouble in Activity Monitor when there is none. None of us are savvy enough to know what the operating system "should be" doing. Just let it do it's own thing like it's designed to do.

 

[redshovel]

To be honest it is causing an issue. As a day goes on and the lid is opened and closed and/or the MBP is unplugged/replugged into the monitor, the two process can swell above 2GBs each and the system slows down until a restart!

 

[chabig]

OK, the system slows down noticeably. That's your problem, and you think it's a memory issue. We would like to see your memory pressure in Activity Monitor. If it's low and green, then you probably don't have a memory problem. If it's not green, we will dig deeper.

 

[jerryk]

I have an ongoing issue whenever I unplug my usb monitor or login from wake that both the 'WindowServer' and 'loginwindow' process double in memory size usage - and will just grow to gigabytes in size until I restart.
What is the reason for this?

The way memory works is it is allocated as needed, but only given back when there is demand for it. So if a process grows to use more memory, the memory usage of that process does not decrease if there is no demand for memory from other processes.

The idea is that the process that originally needed the increased memory may need that code/data again in the future. So, since there is no demand for memory, why reduce the process memory size and potentially take a performance hit to get memory when the process needs the code/data later.