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MAC OS X Lion performance problem - broken memory management
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egremyl
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Apr 24, 2012, 05:07 AM
 
Starting with OS X 10.5 there are evident memory management problems in MAC OS X. The web was already then cluttered with complaints about system slowing down dramatically after some time. Back then i had slower machine, Mac Mini with 1GB RAM, so i (wrongly) concluded that it was due to inferior hardware.

Now i have 2010 MBP, core i7, 8 GB RAM, dual GPU.
Mac os X Snow Leopard was pain, but after migrating to OS X Lion, working some serious stuff on MAC started to be a nightmare.

I finally managed to reproduce the problematic scenario, so i run the test and recorded the screen, into video.

MAC OS X Lion performance problem - broken memory management - YouTube

I run the tar+bzip command, which is basic unix stuff, on the large amount of picture files, in my Pictures/ folder. Just before start, i run the "purge" command, to delete inactive/cached program data.

You can see on the video that free memory starts to drop very fast, and inactive is constantly rising. If you take a look at "bsdtar" command, it takes only a fragment of RAM, so the problem is not in this process. You cannot say that it is a program memory leak, because then the problem would not be in inactive ram, rather in active/wired.

When the free memory dropped below 100mb, i started some apps, like Safari, iPhoto and MS Word, and you can see in the video, that it takes even minutes to start an app, when normally (when there is free RAM), it would take some 3-5 secs to load.

I run the same scenario and the same commands on my Linux Centos 6 box, no problem there ! Memory usage is some 10-20mb, no problems with cache/buffer.

The memory management must be very broken in Mac OS X !
     
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Apr 24, 2012, 05:41 AM
 
The only thing that is broken is your understanding of the terms.

"Inactive" means memory that is currently not in use and can be cleared immediately - it is otherwise free memory that is currently being used as a temporary cache. Put it this way: when the OS is done with some memory, it can do one of two things: Clear it immediately, or keep it around in case it might be useful. If it is kept around, there are two possibilities: it will be useful, in which case the OS saves a lot of time that would other wise be spent on reading it from disk, or it won't be, in which case the OS will eventually clear it. Clearing it takes essentially zero time, and there is always a little Free memory kept around in case some memory is needed in an emergency.

Lots of Free memory is bad, because it is wasted memory. It will happen after reboot, but it is to be avoided. Lots of Inactive memory is good.

Linux has a similar situation, and someone took the time to write up what actually happens. You can read it if you like, but keep in mind that it is not exact as it is written for a different OS.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
Big Mac
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Apr 24, 2012, 07:06 AM
 
Also, it's Mac not MAC.

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
     
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Apr 24, 2012, 11:06 AM
 
Reading it a little closer, it seems that there is a bug where Inactive pages are not freed as they should be, because the launch times of the apps should not go up like that. My apologies for my tone above - if Safari truly takes minutes to launch, there is a bug somewhere. But that doesn't mean that the entire memory management system is broken.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
mduell
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Apr 24, 2012, 06:00 PM
 
Oh boy, another "modern memory management is broken" thread... haven't we already had our quota of these this month?

Originally Posted by egremyl View Post
You can see on the video that free memory starts to drop very fast, and inactive is constantly rising. If you take a look at "bsdtar" command, it takes only a fragment of RAM, so the problem is not in this process. You cannot say that it is a program memory leak, because then the problem would not be in inactive ram, rather in active/wired.
That's the OS read-ahead disk caching, and expected in modern operating systems.

Originally Posted by egremyl View Post
When the free memory dropped below 100mb, i started some apps, like Safari, iPhoto and MS Word, and you can see in the video, that it takes even minutes to start an app, when normally (when there is free RAM), it would take some 3-5 secs to load.
The apps are slow to load because the tar is thrashing the disk. Take a look at the Disk Activity tab in Activity Monitor or iostat.

Stop the tar, let the disks settle for a moment, then launch the apps. Should be nominal regardless of the Inact usage.

As a side note, look at all this waste! Mem: 1970M Active, 1914M Inact, 211G Wired, 197M Cache, 13G Free
( Last edited by mduell; Apr 24, 2012 at 06:08 PM. )
     
egremyl  (op)
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Apr 30, 2012, 04:38 AM
 
Originally Posted by P View Post
The only thing that is broken is your understanding of the terms.
I am perfectly aware and have enough knowledge on OS memory facilities. I dont know which part of my post got you thinking that it is opposite, because i left all the tech details out.

Originally Posted by P View Post
Linux has a similar situation, and someone took the time to write up what actually happens. You can read it if you like, but keep in mind that it is not exact as it is written for a different OS.
Yes and no. They both have in-memory disk cache/buffer. But the implementation are not the same. Like the swap management is implemented rather differently.

I run the same scenario on Linux, and the disk cache in linux is totally unobtrusive. There are no slowdowns or system freeze like on Mac.
     
egremyl  (op)
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Apr 30, 2012, 04:45 AM
 
Originally Posted by P View Post
Reading it a little closer, it seems that there is a bug where Inactive pages are not freed as they should be, because the launch times of the apps should not go up like that. My apologies for my tone above - if Safari truly takes minutes to launch, there is a bug somewhere. But that doesn't mean that the entire memory management system is broken.
Well, thank you I wrote on purpose "broken", beacuse it limits me in my work, and because it's the core system flaw, note some iPhoto/Garageband toy.
     
besson3c
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Apr 30, 2012, 05:02 AM
 
I think in general there are many areas where OS X can stand to improve, performance wise. I think my favorite OS X release was Snow Leopard for this reason, but I was hoping that Apple wouldn't stop there with performance improvements.

I don't know about this particular theory, but OS X still remains a memory hog. I understand that using the memory that is available is not a bad thing, I have no problem with that, but OS X's minimal footprint is still pretty huge, and I'm sure that this manifests into performance degradation as far as the amount of time new applications (and the OS X bits they count on) take to claim their footprint, and it certainly does in intensive I/O operations to such an outdated file system designed the way it is.

All of this being said, what Apple has done with iOS is pretty amazing with such little RAM. I hope the two OSes continue to converge for this reason.
     
egremyl  (op)
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Apr 30, 2012, 11:01 AM
 
Originally Posted by mduell View Post
The apps are slow to load because the tar is thrashing the disk. Take a look at the Disk Activity tab in Activity Monitor or iostat.
Stop the tar, let the disks settle for a moment, then launch the apps. Should be nominal regardless of the Inact usage.
No, it is not. The disk activity with tar is high, but so it is when you copy large amount of files ... and the system doesn't die. I will repeat myself, the are no problems with system responsiveness until it starts to page out. You can open and close apps, you can work in photoshop or maya as well, but once the free memory is out, and inactive gets as large as it can be, mac os x is practically unusable for me.
     
mduell
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Apr 30, 2012, 05:19 PM
 
Originally Posted by egremyl View Post
No, it is not. The disk activity with tar is high, but so it is when you copy large amount of files ... and the system doesn't die.
You're contradicting yourself since tar is copying a large amount of files.

Originally Posted by egremyl View Post
I will repeat myself, the are no problems with system responsiveness until it starts to page out. You can open and close apps, you can work in photoshop or maya as well, but
Your video does not demonstrate this and your video shows only inconsequential (25MB) page outs.

Originally Posted by egremyl View Post
once the free memory is out, and inactive gets as large as it can be, mac os x is practically unusable for me.
Your video does not demonstrate this independently of heavy disk IO.
     
xyz123
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May 2, 2012, 02:23 PM
 
I have observed the same problem as egremyl. During heavy disk I/O the amount of inactive memory increases until almost all free memory is gone. Closing all manually started applications does not help. The amount of inactive memory remains high. The response time in manually started or restarted applications is too long, indicating paging instead of using memory from the inactive memory pool. A purge will free up all inactive memory and response time is back to normal.

Unfortunately many persons replies with basic information about memory management. They seem unable to take in the possibility of an error in OSX Lion. This makes it difficult to discuss the problem.

I have studied operating system theory and for decades installed and maintained operating systems on production critical systems. I recognize a memory management problem when I see one.

(Please overlook any language errors. English is a foreign language.)
     
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May 2, 2012, 04:18 PM
 
Again: A high amount of Inactive memory is not a problem. That in itself is not an indication that anything is wrong. The part of the OP that is potentially troubling is that it apparently is slow to launch apps sometimes.

Because it piqued my interest, I googled it a bit. There are scattered reports of a problem like this, but they are rare and low on detail. It seems most likely to be an issue with a certain kext or configuration. If you have any more information on it, I think Apple would appreciate it (use the feedback box if you don't have a developer account), but you need something more than that movie. For starters, what does the Console say.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
egremyl  (op)
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May 2, 2012, 05:31 PM
 
i submited a bug to apple bug reporter.
if i get a feedback, i shall be more than glad to post some info.
     
xyz123
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May 4, 2012, 06:49 AM
 
Additional information since hardware problem has been suggested.
MacBook Pro 15”, mid 2010,
Model identifier 6,2
Processor 2,4 GHz Intel Core i5,
Memory 4 GB,
Disk 320 GB
All hardware original. I have no indication of any hardware problem.
OS: Mac OS X Lion 10.7.3 (11D50)
     
egremyl  (op)
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May 12, 2012, 02:25 PM
 
i finally got an answer, but unfortunatly it is
The issue is being tracked under under the original Bug ID# ........ which is also listed in the Related Problem section of your bug report.

I can see that other bug listed as bug id#, but i cannot open it, search it ....
does anybody know how to open other people's bug report ?
     
Thinine
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May 12, 2012, 06:47 PM
 
You can't. What was the ID, so anyone else can cite it?
     
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May 13, 2012, 01:38 PM
 
You can check if that ID is available here. That is OpenRadar, an open repository where you can copy your bugs if you like. It was started by people who - like you, and for that matter myself as well - think that Apple should let us search Radar for bugs like that. It only includes bugs that the submitted has copied, though.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
egremyl  (op)
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May 15, 2012, 07:06 AM
 
Originally Posted by P View Post
You can check if that ID is available here. That is OpenRadar, an open repository where you can copy your bugs if you like. It was started by people who - like you, and for that matter myself as well - think that Apple should let us search Radar for bugs like that. It only includes bugs that the submitted has copied, though.
the original bug id (#11140843) cannot be found on OpenRadar :-(
i submited my bug report on OpenRadar rdar://11324487: MAC OS X Lion performance problem - inactive memory management
     
pbw
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Jun 9, 2012, 06:29 AM
 
I'm glad you posted a bug. This is an ongoing and serious problem that can easily enough disappear into the black hole of the Forbidden City. If enough bugs are reported, someone at Apple might actually decide that the problem needs to be fixed.

Posting on forums is an exercise in frustration, except that others who are experiencing similar system problems can discover that they are not the only ones. Thanks again for posting here, and for your bug report.
     
besson3c
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Jun 9, 2012, 06:56 AM
 
Is there a way to monitor bugs like this? I'm not seeing a subscription mechanism even after signing in. I'd like to monitor this ticket.
     
davemchine
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Jul 5, 2012, 12:03 AM
 
There is no question that Lion has a memory management problem. Use it heavily and it will drag itself to it's knees and beg for mercy before falling over. Fortunately you can purchase an inexpensive app from the apple app store called icleanmemory that fixes the problem. Periodically your computer will clean up the memory leaks causing a short pause in activity but it then continues on rather than requiring a reboot. It's one of those things we can only hope is fixed in Mountain Lion.

Some will say it's not a bug in Lion, it's a bug in the software causing the leaks, and they are partially correct. My opinion is that if a couple dollar app can fix the memory problems then certainly apple can integrate it into their OS.
     
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Jul 5, 2012, 07:10 AM
 
I think you're misunderstanding the issue here. If an application is leaking memory, you will have issues with memory running out, but running any of those purge commands will not help. The only thing you can do is quit that application and restart it. The issue here is that Lion in some cases seems to be overly aggressive at speculatively keeping things in Inactive memory. It seems that it is overestimating the amount of memory it has available in some cases. I have looked around, and while there are reports on this, they are very rare. I'm inclined to put the blame on some specific hardware/software combo. Several of those I've found are MBPs with both integrated and discrete graphics - I don't know if that may be a clue.

Running one of those purge apps regularly is a very bad idea, however. Things are kept in Inactive memory for a reason, and periodically purging it only means that you're forcing more disk accesses.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
davemchine
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Jul 5, 2012, 09:50 PM
 
I will politely disagree with your thoughts on this. icleanmemory frees up memory, speeds up the computer and prevents unnecessary reboots. I think osx should handle this problem better and not require an extra program to fix the issue.
     
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Jul 6, 2012, 12:05 AM
 
No, you're misunderstanding what that program does. What it does is claim as much memory as it can - thereby forcing a pageout - before releasing it. If you truly have the problem the first poster has and you fail to solve it any other way, go ahead and use this app, but if you don't have this issue, stay away. It does not speed your computer up - it slows it down, and significantly. All the text about that app implies that this is some sort of "maintenance task" that needs to be done, and that Apple has somehow neglected to do. That is simply not the case. The ideal case is that almost all RAM in the system is Inactive - anything that is Free is wasted. Here is an explanation designed for Linux users - it works similarly. Windows 7 also works this way - the only difference is that MS does not show this fact anywhere. The best thing Apple could do is to change Activity Monitor to report Free and Inactive memory as one group, called "not in use" or something, because people misunderstand Inactive memory is becoming a freaking plague.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
mduell
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Jul 6, 2012, 06:35 AM
 
Originally Posted by P View Post
If you truly have the problem the first poster has and you fail to solve it any other way, go ahead and use this app
The OP has yet to demonstrate any problem other than "busy hard drives are slow" which was already well known and not related to OS X.
     
Steven Mathers
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Jul 24, 2012, 08:09 PM
 
Thanks OP, I found this link which sumarises things.

http://workstuff.tumblr.com/post/20464780085/something-is-deeply-broken-in-os-x-memory-management

For those of you who dont have this problem, hooray for you. For those of us who do, we have a computer that is like, late 80s floppy disk sloooooow due to constant, unneccessary disk usage.

Perhaps it is something to do with a certain 'configuration or upgrade path' ( I went from leopard to snow leopard to lion) or maybe you just have lots of RAM and/or an SSD.

But trust me, for the rest of us, something is deeply, truly, broken. It doesnt matter what the OP did to demonstrate the problem. All I have to do to replicate the problem is to turn my machine on and use it for a short while and then its beachball city.

Turning off spotlight has given some relief, no doubt to removing a serious contender for the HDD.

The tone of "I dont have this problem, therefore the OP is an idiot and/or the problem doesnt exist" is not helpful.
     
siddharthsback
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Jul 27, 2012, 08:04 AM
 
I have got the same problem. I am not a power user. I just use my mac to surf the net , download from torrent and watch movies. Tat's it.

I have mac book pro 13 early 2011 with 4 GB of ram and i run out of ram in like every half an hour. There's certainly wrong with the system ar there can be some sort of malware. It really sucks coz it slows down my Mac. Even i have to use the memory cleaning 3rd part softwares available on the app store.

I am running OS X lion and i hate it. THis problem was not there for the first 6 month when i bought the Mac.

:-(
     
besson3c
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Jul 27, 2012, 10:39 AM
 
Originally Posted by siddharthsback View Post
I have got the same problem. I am not a power user. I just use my mac to surf the net , download from torrent and watch movies. Tat's it.
I have mac book pro 13 early 2011 with 4 GB of ram and i run out of ram in like every half an hour. There's certainly wrong with the system ar there can be some sort of malware. It really sucks coz it slows down my Mac. Even i have to use the memory cleaning 3rd part softwares available on the app store.
I am running OS X lion and i hate it. THis problem was not there for the first 6 month when i bought the Mac.
:-(
Is your machine using virtual memory too?

I don't doubt the possibility you are experiencing this same problem, but I'd suggest if you haven't been already being as accurate as you can about attributing symptoms to a problem just so that you won't be barking up the wrong tree, and thus wasting your time.
     
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Jul 28, 2012, 05:50 AM
 
Go to Activity Monitor and check which process is using memory. Sort it by "real memory" and see what's on top. Also check how much memory is marked as Wired, Active, Inactive and Free. The bug reported here is that there is a lot of Inactive memory and that is not cleared to Free as needed. If you simply have a lot of Active memory, your memory is running out for some other reason (some app is using it).
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
mduell
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Jul 28, 2012, 12:15 PM
 
Originally Posted by Steven Mathers View Post
But trust me, for the rest of us, something is deeply, truly, broken. It doesnt matter what the OP did to demonstrate the problem. All I have to do to replicate the problem is to turn my machine on and use it for a short while and then its beachball city.
Are the steps to replicate a secret? That you won't share with us?


Originally Posted by Steven Mathers View Post
The tone of "I dont have this problem, therefore the OP is an idiot and/or the problem doesnt exist" is not helpful.
The tone of the OP "OMG THE THINGS ARE VERY BROKEN" is going to provoke a lot of mockery. I'm not saying a problems don't exist, I'm saying the specific problem the OP asserts has not been demonstrated.


Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
Is your machine using virtual memory too?
It'd be hard not to in any modern OS.


Originally Posted by P View Post
Go to Activity Monitor and check which process is using memory. Sort it by "real memory" and see what's on top. Also check how much memory is marked as Wired, Active, Inactive and Free. The bug reported here is that there is a lot of Inactive memory and that is not cleared to Free as needed. If you simply have a lot of Active memory, your memory is running out for some other reason (some app is using it).
Even better sort by private memory to avoid counting shared libraries.
     
Steven Mathers
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Jul 28, 2012, 01:15 PM
 
Originally Posted by mduell View Post
Are the steps to replicate a secret? That you won't share with us?
The tone of the OP "OMG THE THINGS ARE VERY BROKEN" is going to provoke a lot of mockery. I'm not saying a problems don't exist, I'm saying the specific problem the OP asserts has not been demonstrated.
It'd be hard not to in any modern OS.
Even better sort by private memory to avoid counting shared libraries.
I already gave you the steps:

1) turn on machine
2) use it

Now,thankfully I can also give you the fix

3) install mountain lion

Whatever the 'improvements to VM' they advertise in ML have addressed the bug - no more constant disk activity beachballing the machine to it knees.

If you have this problem, upgrade immediately.
     
siddharthsback
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Jul 28, 2012, 01:40 PM
 
Yes, i have checked. My system has a lot of inactive memory. When the memory becomes full my system becomes very slow.

I just updates to MAc os X mountain lion and i feel that the problem is solved. Used the new os only for a day but i feel that the problem is solved. I also have disabled the spotlight feature. I will reactivate it and post back the results.
     
besson3c
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Jul 28, 2012, 07:04 PM
 
Originally Posted by siddharthsback View Post
Yes, i have checked. My system has a lot of inactive memory. When the memory becomes full my system becomes very slow.
I just updates to MAc os X mountain lion and i feel that the problem is solved. Used the new os only for a day but i feel that the problem is solved. I also have disabled the spotlight feature. I will reactivate it and post back the results.
I'm glad that the problem is solved for you, but just FYI the inactive memory number was not evidence of you having this problem.
     
timnew
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Aug 8, 2012, 06:14 PM
 
I am not a technical person so I freely admit that I don't know the technical words for this issue nor the why or hows. But I do know what happens. I use Photoshop CS5 and I can open and edit 5 to 10 photos without any issue. I open another 5 or 10 after the first batch is edited and saved and everything gets slower. Each photograph I open and edit slows down everything even more. My Free Memory goes to virtually 0. No photos open, no programs other than Photoshop running and all memory is fully occupied. I can do nothing without first either quitting Photoshop completely and sometimes I can't even do that without "Force Quitting".

So why does the memory not free up? Why is my memory hijacked?

This is a first generation MacBook Pro 17 inch and it is limited to 4 GB of memory but everything works fine until I start editing photos and then the memory is used up with each photo I edit until there is none. What takes seconds for the first photo literally takes minutes with later photos or completely freezes.
     
BLAZE_MkIV
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Aug 8, 2012, 07:00 PM
 
Sounds like a problem with photoshop. Contact there customer support, you've paid for it.
     
Thorzdad
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Aug 9, 2012, 02:31 AM
 
Are you using a separate external drive as a scratch disc for Photoshop? If you are working on a large number of images (and it sounds like you are) Photoshop's performance can and will drop if it has to use the computer's main HD for scratch space. An external scratch disc will help quite a bit with performance.

You might also adjust settings in Photoshop > Preferences > Performance.
     
timnew
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Aug 9, 2012, 06:55 PM
 
Thanks Thorzdad I will try that But why does my Mac's memory not clear? Once the photos are edited and saved and exited shouldn't my RAM restore? Why do I have to quit PS before that memory is released?
     
Thorzdad
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Aug 10, 2012, 03:10 AM
 
Photoshop holds a lot of memory captive, for maintaining the Undo cache, History panel, clipboard, etc. Undo and History should clear when you close all open documents. Clipboard, though, is going to remain in memory, and that can be quite large depending on what you last copied.

You can clean-out memory in Photoshop by going to the Edit > Purge command.
     
larkost
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Aug 11, 2012, 09:13 AM
 
To amplify a bit about Photoshop: because all of Adobe's flagship products are cross-platform, and some fundamental things (like memory management) are different on different platforms Adobe replicates a lot of functionality that normally comes from the OS within its own code. Memory management is one of these things. If you think you are seeing a memory mangement probem while an Adobe product is open, then there is a good chance that the Adobe product is implicated, if not directly at fault. They basically claim large regions of memory for themselves, and attempt to manage those regions. The underlying OS is almost alwasy better at doing this, but that creates uncertainty in Adobe products, and would force them to tune for every platform they were on. By doing it this way they get "ok" performance more quickly, but are never going to get great performance. But sometimes it means they get much worse perfomance.

timnew's report sounds exactly like this. Photoshop's internal managed memory has either become full, or fragemented, and it has dropped off a performance cliff. Now I should still point out that timnew is misunderstanding "free" memory like many other posters in this thread (and in many threads like it). If you think of "free = wasted" the you will be closer to the truth. Problems, if they exist, are elsewhere.
     
timnew
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Aug 12, 2012, 06:27 PM
 
I used Photoshop simply because it is the easiest to document / replicate. It is not the sole culprit. I see the problem even when I am not running Photoshop. Last night I had to force reboot even though I only had 1 application running and it wasn't Photoshop and I had not had Photoshop open. I see it often after I open multiple applications or windows in Apps such as Powerpoint, Excel, Word that even after closing the window or sometimes the app itself, my memory doesn't refresh. These are more common because I teach and use all 3 more frequently than I do Photoshop. Once memory is allocated, it seems to stay allocated even after the window or application is closed for a fairly long period of time.

Long term a solution is a new MacBook Pro but that isn't feasible atm. So Short term I am using the Terminal to purge. Last night I didn't notice how much memory was consumed until too late and I couldn't even open terminal to purge. After 30 minutes of no response I forced restart.
     
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Aug 13, 2012, 12:29 AM
 
Then your problem is not a lack of RAM, it is something else.

There are two different things at work here. One is that Photoshop does not release memory when you close documents, and another that the OS does not release memory when you close programs. The first is not something Apple can affect, and it's likely not even a bug. The other would be a bug if you have truly closed the application (and not just the window, which is something else), but it honestly doesn't sound like it.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
agold791
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Sep 5, 2012, 09:53 AM
 
I was having similar issues with my MBP Core 2 Duo with 8GB of ram running Lion. I noticed that over time, free memory would be reduced to just about nothing, with plenty of inactive memory. Launching applications would take a much longer time than usual when only inactive memory was available. At this point, I tried closing startup apps and stopping applications one at a time to find the culprit. The issue seemed to reappear a day or two later with no obvious cause. The next step was to check startup disk usage, which turned out to be approximately 90%. I deleted some of the larger unused directories to get down to 75% disk usage, and about half of the inactive memory cleared immediately. My only guess is that OS X was unable to page efficiently to disk when reaching 90% capacity.

No cache files or temp browser files were deleted during my cleanup, only the download directory contents, and a few movies.

I'm not suggesting this is the fix for everyone's problems, just an observation.
     
BLAZE_MkIV
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Sep 5, 2012, 10:32 AM
 
A full disk will cause performance slow downs. They don't have anything to do with the memory management though.
     
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Sep 5, 2012, 10:51 AM
 
That was the logic that I followed, but it seemed to have an effect on the inactive memory. Like I said, just an observation.
     
BLAZE_MkIV
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Sep 5, 2012, 12:19 PM
 
I'd bet the spotlight indexer triggered when you deleted those directories Thus causing a break in your causality.
     
Steven Mathers
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Sep 6, 2012, 12:49 PM
 
have you upgraded to mountain lion? Lion has poor memory management. ML fixes it.
     
BLAZE_MkIV
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Sep 6, 2012, 02:18 PM
 
Originally Posted by Steven Mathers View Post
have you upgraded to mountain lion? Lion has poor memory management. ML fixes it.
Proof?
     
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Sep 7, 2012, 12:11 AM
 
Noone has proof that the issue even exists in the first place, but if you look around the 'net, you can see that the most ardent complainers claim that ML has fixed it.

The entire issue is filled with rumors and bad evidence. On the one hand, you have posts like the OP stating that the issue was there all the way back in 10.5, and yet there is absolutely no evidence of anyone complaining back then. The complaints all show up after Lion. I think that there is an edge case where the VM manager miscalculates how much physical memory it has - I connected it to the switchable integrated graphics myself, but as everyone else, I have no proof of that - and thus ends up in a situation where it thinks that it has enough Free memory to do something (so it doesn't free more) and then interrupts because the Free memory is not there.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
   
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