jzdziarski
Registered
I'm somewhat unfamiliar with how OSX deals with memory. In most *nixes, when an application exits, the entire process image (including all allocated memory) are unlinked completely and returned back to the operating system. I've noticed OSX seems to act more like windows, however, and when you quit an application the pages never get removed - they're just part of the "inactive" memory pool.
I realized this after upgrading my powerbook to 2GB of RAM, thinking I was running low. I can reboot now and have almost 90% of the memory free, play a game of UT2004, and only a mere 30% or so will be free after that - the rest "inactive". I can think of a number of reasons having inactive pages just sitting in memory would be a bad thing, so why does OSX seem to do this? Or is this whole thing one huge bug that needs to get sorted out in Tiger?
Finally, are there any tools someone can recommend that will flush inactive memory?
Jonathan
I realized this after upgrading my powerbook to 2GB of RAM, thinking I was running low. I can reboot now and have almost 90% of the memory free, play a game of UT2004, and only a mere 30% or so will be free after that - the rest "inactive". I can think of a number of reasons having inactive pages just sitting in memory would be a bad thing, so why does OSX seem to do this? Or is this whole thing one huge bug that needs to get sorted out in Tiger?
Finally, are there any tools someone can recommend that will flush inactive memory?
Jonathan