Recovering RAM

D
Posted By
dnkcampbell
Oct 10, 2008
Views
381
Replies
15
Status
Closed
Aside from re-booting, how can I free up the RAM after shutting down Photoshop? [Photoshop Ver. 8, Powerbook G4, OS 10.4.11, 1G Ram]
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R
Ram
Oct 10, 2008
You can try iFreeMem <http://www.activata.co.uk/ifreemem/>.

But you really should max out that laptop with as much RAM as it can take. 1 GB for Photoshop is pathetically little.
D
dnkcampbell
Oct 10, 2008
Ramon: Thanks for the iFreemem suggestion. Sad to say, though, that this laptop is maxed out at 1G.
R
Ram
Oct 10, 2008
Bummer!
JM
Jonas_M._Rogne
Oct 15, 2008
We are having the same problem. Running OSX 10.4.11 and CS3. Photoshop eats up a lot of RAM, if i open e.g. 10 files at once and then close them again Photoshop will have maxed out my ram. Doesn’t seem to happen if I have only one image open at once and i don’t use layers.

And it doesn’t let go of it until i restart Photoshop. Sometimes it seems to keep the ram in use even after quitting and i guess i have to reboot to free it up properly.

Right now Photoshop uses 1.5 GB real, and 2 GB virtual memory. With no images open. Anyone else have this? (try opening a bunch of large images then closing them).

Will check out iFreeMem, but it’s not the best solution when there’s a company with a lot of computers and different users.
CC
Chris_Cox
Oct 17, 2008
Photoshop is supposed to hold onto RAM when you close documents and reuse that RAM for later documents. (otherwise it would run much slower)

But Photoshop (or any other application) *cannot* hold onto RAM after quitting.

The OS disk cache memory is freed up as soon as you need to use it — so iFreeMem sounds like a useless utility.
R
Ram
Feb 28, 2009
Chris,

so iFreeMem sounds like a useless utility.

Resurrecting this old thread for a second, I just found one instance when iFreeMem appears to make a difference on an older PowerPC box that is maxed out at 2 GB of RAM: I sometimes get a spinning flywheel in Entourage or Firefox (doesn’t happen much at all in Photoshop), especially Entourage. At such times, Photoshop suffers. I just tried iFreeMemory in a couple of these instances, and it seems to make a heck of a difference.

It could be a coincidence—or wishful thinking, meaning that the spinning wheel would/could have disappeared in the few seconds that iFreeMem takes to do its thing. What are your thoughts on this in regard to the effect on Photoshop? Running Ps 11.0.1 in Tiger 10.4.11.

Thanks in advance.
L
Lundberg02
Feb 28, 2009
The iFreeMem utility is very useful to me, but I have never had the occasion to use it in connection with Photoshop.
R
Ram
Mar 1, 2009
Well, as I said, "it could be a coincidence—or wishful thinking, meaning that the spinning wheel would/could have disappeared in the few seconds that iFreeMem takes to do its thing."
CC
Chris_Cox
Mar 1, 2009
The OS already releases caches when files are no longer in use, and after a certain period of time. So I’m not sure what iFreeMem really changes. I wouldn’t expect it to improve performance most of the time, but to hurt performance.
R
Ram
Mar 1, 2009
Chris,

Thanks for your valuable and, in my view, always authoritative input.

My reason for wondering is that I have Entourage and Firefox practically always running (Photoshop is definitely always running), and Firefox does seem to have a memory leak, as I suspect Entourage does.
R
Ram
Mar 1, 2009
Lundberg02,

Here’s a post from yesterday at the Apple discussion boards which reinforces what Chris said. It’s a reply to a specific mention of iFreeMem:

Generally clearing cache will slow your system down, not speed it up. Data is kept in cache so it is available to your system from RAM rather then a slower source such as a disk or the web. Once you clear cache, your system is forced to get all the data once more from the slower sources, hence it runs slower.

Cache should only be clear when you have a very strong reason to believe that the data in cache has been corrupted and only then.

I know that is not what the developers of the cache cleaners tell you. But think about it for a half a second, if the only time anyone was going to use their product was when cache was corrupt they would be make about one sale a decade.

CLICK HERE < http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=9077355&a mp;#9077355> for the original thread at the Apple boards.
L
Lundberg02
Mar 1, 2009
I don’t believe that iFreeMem touches your cache. It clears unreleased RAM, such as the massive amounts that Safari won’t let go of. This is based on daily use to keep Safari from quitting on me.
R
Ram
Mar 2, 2009
don’t believe that iFreeMem touches your cache. It clears unreleased RAM,

The reference is specific to RAM cache. If it clears RAM, it clears RAM cache. 🙂
L
Lundberg02
Mar 2, 2009
You toucha my cache, I breaka you face.
R
Ram
Mar 2, 2009
LOL ! 😀

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