How to increase virtual memory 10.5.8 imac?

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mah9999 Author

Level 1

5 points

How to increase virtual memory 10.5.8 imac?

I have 180 GB free on the hard disk.

Processes: 107 total, 2 running, 2 stuck, 103 sleeping... 430 threads 16:31:59

Load Avg: 0.48, 0.51, 0.55 CPU usage: 7.36% user, 14.34% sys, 78.29% idle

SharedLibs: num = 12, resident = 37M code, 768K data, 3320K linkedit.

MemRegions: num = 62876, resident = 444M + 14M private, 158M shared.

PhysMem: 195M wired, 522M active, 117M inactive, 835M used, 189M free.

VM: 12G + 389M 5668464(2) pageins, 3301833(0) pageouts

thanks

iMac, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Feb 7, 2012 1:34 PM

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Answer 1

Niel

Level 10

741,845 points

Feb 7, 2012 1:37 PM in response to mah9999

Virtual memory is handled by Mac OS X automatically. If you need to ask how to reconfigure it manually, you shouldn't do it.

(63896)

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Answer 2

mah9999 Author

Level 1

5 points

Feb 7, 2012 1:42 PM in response to Niel

I understand what virtual memory is, it seems to me, that I should be able to increase it , since it is only using 12GB. I would like to do this, or understand why I can not. I have included the results of the top command from one of the virtual memory questions I read.

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Answer 3

Niel

Level 10

741,845 points

Feb 7, 2012 1:48 PM in response to mah9999

Mac OS X will increase it if it thinks it needs to. Attempting to add more manually will only take up space on the drive without accomplishing anything meaningful.

(63897)

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Answer 4

Feb 7, 2012 1:53 PM in response to mah9999

I suspect that instead of your method of attacking this problem by attempting to increase VM, what you Mac actually needs is an increase in RAM.

If you increase RAM that will reduce the demand for VM.

Allan

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Answer 5

Jyby

Level 1

4 points

Aug 21, 2012 8:22 PM in response to mah9999

I remember increasing virtual memory with my Power Machintosh 6500; just to play The Sims! Before Apple killed Mac OS 9, virtual memory modification used to be a feature. So now I guess they either feel we have enough RAM or they have provided dynamic vRAM.

You may be able to test the fact Niel provided, by punching in this line of code in terminal, when you've maxed out your RAM:

sysctl vm.swapusage

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