Swap files

Open up the terminal,
found in applications->Utilities.
Type cd /var/vm
Type ls -al

You’ll see at least one swap file maybe more. The file sizes will grown and osx adds swap files as needed. I'm not sure of the heuristics when it decides not to grow a given swap file but instead create a new one.

Anyways to clear out the swap file - reboot. That is really the only and safest way. I've come across some solutions that purport to clear out the files, but the stability of osx is at stake. Just reboot.

Mike

No problem,
there's plus and minuses in how apple implemented VM, with Linux you can specify a swap partition, with OSX you cannot. using a predefined partition reduces overhead as it does not need to manage the files and growth of those files. The simplicity of Apple's solution though fits in line with the ease of OSX.

Mike

You can also select "Go to Folder" from the Finder's Go menu and type in:

/var/vm/

And the folder will open in the Finder and show you the swap file(s). No need for the Terminal. 🙂

-Doug

That's the way they go, each new one gets bigger:

64MB
64MB
128MB
256MB
512MB
1GB
2GB

-Doug