On 08/09/2010, at 6:41 PM, Rob Phillips wrote: > Yes, Ronni. I knew about the free disk space, and I try to keep about 20% > free. In fact I had about 20% free, but it was fragmented. I still have > about 20% free and still have problems.
20% is the bare minimum as I mentioned previously. Fragmentation will happen if you don't have enough free space on your Hard Drive. To explain Fragmentation in OS X would require more space than available in this email. If you have low hard drive space, the system may not have adequate virtual memory space available for paging out memory. Paging happens all the time to keep memory optimised for performance, and if the hard drive space is low then the efficiency of this process will be reduced. If you are also low on available RAM for your active processes, then your system may go so slow that it will seem to fully lock up. When it comes to hard drive space, the more the better, though keep at least 20% free as a rule of thumb. This will help prevent drive fragmentation that can lead to degraded virtual memory performance. I personally like to keep much more than 20% 'Free Available' Hard Drive space on my computers. I like my computers to run fast and clean. <http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1375> > With a replacement machine with more disk space, I should be allright for a > while. :-) I'll buy more RAM. Good. > > For the benefit of others, I'd value your opinion on another technique I used > to address possible OS problems. I have a second 15GB partition on my > internal MBP disk. This has a bare bones system on it. So, when I was > getting Finder corruptions, I was able to boot off the other partition and > still access the file system to delete the Finder Prefs file. I don't think > you can do this if you boot off the Installation DVD. Correct, you cannot access the ~Library > Preference file system from the Installation DVD. You can "Repair Disk" & "Repair Permissions". > I'm probably a bit anally-retentive :-) but I like to prepare for all > eventualities so I can fix my system myself, especially since I travel a lot. A good Back Up Strategy and regular Maintenance are the two most important things. Cheers, Ronni > > Rob > > On 8/09/10 5:36 PM, Ronda Brown wrote: >> >> >> On 08/09/2010, at 3:16 PM, Rob Phillips wrote: >> >>> >>> Hi Ronni >>> >>> On 6/09/10 2:33 PM, Ronda Brown wrote: >>>> Hi Rob, >>>> >>>> Sorry to hear you are still having problems with your MBP. You are not >>>> going to particularly like what I have to say … sorry :-( >>>> >>>> OSX requires plenty of Free Unused Hard Drive space to run well. Also you >>>> only have 2GB RAM, Snow Leopard really needs 4GB (I know if only requires >>>> 1GB to install, but to run well it needs 4GB). >>> Yeah. In the past I've always maxed out the RAM, but I didn't for this >>> machine, because with Leopard it didn't seem a problem. >>>> >>>> A hard drive that fills up and turns flaky is nearly impossible to get >>>> back to normal without Erasing reformatting. >>>> If you run Photoshop it is best to have 100GB of free space. If all you >>>> were doing is Microsoft Word and email, I would keep a minimum of 50 GB >>>> free unused space available, this allows the operating system vital unused >>>> space to write its swap files, virtual memory scratch disk. >>>> >>>> Full hard drives also tend to fragment system and data files and greatly >>>> slow disk access down, too. >>>> >>>> Left unchecked, the problem will likely spread and corrupt the entire >>>> install until the hard drive literally won't mount or the computer won't >>>> boot or run without constant crashing. >>>> This is where you are at …. (I did warn you that you wouldn't like what I >>>> have to say). >>> This was probably my next option, so it isn't too much of a surprise! >>> However, I emailed the same info (plus reports of some recent kernel >>> panics) to the IT people at work, and they are trying to get me a new >>> machine on warranty. That's better news than your suggestion! :-) >> >> Hi Rob, >> >> It will be a good win if you get a new MBP on warranty ;-) … ah, the joys >> of working in Education … >> I would pay the extra and have more RAM installed though. Also when you have >> the new replacement MBP, take care to leave plenty of Free Available space >> on the Hard Drive or you will find yourself in trouble again. >> >> I like to keep my computers with at least 20-25% Free Available space on my >> Hard Drive. >> There are many different types of problems that can manifest the symptoms >> you experienced. Insufficient RAM or even hardware failure can be the >> culprit. >> But one of the most common causes of the problems you describe is not having >> enough free space on a startup drive. >> >> Filling your hard drive until it's almost full is fraught with issues. >> First, your Mac needs some free space for creating swap space to manage >> memory use. >> Even when you have adequate RAM, OS X will reserve some space at startup for >> memory swap space. >> In addition, individual applications usually use some disk space for >> temporary storage. >> >> The point is that many pieces of the OS and many applications use hard drive >> space, usually without your being aware of it. >> When it gets your attention, it's usually because of erratic system >> performance. >> >> In general, you should keep as much of your drive free as possible. As I >> mentioned above, If I had to put a minimum on the amount, I would say keep >> at least 20% of your startup drive free at all times; more is better. If >> you're getting to the point where you worry about your hard drive's free >> space, it's probably time to either spring for a larger hard drive or >> archive some of the data and get it off the drive. >> >> How did I come up with 20% as a bare minimum? >> >> I picked this value so that some basic OS X maintenance scripts will have >> sufficient free drive space to run. This includes OS X's built-in disk >> defragmentation system, memory swap space, and enough space to create cache >> and temp files when OS X starts up, while still leaving room for basic >> applications, such as email and web browsers, to use free space as needed. >> >> Cheers, >> Ronni >> >> 17" MacBook Pro Intel Core i7 >> 2.66GHz / 4GB / 1067 MHz DDR3 / 500GB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200rpm >> >> OS X 10.6.3 Snow Leopard >> Windows 7 Ultimate (under sufferance) >> >> >> >> -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Unsubscribe - <mailto:[email protected]>
