CPressland Posted August 1, 2011 Share Posted August 1, 2011 Hey Guys, I've recently lost my Core i7, 8GB RAM iMac and had to move back to an older MacMini 2009 with 2GB of RAM and a 160GB HDD. I find with Lion this thing is running pretty slow and the HDD is constantly churning and grinding away, iStat Menus shows 6GB of SWAP used so it's clear I need more RAM but I really cannot afford anymore DDR3 at the moment so I was wondering if a Windows 7 Feature has any kind of Mac OS Equivalent. I've got a 8GB USB Stick here that's completely unused and I was wondering if I could use it as low priority memory like the Windows 7 Ready Boost Feature. Any ideas guys? Thanks Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PNWDweller Posted August 2, 2011 Share Posted August 2, 2011 To the best of my knowledge, there is nothing like Readyboost for the Mac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scorbing Posted August 7, 2011 Share Posted August 7, 2011 Hey Guys, I've recently lost my Core i7, 8GB RAM iMac and had to move back to an older MacMini 2009 with 2GB of RAM and a 160GB HDD. I find with Lion this thing is running pretty slow and the HDD is constantly churning and grinding away, iStat Menus shows 6GB of SWAP used so it's clear I need more RAM but I really cannot afford anymore DDR3 at the moment so I was wondering if a Windows 7 Feature has any kind of Mac OS Equivalent. I've got a 8GB USB Stick here that's completely unused and I was wondering if I could use it as low priority memory like the Windows 7 Ready Boost Feature. Any ideas guys? Thanks Chris Macs are not PCs dude. MacOS X is not Windows, they do not need such a thing. They work fine as it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BletchleyPark Posted August 7, 2011 Share Posted August 7, 2011 Can't tell if sarcasm... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firelord42 Posted August 7, 2011 Share Posted August 7, 2011 There is a way to do read-boost like functionality but in reality it is really a swap file hack. I originally thought the best way would be to mount the swap file directory to the usb stick, but I found a better way online. As a warning, when you do this, you probably want to reformat to HFS+ on your USB stick and you probably wont be able to remove it until you change it back *AND* restart your computer. Anyways, I found this online: http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20001215021440138 I also recommend you look through the comments. Good luck and please tell us if it works. As always, I recommend you make a backup before doing major changes to your OSX system. EDIT: I also would like to note that your swap space will be completely capped at 8GB using this technique. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CPressland Posted August 10, 2011 Author Share Posted August 10, 2011 To the best of my knowledge, there is nothing like Readyboost for the Mac. That certainly seams to be the trend :( Macs are not PCs dude. MacOS X is not Windows, they do not need such a thing. They work fine as it is. Actually they are, in every way, Intel Chipsets, Intel Processors, Nvidia Graphics, DDR3 Memory. And yes, they work fine, but not when I've just gone from an iMac with 8GB of RAM to a Mac Mini with 2GB and am having to open projects which require massive amounts of memory. Alas, I have since upgraded the unit to 8GB Can't tell if sarcasm... It is, but Mac Users 'trolling' the Windows area get Warnings. Idiots trolling the Mac forums get nothing. There is a way to do read-boost like functionality but in reality it is really a swap file hack. I originally thought the best way would be to mount the swap file directory to the usb stick, but I found a better way online. As a warning, when you do this, you probably want to reformat to HFS+ on your USB stick and you probably wont be able to remove it until you change it back *AND* restart your computer. Anyways, I found this online: http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20001215021440138 I also recommend you look through the comments. Good luck and please tell us if it works. As always, I recommend you make a backup before doing major changes to your OSX system. EDIT: I also would like to note that your swap space will be completely capped at 8GB using this technique. But USB is slower than my Internal Hard Drive. Moving the entire SWAP file here would be very silly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
firelord42 Posted August 12, 2011 Share Posted August 12, 2011 But USB is slower than my Internal Hard Drive. Moving the entire SWAP file here would be very silly. But it would take the swapping stress off the drive :p The internal HDD may be faster, but if its bogged down with I/O your swap in and out of ram is being slowed. In that context, it may be quicker to dedicate the entire usb drive to swap. Actually, now I am curious... I want to find some hard numbers on HDD I/O and the ability to handle paged memory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nub Posted August 12, 2011 Share Posted August 12, 2011 But USB is slower than my Internal Hard Drive. Moving the entire SWAP file here would be very silly. The core idea of ReadyBoost is that a flash drive has a much faster seek time (less than 1 ms), allowing it to satisfy requests faster than reading files from a hard disk. ... USB 2.0 flash drives are slower for sequential reads and writes than modern desktop hard drives. Desktop hard drives can sustain anywhere from 2 to 10 times the transfer speed of USB 2.0 flash drives ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reggi Tirtakusumah Posted August 16, 2017 Share Posted August 16, 2017 On 8/8/2011 at 0:23 AM, Scorbing said: Macs are not PCs dude. MacOS X is not Windows, they do not need such a thing. They work fine as it is. Yes you can. I don't know if it's the same. But creating stripped raid set of my thunbdrives insanely improved my performance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PsYcHoKiLLa Posted August 16, 2017 Share Posted August 16, 2017 Way to resurrect a 6 yr old thread! DConnell 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reggi Tirtakusumah Posted August 16, 2017 Share Posted August 16, 2017 1 hour ago, PsYcHoKiLLa said: Way to resurrect a 6 yr old thread! Still unanswered tho lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim K Global Moderator Posted August 16, 2017 Global Moderator Share Posted August 16, 2017 Please do not resurrect old threads. //Locked Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts