Memory use incrementing until out of memory

[Zak99]

HI,

Can you help please, Having weird out of memory problems. In activity monitor I can see the top five processes (roughly) until their use is in the order of Gb. See screen captures .

What could be causing this please?

MacBook Pro
15-inch, Late 2011
Processor 2.4 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 16 GB 1333 MHz DDR3

Disc Capacity: 749.81 GB
Available: 282.39 GB

Had another thread going with welcome advice but I guess I was a bit vague about the symptoms. Hopefully this is more specific.

thank you

 

[Zak99]

Sorry I've somehow loaded images twice.

 

[Zak99]

Sorry again, cant see how to edit message. The first four images are relevant. They are all within a few minutes of each other and show in each image the memory use increasing steadily on about the first five processes (sorted by mem use). The fourth image is a bit later when out of memory.

I cant delete the loginwindow process and eventually that gets up to over 4Gb and the apps start crashing.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello,

Not sure what is happening, as those all look normal. The only thing that isn't normal, is the warning dialog box.

-Which version of OS X?
-Since there are no page outs, it means that there is still application memory left in RAM.
-You have plenty of disk space remaining.
-Do you have a Gmail account setup in Apple Mail?

C

 

[Zak99]

Thanks Cory. Lion 10.7.5 i think from memory (not home). The memory is ALL getting used up, look at the 4th image.

It starts off normal then the usage keeps clocking up over say 15 minutes until theres nothing left.

 

[Zak99]

Hi, can anyone help with this please?

Rgds

Zak

 

[honestone]

One would think that with 16 gig of RAM, it would be OK. Note, though, that the 3 memory hogs, Firefox, all the Google Chrome "pieces", and Apple's Mail program, are taking up over 9.61 gig of RAM. Is there a reason why you need all 3 programs running at the same time? Also, although it is not taking up much space, why is OpenOffice running too?

When you shut down your Mac, then start up again, is there a lot of memory available? Also, what happens when you are only running one of the browsers, and nothing else? Any memory issues then?

Myself, I have only 4 gig of RAM on each of my Macs, and about 99% of the time, I run only one app. For example, when I first boot up my Mac, I launch Outlook 2016 to check my mail. When I am done, I quit that program. My primary Browser is Google Chrome, and it is known to be somewhat of a Memory hog. In fact, if I use it for some time, and visit sites with a lot of graphic images/videos, the available memory I have left certainly decreases more and more. (I am currently using Sierra, OS 10.12.1, but the same was true when I was using El Capitan, OS 10.11.x).

 

[Zak99]

Thank you Honestone. Yes if i restart, there is loads of memory free. I'm probably not explaining it well. I'm not sure what app starts it, but in activity monitor i can watch the memory use jumping up incrementaly in steps on its own. It just keeps climbing until out of memory. it takes about 20 mins from starting to use it.

I admit I am a many app at once user and never used to have a problem.

 

[honestone]

Thank you Honestone. Yes if i restart, there is loads of memory free. I'm probably not explaining it well. I'm not sure what app starts it, but in activity monitor i can watch the memory use jumping up incrementaly in steps on its own. It just keeps climbing until out of memory. it takes about 20 mins from starting to use it.

I admit I am a many app at once user and never used to have a problem.

Regarding that memory jumping up in steps on its own, does that happen even when you do not launch any software at all, ie, with just the Finder and Activity Monitor running?

Also, have you done any disk cleanup/maintenance/repairs? And are you making backups to an external device?

Additionally, three things stand out:

1. For the process entitled "loginwindow", yours says "4.61 gig" but mine (I have it running right now on my Mac MIni (along with Google Chrome), it says only "12.2 meg".

2. For the process entitled "UserEventAgent", yours says "3.21 gig", but mine says "4.3 Meg".

3. For the process entitled "SystemUIServer", yours says "2.89 gig", but mine says "14.7 Meg".

Not sure why such SIGNIFICANT differences!

 

[Zak99]

Thanks again.

Yes if I restart and don't load any apps, the memory still increments, see attached pic, mainly the top three are steadily incrementing.

Backed up with Time machine to and external My Passport. If I need to wipe the drive I'd prefer to get a second external backup.
Repaired errors with disk utilty and fixed permissions

I tried several time to install Onyx but it would not load unfortunately.

rgds

 

[Zak99]

Just tried to Install Onyx again. Appears to install OK, but when I click on its icon in Apps it just loads the Onyx icon in the bottom and nothing else.

 

[honestone]

So, the 3 processes I pointed out above are the culprits. Maybe a complete re-installation is in order. That is, you'll need to boot from the (hidden) Recovery HD, run Disk Utility from there to Erase and Format your internal drive, do a clean, "virgin" installation of the OS (I assume it will be 10.7.5), and then use Migration Assistant to "migrate"/copy all the needed "stuff" from your (most recent?) Time Machine Backup. This link explains how to boot to that partition, and what it can do:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314

Onyx will mainly clean up some stuff, along with Repairing Permissions (which you should run a couple of Times. Have you ever Repaired Permissions?). By the way, did you download V2.4.8 of Onyx? There are different versions for each OS. Just in case, you can get it form here:

http://www.titanium.free.fr/onyx.html

 

[Zak99]

Thanks again Honestone. Yes I repaired Permissions with Disk Utilty. Yes I loaded v2.4.8 Onyx from that link but all it does is load an Icon at the bottom of screen. I mailed Titanium support but nothing useful yet.

I'm reluctant to do a disc delete and clean install but can see it may be my only option. Its new territory for me, I'm scared of losing my data, I have a My Passport/Time Machine backup but think I'd be happier with a second backup before wiping, so would need to spend on another drive or cloud space.. I suppose its possible I could reinstall a rogue app (if thats what it is?) from my backup and be back in the same place.

Are there any other diagnostics I can perform please, and maybe something else free than Onyx that may install.

Someone else suggested looking at virtual memory but I cant see anything useful with my limited knowledge.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yutlvrbotoknkb4/Screen Shot 2016-12-12 at 09.06.55.png?dl=0

 

[honestone]

I understand your concerns. Not sure why Onyx will not launch properly. Besides Google Chrome, FireFox, and OpenOffice, do you use any other third party software? Also, you don't happen to have either MacKeeper or CleanMyMac on your machine? If you do, definitely get rid of both of them. They cause more harm than good.

The perplexing thing is the 3 processes I mentioned which are causing the grief. Unfortunately my knowledge about them is limited, at best. However, I just did a google search of "Why does loginwindow on a Mac keep using more and more memory?", and this useful link seems to be informative:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3248575?tstart=0

(By the way, here are all the "hits" from that search, including the one above:

https://www.google.com/search?q=Why+does+loginwindow+on+a+Mac+keep+using+more+and+more+memory?&oq=Why+does+loginwindow+on+a+Mac+keep+using+more+and+more+memory?&aqs=chrome..69i57.25230j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)

One other thing (I hope) that will not be an issue is that Western Digital Drives tend to "not play too nicely" with Macs. Does not happen all the time, but I have seen reports of issues (I have never owned one, preferring to use drives made by Seagate (and recently Samsung SSDs)). Have you even done a restore of anything from your Time Machine backup/backups on that drive? Also, how large is it, 1 TB, 2TB? And, how much free space is left on the drive?

Another thing you can try is to boot to the Recovery HD partition, launch Disk Utility form there, and have it perform First Aid on your internal drive, both at the Volume (ie, top) and Partition (ie, secondary) levels. It is better to do that with Disk Utility in an "isolated" manner.

Do you happen to have the file entitled "Install Mac OS X Lion" anywhere? That could come in handy. If you don't have it, you should be able to download it from the App Store.

It's too bad you don't have a more robust disk maintenance/repair program like Disk Warrior or TechTool Pro. I have both, and they are definitely helpful.