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DESCRIPTION

iFreeMem... Free system memory for better application performance. A quick and easy alternative to either a reboot or RAM upgrade to get defragmented free memory.

If you are in the middle of using an application and the system becomes unresponsive for several seconds it could be the memory manager organising free memory for your application to use. IFreeMem clears Inactive memory to help your applications avoid the performance hit you get when running low on Free memory. You could think of it like a RAM upgrade.

Especially useful for users of memory hungry applications, i.e.:

  • Musicians
  • DJ's
  • Graphic Designers
  • Final Cut Pro users
  • Photographers
  • Scientists
  • Parallels Desktop users
Rejuvenates old Machines and optimizes new machines.
WHAT'S NEW
release notes not currently available at developer site nor in download
REQUIREMENTS
Mac OS X 10.3 or later.


SCREENSHOT

Developer:Activata
Downloads:22,959
  - Version d/l:6,989
Utilities:System
License:Shareware
Date:29 Jul 2008
Platform:PPC/Intel
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iFreeMem User Reviews (31 posts)Write A Review
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Aug 22 2008

EASER  I honestly wonder if this works. I ran VMfusion, which ate up pretty much all of my remaining memory. After I quit, I ran iFreeMem. Although the graph visually says I "recovered" a lot of memory, my computer still ran about as sluggish as it did right after I quite VMfusion. It most certainly did not run as fast as it would if I restarted.   
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
+1
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
May 13 2009

GERWINPHILIPPO  Basically, what this program does, is that it allocates a large block of memory. This forces OSX to release memory that is used for file caching. File caching speeds up your system, because files that are in memory are retrieved much faster than when they are on disk.

After that, the program releases this block again. The result is, that more free memory shows up. However, now that all file caching is gone, all this has to be taken from the harddisk again, so it slows your system down.  
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0

Jul 30 2008

GERWINPHILIPPO  "Defragment memory" ? That must surely be a joke?! That's just proposterous! Fragmentation is a mechanical phenomenon that cannot, by definition, occur in memory. This is definitely snake oil. You must be a fool to actually pay for this rubbish.  
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0
[ 2 Replies - Reply ]
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May 13 2009

ROB.H  With respect, memory fragmentation is NOT just a mechanical phenomenon. Any system whereby resources are allocated and then de-allocated as required could potentially suffer from fragmentation. There's an article by Apple about memory fragmentation here - http://support.apple.com/kb/TA21681?viewlocale=en_US

The other thing is, iFreeMem is free, so no-one is asking you to pay for anything.  
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0
May 13 2009

GERWINPHILIPPO  That article is about OS9, is from 2000, and is completely irrelevant to the memory usage of a Unix system. I don't know how you managed to digg up this dinosaur of an article, but it is as relevant to OSX as is an article about steam engines. A Unix system manages the memory allocation for it's applications, and fragmentation is a meaningless concept in this respect.

Also, this program is shareware, so you can pay for it, and I mentioned you must be a fool to do so.   
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0

Jun 9 2008

FOULGER  Sure there are plenty of Applications/Utilities that do the same thing and one can enter a unix command & also optimise RAM but ifreemem is in the menubar, memory use can be seen and clicking on optimise takes just a small amount of time. For me that saves money each time I use it. The author has offered it for sale, if you like it then pay for it, if you don't then use something else. Its just so convenient and can be used with very little waste of time.

As a codicil, I would, however exhort my oft used advice "Halve the price & triple the profit"  
(Version 2.5.1)

praisebury
+1
[ Reply ]
Jun 8 2008

NARBO  sudo /usr/sbin/periodic weekly

produces the same results for FREE.  
(Version 2.5.1)

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0
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Aug 25 2008

XPLICIT  ... but takes up to 10 minutes.  
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0
Mar 18 2009

JRISKIN  I combed through the periodic scripts and found NOTHING related to memory.

The weekly runs the following scripts, 310.locate (update the spotlight database), 320.whatis (rebuild the manpage database), 999.local.

I can't imagine how this is optimizing memory except that things are going to shift around while it rebuilds databases.  
(Version 3.0)

praisebury
0

Jun 8 2008

HOLYPOLY  Leopard Cache Cleaner does that (and MUCH more) for $8.99 .   
(Version 2.5.1)

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0
[ Reply ]
Jun 5 2008

XPLICIT  Thanks Dana for telling that it works as advertised, because I get slow downs on a MBP with 2GB RAM. That is without even starting the "killer" apps, like PS and such. And I don't agree to 2GB not being enough memory.  
(Version 2.5)

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0
[ Reply ]
Apr 11 2008

DANA SUTTON  Well, for better or worse it works as advertised. Use it, you get significantly more free memory. But nearly twenty bucks for a gizmo like this is i. m. h. o. unacceptably steep. I'd spring for about five, tops. If you have so little memory that you really need it, you probably would be better advised to start saving your pennies and buy more RAM.  
(Version 2.5)

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0
[ Reply ]
Feb 25 2008

MAC-KIWI  If you clean the cache-folders by an apple-script, you have the same effect. Applescript is for free and integrated in OSX.  
(Version 2.0)

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0
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Mar 2 2008

ARROYODORADO  Sorry, but reorganizing your built in RAM is something so totally completely different from "cleaning the cache folders" that I doubt you understand anything this little app does at all - regardless of if it really works or not. I don't know if this app is an alternative to some reboots one has to do from time to time, but I think someone with such limited understanding of computers should not post discrediting comments like yours. My opinion.  
(Version 2.0)

praisebury
0
Mar 11 2008

NEUTRALZONE  Not only is cleaning the cache folders on disk not the same as the questionable purpose of this software, but cache cleaning normally lengthens startup time quite a bit! Startup time in OS X is optimized by caches, so when you lose those, they need to be rebuilt. When I dump caches, startup time goes from 35 seconds to 3 minutes.  
(Version 2.5)

praisebury
0

Feb 24 2008

PHYSICSGUY  You shouldn't have much free memory. What you want to make sure of is that your free + inactive memory isn't low.

The reason people see slowdowns when they run this program is that you're effectively deleting a bunch of cached data (like Safari tabs you aren't currently viewing) from memory, so you have to reload it from disk.

Here's an Apple document that goes over the types of memory you see in Activity Monitor and what they mean: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107918  
(Version 2.0)

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0
[ Reply ]
Feb 24 2008

FOULGER  I've been using the trial for two days and it appears to be making things more zippy. I'll use it till the trial expires and if I conclude that it speeds things up overall I will buy it.  
(Version 2.0)

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