SLLOOWWW

[Tom Klaber]

Vectorworks seems to be running slower and slower.  It will just stop and think about nothing for MINUTES.  A change in sheet layer will be met with 3 to 5 minutes sitting there.  No operation done - just a change in view.  The view is visible - but it will go into Not Responding for MINUTES.  What is going on??  What is it thinking about?? Its just a sheet with 2 elevations.  It is so frustrating. 

[rDesign]

@line-weight Have you tried any RAM applications which can free up RAM when it starts to runs out? It might save you having to quit & restart.

There’s a couple of them out there. FreeMemory is one that I use on my Intel MBP, don’t know if it works on M-series processors. Apple Store Link below to another.

 

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/memory-diag/id748212890?mt=12

[Andy Broomell]

I have a student using 2025 that's been running into issues lately with Vectorworks becoming incredibly sluggish, seemingly for no reason. The signs point to some sort of RAM issue. It's a pretty new computer and software is up to date, and their files aren't particularly complex.

[Pat Stanford]

What OS are they on.  There were/are definite problems for some users on MacOS14.

 

Workarounds that work for some people include Setting Display have Separate Spaces and setting the VW application window so that it is about 1" from the left edge of the screen especially if using multiple monitors.

 

My issue with sluggishness went away when I upgraded to OS15.3.

 

The problem appears to be an Apple issue with the dynamic screen interfacing allowing you to just place a phone or iPad near a Mac and have it automatically become part of the "workspace"

[Andy Broomell]

26 minutes ago, Pat Stanford said:

What OS are they on. 

 

15.3

 

Working just on their laptop screen, but I'll mention the thoughts about spaces and dynamic screen interfacing, thanks!

[Pat Stanford]

I was seeing slowdown on 14, but have not seen on 15.3.  Make sure she updated to 15.3.1 and VW2025 Update 3 (or Update 4 when it comes out in the next couple of weeks).

[line-weight]

3 hours ago, rDesign said:

@line-weight Have you tried any RAM applications which can free up RAM when it starts to runs out? It might save you having to quit & restart.

There’s a couple of them out there. FreeMemory is one that I use on my Intel MBP, don’t know if it works on M-series processors. Apple Store Link below to another.

 

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/memory-diag/id748212890?mt=12

 

Thanks for this, I have installed one of these and tried messing with it a bit.

 

I don't see it visibly doing much to the amount of memory VW is using. I don't fully understand how all the memory stuff works but I think that part of what's happening is that VW is putting stuff in swap files which I assume are on my HD not in the RAM.

 

My mac (M1 mini) has 16GB of RAM and I start to get problems when VW2025 is listed as using around 20GB in Activity monitor. Obviously not all of that 20GB is in the 16GB RAM.

 

What I observe is this: I open a large file on a certain sheet layer. VW starts using about 5GB of memory (again, according to Activity Monitor). It sits like that as long as I stay looking at that sheet layer. But if I then go to another sheet layer, with a lot of highly detailed viewports on it, the memory shoots up to around 20GB and I start getting problems. If I then go back to the first sheet layer, it stays at 20GB - it doesn't revert to the 5GB that it needed first time. To me this suggests that it has used some memory to show me that other sheet but has not released it, now that I don't need to look at that sheet.

At this point if I try pressing "recycle memory" on the app you link to above, nothing happens to that 20GB registered against VW. The only way I can get it to clear is to close the file and re-open.

 

 

[fips]

I believe Vectorworks is leaking memory.
Quite often when I just change the view in hidden line mode it just eats more and more memory, until I get OOM errors in Windows.

 

a minute later

 

I'm wokring on a 200 mb ifc file, each import takes 2 hours.

My vwx file is only 270 mb, the project just started.

I'm clueless how to continue, all my drivers are current.

 

Edited March 27 by fips

[line-weight]

6 hours ago, fips said:

I believe Vectorworks is leaking memory.
Quite often when I just change the view in hidden line mode it just eats more and more memory, until I get OOM errors in Windows.

 

a minute later

 

I'm wokring on a 200 mb ifc file, each import takes 2 hours.

My vwx file is only 270 mb, the project just started.

I'm clueless how to continue, all my drivers are current.

 

Is it eating memory on your HD or in RAM?

[fips]

Ram

[line-weight]

The message I am frequently getting while using VW2025 (on MacOS Sequoia) is

 

"Your system has run out of application memory"

 

I'm a little unclear whether this is a RAM problem or a lack of space on my HD (or both).

[rDesign]

6 hours ago, line-weight said:

The message I am frequently getting while using VW2025 (on MacOS Sequoia) is

 

"Your system has run out of application memory"

 

I'm a little unclear whether this is a RAM problem or a lack of space on my HD (or both).

It could be both. You should always maintain a minimum of 10% free space on your boot drive so that it can be used for virtual memory (swap), which is created when you run low on available physical RAM.

[line-weight]

On 4/1/2025 at 4:20 PM, rDesign said:

It could be both. You should always maintain a minimum of 10% free space on your boot drive so that it can be used for virtual memory (swap), which is created when you run low on available physical RAM.

Yeah, I do try and make sure I keep free space on my boot drive, which isn't enormous at 256GB.

 

I think the issue is that even if I keep 10% of that free (25GB), VW2025 will happily chew it all up as swap space and then I start getting the "run out of application memory" alerts. Sometimes I can't even do a "save as" operation.

 

Just now I have about 45GB free on my boot drive (or I did before opening VW) and I am waiting to see how much VW ends up using. So far today it has got to 22GB, according to Activity Monitor.

 

I have been running one of those RAM monitoring apps - but I don't think they can do anything about what is being put into swap memory - I can press the button in the app that recycles memory but as far as I can see, what happens it frees up a small amount in RAM (which then gets filled up again almost immediately) but it has no effect on the amount of swap memory being used.

[line-weight]

So: I have confirmed this is what happened: my HD had about 40GB free when I started a session in Vectorworks.

 

The amount of swap memory used gradually goes up and up - it's got to about 36GB and this means that in combination with other applications (using about 2GB) there is less than 2GB left on the HD and Vectorworks tells me there's not enough space on disk to save the file I'm working on (I have to go and delete a couple of backups to make it work).

 

Is that what's supposed to happen? Shouldn't VW know when it's nearly used all of the space on disk, and stop adding swap files at some point (or remove old ones)?

 

Does this count as a "memory leak" or does VW make some assumption about the amount of space it can use on my HD for swap files, some amount that is higher than what I commonly have available?