Firefox Cache
To disable the the Firefox cache on the disk (SSD) and move it to your RAM, follow these steps:
- Go to
about:configand setbrowser.cache.disk.enabletofalse - as well as
browser.cache.memory.enabletotrue.
You can check what the cache is doing by going to about:cache
Set the noatime option on the root filesystem
You can run the following script on the terminal (don't forget to make it executable beforehand using chmod +x AlwaysMountRootFSWithNoatime_MacOSX.sh) or copy it to your Terminal line by line (not recommended):
After running this script once (you need to enter your password), reboot.
Move /private/tmp, /var/run (not /var/db) to a ram disk
After running this script once (you need to enter your password), reboot.
To check if are actually using the ram disk, run the command mount in the Terminal.app where the output should contain something like
/dev/disk2 on /private/tmp (hfs, local, union, nobrowse) /dev/disk3 on /private/var/run (hfs, local, union, nobrowse)
You can also run hdiutil info and get an output like this:
framework : 289 driver : 10.6v289 images : 4 ================================================ image-path : ram://524288 shadow-path : <none> icon-path : <none> image-type : <unknown> system-image : TRUE blockcount : 524288 blocksize : <unknown> writeable : TRUE autodiskmount : false removable : TRUE image-encrypted : <false> mounting user : root mounting mode : <unknown> process ID : <in-kernel> /dev/disk2 /private/tmp ================================================ image-path : ram://131072 shadow-path : <none> icon-path : <none> image-type : <unknown> system-image : TRUE blockcount : 131072 blocksize : <unknown> writeable : TRUE autodiskmount : false removable : TRUE image-encrypted : <false> mounting user : root mounting mode : <unknown> process ID : <in-kernel> /dev/disk3 /private/var/run
Disable Hibernation and delete the RAM image file
Every time your Mac is sent to sleep, it could store the content of your RAM in the file /var/vm/sleepimage. To prevent this and disable hibernation, do:
sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 0 sudo rm /var/vm/sleepimage
Disable waking up when LID opens
sudo pmset -a lidwake 0
Disabling Sudden Motion Sensor (If you don't have any HDD left in your Mac)
sudo pmset -a sms 0
To check all the changes made using pmset, run:
pmset -g
Disable the swap files (virtual memory)
Paging is handled by a daemon called dynamic_pager. Turn this off with launchctl. I did not test the following, but it seems to be OK, to do it:
sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.dynamic_pager.plist # reboot: sudo shutdown -r now
resources
- "Mac OS X SSD tweaks": http://blogs.nullvision.com/?p=275
- and the newer "Mac OS X SSD tweaks revised": http://blogs.nullvision.com/?p=357
- OSX SSD Terminal Tweaks + Other Tweaks Applied: http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?62354
- Turning swap off: http://superuser.com/questions/261825/how-to-stop-swap-process-in-os-x