Can I Optimize My Mac to Prevent Spinning Wheel

#1

Hi everyone,

I’m Darshan Hiranandani, working on a large project in InDesign (900 pages) and experiencing constant slowdowns and the spinning wheel. It seems like my Mac isn’t handling the processing load very well.

Does anyone know of any apps or techniques to clean up and optimize my Mac’s performance when working with large InDesign files?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and solutions. Thanks!
Regards
Darshan Hiranandani

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#2

Have enough disk space on internal SSD left for RAM swapping. I’m thinking of 50GB.

If I remember* correctly InDesign has the capability to split large Projects.
Maybe that would help.

*) I moved from Adobe CS6 to Serif Affinity Suite years ago.

#3

I keep around 125 to 150 gigs free disk space on my work Mac. I do a LOT of very large format print files (but not 900 page files, Yikes!)
The other thing is RAM. While 8gigs is the minimum, 16 is recommended.
It might also matter what OS you are using and whether or not you have a mulitcore Intel processor or one of the Apple M processors.

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#4

You should split your book up into individual chapters and they would be separate files.

You then compile them in order with File New Book

This brings up a panel where you can add the chapter files.

Start with a duplicate of your document. And keep a version of it as whole until you’ve successfully done the task.

There’s many tutorials for InDesign book feature.

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#5

Yes, optimizing your Mac for working with large InDesign files can make a world of difference. Here are a few tips and tools to help:

Apps for Optimization:

  1. CleanMyMac X: A fantastic tool to remove system junk, manage startup items, and free up RAM. It’s great for keeping your Mac running smoothly.
  2. Disk Drill: Helps recover disk space by identifying large and duplicate files.
  3. Activity Monitor (Built-in): Use this to identify apps or processes consuming excessive resources and close them when not needed.

Techniques for Optimization:

  1. Increase RAM: If possible, upgrading your Mac’s RAM can significantly improve performance with large files.
  2. Optimize InDesign Preferences:
  • Turn off “Live Preflight” (Window > Output > Preflight).
  • Reduce display quality to “Typical” or “Fast” (View > Display Performance).
  • Limit the number of fonts loaded in the document.
  1. External Storage: Store large assets (like images) on an external SSD instead of your main drive to avoid overloading your system.
  2. Purge Cache: Clear InDesign’s temporary files by manually deleting them from your Library folder or using an app like CC Cleaner Tool.
#6

@deepetchservice, just a note. Your post appears to be AI-generated. The forum rules prohibit using AI to write posts.

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#7

AI overviews are often wrong. At least in some aspect of their advice.

In InDesign, I challenge anyone to work in Fast display mode in any document containing images.

When using any “Cleaner” tool, be sure to double check your parameters and be very sure about the files it is removing. You can do a lot of damage with a cleaner.

#8

With that number of pages, this book will be bound in sections of 16/24/32 pages. It makes sense to split the book into separate InDesign files - although you may have some difficulty with reflowing text across sections if they are separate files. (I’m using a pre-subscription version of InDesign).

To free up RAM I use a RAM scrubber called Memory Clean 2.

#9

Most of the time especially on documents that are dragging. I work on very large text based leaflets (A0 size) with about 8 columns of text and images anchored throughout.

InDesign no-likey - so I can turn to Fast Display and only put that on when updating/changing/swapping images - then turn it off.

It’s an option, if you’re only editing text, it can speed up InDesign.

#10

Close any unnecessary apps running in the background, as apps like Chrome, Spotify, or messaging apps can consume a lot of system resources. Also, you could try increasing the RAM allocation for InDesign in the application’s preferences, which can give the software more memory to work with.

#11

You can no longer assign Ram allocation in inDesign. Photoshop still allows it.
Depending on the OS, you might be able to optimize Ram usage (read OLD OS,) but it is totally unnecessary if using any of the Mac M chip units.

#12

When it comes to a 900 page book, or large amount of pages/data - no amount of RAM allocation, disk space, or processor speed is going to help InDesign.

Split it up into multiple files and combine it in a Book File
Turn off high quality dispaly, greek text, and reduce the display performance as much as possible

Nothing else is going to work.