Resolving Memory Issues & Errors

This page lists a range of strategies to address any memory issues you may encounter using Hero Desktop such as Out of Memory Errors.

We are always working on improving the memory performance of Hero but if the solutions below do not resolve your memory error, then please contact Hero Support

Hero’s Biggest Memory Users: Background Images & Simulation Results

Users should know that the two typical largest consumers of memory within Hero are Background Images & Simulation Results. These can typically take upwards of 80% of Hero’s memory use and while we are working on solutions to further minimise these, if you are having memory issues it is likely related to one of these two elements.

Causes & Possible Solutions to Out of Memory Errors

If you have encountered an Out of Memory Error within Hero, this may be due to:

Cause	Details

Cause	Details
Background Image Quality Settings too High	Background Images are typically the highest user of memory within Hero. Possible Solutions: Reduce the Background Image Quality settings within the Settings for your project to the lowest setting that still produces legible background images. Note changing the Background Image Quality setting does NOT effect existing background images only newly imported images so you wil need to re-import background images to improve a Project’s memory performance. You will be required to delete the existing background images (and if you are really having memory issues you may need to delete all background images, save the Hero file and restart Hero) and then re-import your background images using the new BackgroundImage quality settings.
Hero running for long periods or loading many projects continually	Software applications that run for long periods of time can sometimes consume additional memory (via memory leaks not being released back to the system) Possible Solutions: Restarting Hero and reloading your project will clear your memory & start with a clean application.
Insufficient Physical Memory	Insufficient physical memory on your computer. Possible Solutions: While the minimum memory requirements for Hero are at least 4gb, we recommend at least 8gb and even 16gb particularly for large multi-dwelling modelling projects.
32-bit Hero Installer used	A 32-bit computer architecture limits the maximum memory use of Hero. Possible Solutions: While Hero provides a 32-bit installer, we strongly recommend 64-bit operating systems are used to maximise the available memory use.
Insufficient Memory Allocated to Hero Virtual Machine	Hero by default requests a maximum of 50% of the available memory on your device. You can amend this maximum percentage if you would like to allow Hero further system resources. Note this is only the MAXIMUM memory use and not the typical memory use. If Hero does not require this memory it won’t use it all up to the maximum but it can make Hero slightly more “memory hungry” by assuming there is more memory available for its use. Possible Solutions - Advanced Users Only: You can allocate a greater maximum memory for the Hero Virtual Machine by changing the -Xmx variable within the Hero.vmoptions file located within your Hero installed directory. This variable is in megabytes and will be in a format `-Xmx8137m` (ie 8gb allocated for a 16gb machine). You could change this and restart Hero to give Hero the new maximum value. It would be worth backing up your Hero.vmoptions file so that you can always revert to the default.
Other Solutions	In extreme situations (such as for low memory machines or extremely large projects) it may be worth considering using Background Images and then discarding them (ie deleting them) so that they don’t consume system resources. This strategy may need to be combined with the solutions outlined above of Restarting Hero after background images have been deleted so that Hero can reallocate & refresh its memory use.