I know, the activity monitor is a bit confusing. The "Memory" column reflects the total memory used (memory plus compressed memory). Technically, the amount of ram (of 32gb) being used at any given moment is at the bottom of the screen where it says "memory used". Sometimes it gets close to 32, but never seems to reach 32. And the "memory pressure" gauge doesnt show much happening there, so its hard for me to believe that im having a memory problem. Ill try making a smaller test file with fewer participants and see what happens.