Is this normal???

[rabidbunny]

I have a Dell 4550 with a total of 1280mb system ram. I have noticed lately that I only have about 800mb left. I have ez firewall and antivirus, along with volume and a small printer icon. So what could be hogging up all that memory? I know Windows doesn't need over 256 JUST for the os cuz I had my 256 chip in there and there was about 60mb left.....

Any help and/or suggestions would be great!!

 

[sdrawkcaBgoD]

All your other processes in the background. Open up task manager (ctrl+alt+del) and check out the things you have running. Windows loves to use as much RAM as it can for every active process, evn if it will never be used. It's entirely normal.

 

[The_Prophecy]

All your other processes in the background. Open up task manager (ctrl+alt+del) and check out the things you have running. Windows loves to use as much RAM as it can for every active process, if even it will never be used. It's entirely normal.

sdrawkcaBgoD is right... Windows LOVES ram... it's sad and unfortunate, but true.

 

[JesterX]

All your other processes in the background. Open up task manager (ctrl+alt+del) and check out the things you have running. Windows loves to use as much RAM as it can for every active process, if even it will never be used. It's entirely normal.

sdrawkcaBgoD is right... Windows LOVES ram... it's sad and unfortunate, but true.

Well, get a Mac, OS X loves RAM + a few GBs of SWAP.

 

[rabidbunny]

I checked every single process on google and found everything to be normal. No adware etc... but should just windows itself take up that much?? or is it just me??

 

[sdrawkcaBgoD]

It's not really the Windows OS itself that's using your RAM. It's kinda the Windows way of pre-caching things. It's to ensure that the processes you have running have RAM available should they ever be called on to actually do anything. So, you say you have about 800 MB left, right? Well, if you start a memory-hungry app that requires let's say 900 MB of RAM to run at its fullest, then Windows will start pulling the used RAM from the other processes that aren't even using it. Essentially, the theory behind it is if you have it, use it. It will in no way affect any program that should arise that would actually require it. It's a "be prepared' kinda thing.

 

[htoonthura]

I have a Dell 4550 with a total of 1280mb system ram. I have noticed lately that I only have about 800mb left. I have ez firewall and antivirus, along with volume and a small printer icon. So what could be hogging up all that memory? I know Windows doesn't need over 256 JUST for the os cuz I had my 256 chip in there and there was about 60mb left.....

Any help and/or suggestions would be great!!

hello

Just add more memory. Memory sticks are cheaper than before. I do not think you need not be worried about it. If that is not possible, just increase the page file size.

Thura.

 

[sdrawkcaBgoD]

He doesn't need more memory. His memory size is fine. And as for increasing his pagefile size... well, that's absolutely unnecessary. His system is fine and running just the way it's supposed to. Increasing onboard RAM will make no difference whatsoever for this situation.

 

[rabidbunny]

Just add more memory. Memory sticks are cheaper than before. I do not think you need not be worried about it. If that is not possible, just increase the page file size.

Well, my pc doesn't or at least shouldn't support any more ram than what's in there now. It origionally was only supposed to have 2x512 mb chips, but I got a Gb stick and left the 256 in there and it worked too. So I think that I could increase it to 2gb according to the motherboard specs, but I won't be doing any more gaming on this Dell, cuz im going to build my own rig. So it won't matter much anyway.

And as far as the pagefile goes, it is set to right around 1gb to 2gb. That is PLENTY.

It's not really the Windows OS itself that's using your RAM. It's kinda the Windows way of pre-caching things. It's to ensure that the processes you have running have RAM available should they ever be called on to actually do anything. So, you say you have about 800 MB left, right? Well, if you start a memory-hungry app that requires let's say 900 MB of RAM to run at its fullest, then Windows will start pulling the used RAM from the other processes that aren't even using it. Essentially, the theory behind it is if you have it, use it. It will in no way affect any program that should arise that would actually require it. It's a "be prepared' kinda thing.

That is exactly the type of help I was looking for. Thank you sdrawkcaBgoD!!!

 

[sdrawkcaBgoD]

I got your back, bro.