Desktop heap in windows 7 and the ability to run a large number of programs simu

I currently have an HP Pavillion computer: windows vista premium; 64 bit quad 4 processor; 8 gb of ram. When I have a large number of IE windows open (over 100) after a period of time my computer develops graphics problems and I get out of resource error messeges from other programs running. This occurs even though I am only using half of the 8 gb ram I have. I have to shut down some processes to fix the problem. I did some research and this may have to do with desktop heap failure. I have the setting for destop heap set to the maximum recommended for windows vista 64k bit. Is Windows 7 any better at handling desktop heap and therefore can allow more programs to run simutanously?

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not sure, but had to ask why would you have over a hundred ie windows open.

side note
firefox uses less resources perhaps a simple browser switch can fix your problem

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------------------------------ E8400 : GA-EP35-DS3L : mushkin 4GB DDR2 800 : HD 2600PRO : 450W ATX12V : Windows 7
Reply to 505090

johninsacramento wrote :

I currently have an HP Pavillion computer: windows vista premium; 64 bit quad 4 processor; 8 gb of ram. When I have a large number of IE windows open (over 100) after a period of time my computer develops graphics problems and I get out of resource error messeges from other programs running. This occurs even though I am only using half of the 8 gb ram I have. I have to shut down some processes to fix the problem. I did some research and this may have to do with desktop heap failure. I have the setting for destop heap set to the maximum recommended for windows vista 64k bit. Is Windows 7 any better at handling desktop heap and therefore can allow more programs to run simutanously?

Can't help you with respect to the Win 7 situation, but this article describes how to increase the size of the desktop heap if you're running into it's limitations...

Reply to sminlal

I wonder if it could be to do with you running out of video memory. Each window takes up a bit of your video memory, though I think it only happens if you are running Aero. So if you have too many windows open, it could well be that your video card has ran out of memory, which is why you are getting those graphical problems.

What graphics hardware do you have installed?

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Reply to Lippy13

johninsacramento wrote :

Is Windows 7 any better at handling desktop heap and therefore can allow more programs to run simutanously?

Yah - Per the following: http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/archive/2 [...] mance.aspx

johninsacramento wrote :

I currently have an HP Pavillion
computer: windows vista premium; 64 bit quad 4 processor; 8 gb of ram. When I have a large number of IE windows open (over 100) after a period of time my computer develops graphics problems and I get out of resource error messeges from other programs running. This occurs even though I am only using half of the 8 gb ram I have.

You're running out because 32 bit apps can still only take advantage of (up to) 4GB worth of address space.

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Message edited by Scotteq on 07-16-2009 at 01:49:07 PM

------------------------------ Which Chip? Well, it depends on which set of thieving b@stardz you choose to support: The ones who use insider trading to enrich themselves while running their company into the ground, or the ones who illegally pay vendors to not support the first group.
Reply to Scotteq

505090 wrote :

not sure, but had to ask why would you have over a hundred ie windows open.

side note
firefox uses less resources perhaps a simple browser switch can fix your problem

I do medical research and I open many web pages and keep them open. I use IE 8 without add-ons. I can open many more web pages without add-ons.

Reply to johninsacramento

Lippy13 wrote :

I wonder if it could be to do with you running out of video memory. Each window takes up a bit of your video memory, though I think it only happens if you are running Aero. So if you have too many windows open, it could well be that your video card has ran out of memory, which is why you are getting those graphical problems.

What graphics hardware do you have installed?

I have a NVDIA 9500 GS with 512 mb ram. I am not using Aero.

Reply to johninsacramento

Scotteq wrote :

Yah - Per the following: http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/archive/2 [...] mance.aspx

You're running out because 32 bit apps can still only take advantage of (up to) 4GB worth of address space.

I see nothing in the article you linked to that talks about changes to the allocations for session state or the desktop heap.

And the 4GB limit in 32-bit systems has nothing to do with the limit on the desktop heap. If you look at the article I linked to above you'll see that by default the heap for each session is well under 1MB in size. You can increase it through the registry settings mentioned in the article.

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Reply to sminlal

sminlal wrote :

I see nothing in the article you linked to that talks about changes to the allocations for session state or the desktop heap.

And the 4GB limit in 32-bit systems has nothing to do with the limit on the desktop heap. If you look at the article I linked to above you'll see that by default the heap for each session is well under 1MB in size. You can increase it through the registry settings mentioned in the article.

I have the desktop heap setting set to the highest levels recommended by Microsoft. When you open numberous applications (each instance of IE is an application) you can exhaust Desktop heap. I have read that numerous problems can occur: starting more applications will not start; getting out of memory errors etc. This seems to occur even though you have lots of Ram still available. In my case I seem to be getting graphics problems.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/947246

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Reply to johninsacramento

johninsacramento wrote :

I have the desktop heap setting set to the highest levels recommended by Microsoft. When you open numberous applications (each instance of IE is an application) you can exhaust Desktop heap.

Don't take this as gospel, but I suspect you're running into an architectural limitation. I wouldn't hold out a great deal of hope for higher limits in Windows 7 - it's a lot more like Vista than Vista is like XP.

Do you really have separate IE *windows* open? If desktop heap is the issue then you might be able to get more web pages up by opening them in tabs instead of windows. Or perhaps a combination of fewer windows with more tabs in each window...

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Reply to sminlal

sminlal wrote :

Don't take this as gospel, but I suspect you're running into an architectural limitation. I wouldn't hold out a great deal of hope for higher limits in Windows 7 - it's a lot more like Vista than Vista is like XP.

Do you really have separate IE *windows* open? If desktop heap is the issue then you might be able to get more web pages up by opening them in tabs instead of windows. Or perhaps a combination of fewer windows with more tabs in each window...

Yes I open about 10-15 tabs per window. From the little bit of research I have done it appears that there is a limit on how many processes you can run under Vista. You can still have plenty of ram memory left. In fact when I have about 100 IE tabs/windows (mostly tabs) open I still have 50% ram left. It seems to me that the limitation on the number of running processes you can have should be determined by available ram memory/virtual memory and not on the number of processes you have running. I was hoping that in windows 7 that the limit on the number of processes you can have running would be increased. I understand that "desktop heap" limits the number of processes you can run simutaneously. A user here and a tech at Fry's electronics mentioned 32 bit applications like IE would not be able to open more IE processes (more tabs/windows) once it has reached 4 gb of address space. However, this can't be my problem because when I have the problems with all of my running programs (graphics related). I get error messages (out of resources) from other running processes like word when I only have 1 single file of word running.

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Reply to johninsacramento

You could check if it is a problem with 32bit IE by using the 64bit version. It should already be installed on your system but if not you can download it from microsoft. It seems to be a bit more stable than the 32bit version for me, though it doesn't support flash so that might mean it's of less use to you.

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Reply to ragsmaloy

ragsmaloy wrote :

You could check if it is a problem with 32bit IE by using the 64bit version. It should already be installed on your system but if not you can download it from microsoft. It seems to be a bit more stable than the 32bit version for me, though it doesn't support flash so that might mean it's of less use to you.

The problem I am having can be more generically described like this: suppose you want to run a large number of applications: games; lots of word files; Internet Explorer, Firefox etc. You have 50% Ram memory remaining, yet you get out of resources errors and your applications don't display correctly and your graphics are all garbled and jumbling all over the screen. You are forced to close some applications (some IE tabs or word files etc) and most of the problems are fixed. Graphics in Firefox, if open, are not fixed by closing down some processes (I have to close it and restart it after the problems start).

Hypothetically if the problem involved using up all the 4 gb address space of a 32 bit application such as IE 32 bit how does this affect all my other programs. I understand that maybe IE 32 bit would malfunction, but should word 32 bit also be affected ( when I only have 1 file open for it - I am not exhausting it's 4 gb address space). After all I still have 50 % RAM left - I have 8 GB RAM total).

Reply to johninsacramento

John,

I'm not sure this is the proper place to access the technical detailia needed to answer/fix your issue. I'd like to direct you to:

http://social.technet.microsoft.co [...] ry/w7itpro

Or perhaps http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/F [...] categories

------------------------------ Which Chip? Well, it depends on which set of thieving b@stardz you choose to support: The ones who use insider trading to enrich themselves while running their company into the ground, or the ones who illegally pay vendors to not support the first group.
Reply to Scotteq

The problem is you don't have 4GB per process, you have 4GB TOTAL. Each process is actually limited to 2GB, not 4GB. So one IE window with a lot of tabs open could theoretically exhaust that 2GB very quickly. Even with 64-bit Windows, each 32-bit process is limited to 2GB... the only difference is that they aren't limited to 2GB below the first 4GB.

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------------------------------ Desktop: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Intel Q6600 CPU; E-VGA 780i SLI motherboard; E-VGA E-GeForce 8800GT; OCZ Vista 4GB dual-channel kit; Ultra X2 750W power supply; 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB in RAID 0. Laptop: Acer Aspire 8730-6314;
Reply to Zoron

johninsacramento wrote :

It seems to me that the limitation on the number of running processes you can have should be determined by available ram memory/virtual memory and not on the number of processes you have running.

The problem is that the 4GB of RAM isn't the only limitation. There are a lot of other resources in the system that are required to support every process, such as handles, message queues, virtual memory page table entries, etc. etc.

The designers have chosen a configuration they believe will work for most people, but I suspect that what you're trying to do is simply beyond what they've allowed for.

If simple browsing is your primary need, you might consider looking into a Linux solution. I couldn't tell you for sure that you'd be able to open more windows, but the open-source systems by their nature tend to be more flexible and even if a stock installation couldn't do what you want there's a pretty good chance you could find a way to do it.

Reply to sminlal

Zoron wrote :

The problem is you don't have 4GB per process, you have 4GB TOTAL. Each process is actually limited to 2GB, not 4GB. So one IE window with a lot of tabs open could theoretically exhaust that 2GB very quickly. Even with 64-bit Windows, each 32-bit process is limited to 2GB... the only difference is that they aren't limited to 2GB below the first 4GB.

Actually, none of these statements are true...

An application process has access to 4GB of virtual space which is normally split as 2GB for the program and 2GB for the system, but can be adjusted to 3GB for the program and 1GB for the system using the "/3GB" boot option.

The TOTAL amount of virtual address space for all processes is whatever RAM you have plus the size of all your pagefiles. Since pagefiles can be a maximum of 4GB, and since you can have up to 16 pagefiles, this means you can have up to 64GB (plus RAM size) of virtual address space allocated. In reality you'd likely run out of virtual memory PTEs (Page Table Entries) long before you were able to allocate that much space.

In 64-bit Windows, a 32-bit process actually has access to the entire 4GB of 32-bit virtual address space because the system resides in the upper portion of 64-bit address space.

See this PDF article for more details.

Reply to sminlal

Ok.. so I misunderstood things I've read then. Thanks for the correction.

------------------------------ Desktop: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Intel Q6600 CPU; E-VGA 780i SLI motherboard; E-VGA E-GeForce 8800GT; OCZ Vista 4GB dual-channel kit; Ultra X2 750W power supply; 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB in RAID 0. Laptop: Acer Aspire 8730-6314;
Reply to Zoron

So does Windows 7 and Vista have a limit on the number of processes that can run regardless of the amount of Ram memory/virtual memory. So if I increased my Ram memory to 128 GB would I still have the same problems?

Can't my available Ram be ued to meet the graphics needs of my system. Even though I have 4 GB RAm free can't this be used for graphics?

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Reply to johninsacramento

johninsacramento wrote :

Can't my available Ram be ued to meet the graphics needs of my system. Even though I have 4 GB RAm free can't this be used for graphics?

The problem is it takes memory to manage memory. It's kind of like a disk drive - when you format a disk drive you find that some of the space is not available for file storage - that space is used for the directories that identify the files, tracks where they are, and maps the used and free space on the drive.

Memory is the same, but memory management is complicated by the fact that every application can have MORE addresses than the actual RAM you have, as well as share the same system addresses, some of which aren't allowed to be moved out of physical RAM, etc. etc. I'm not an expert at this, but I appreciate the fact that the designers have to make tradeoffs when they implement these things and they try to strike a balance that works for both low-end and high-end systems.

If I can make a very crude analogy, it's kind of like asking why can't I build a 10-mile-high building since there's plenty of vertical space available on my lot. It's true that there's a lot of space up there, but to make use of it is not necessarily an easy task.

Here's an MSDN article that describes the virtual and physical address space limitations on various versions of windows: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778(VS.85).aspx. This isn't directly related to the desktop heap issue, but it makes interesting reading (IMHO)

Reply to sminlal

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Desktop heap in windows 7 and the ability to run a large number of programs simu

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