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Adding up memory being used

N

Neos

Senior member
If I add up the memory being used for each process in Task Manager - does that tell me how much ram I have left? It totals up 152,320K used. I have 256 Mg of ram installed.

Does that mean that I am functioning on a bit more than 100 Mg of ram? Maybe that is the reason I am having slowdown problems?

Andrew in AL
 
Only using 150M of 256M will not cause slowdowns.

There's no good way to add up how much memory's being used. The only real gauge is the "Available" memory number on the "Performance" tab of taskmgr.
 
Duh ...now why did I not look there?😱

I am just trying to figure out why this pc will be so slow at times. I just finished a total reload, and all was going well. Then I loaded one more program - and it seemed to be up to it's old tricks.

I was hoping that it would be as simple as adding more mem.

Andrew in AL
 
Windows will try to use all RAM available. If you have RAM that is currently not being used Windows will retain code in memory of recently closed applications so faster operation if the application is used again. Windows actually manages memory very well. As for your slowdown problem. Did you check for viruses and/or spyware? That would be your first step.
 
What you mention may be part of the problem. I had set a specific amount of page file. It was always a good deal to do that with 95 & 98SE ...
maybe not so much with XP Pro.
I have set it back to let the OS handle it.
 
No, no, no. It is completly false.

Windows has a dynamic way of handling memory resources.

For example, if you have 256Mb of RAM, it will, at most, use 180Mb. Should you have, however, say 512Mb, then your peak level would usually be 450Mb used.

Windows loves memory. It really does. Try adding as much memory possible. 512Mb is the sweet spot, 768Mb is great... and 1024Mb, as many of us have, is simply a luxury tending to a tad overkill.

Cheers.
 
Originally posted by: KoolDrew
Windows will try to use all RAM available. If you have RAM that is currently not being used Windows will retain code in memory of recently closed applications so faster operation if the application is used again. Windows actually manages memory very well. As for your slowdown problem. Did you check for viruses and/or spyware? That would be your first step.
Click to expand...

Not really. Check your task manager. I know when I run windows with 1 GB of ram it may use 250 MB of ram and 220 MB of my page file. WTF does it use 220 MB of slow swap when there's 750 MB of free ram?

Linux on the other hand is much different.

Used memory: 281 of 1010 MB
Used swap: 0 of 981 MB
 
Not really. Check your task manager. I know when I run windows with 1 GB of ram it may use 250 MB of ram and 220 MB of my page file. WTF does it use 220 MB of slow swap when there's 750 MB of free ram?
Click to expand...

Because taskmgr is stupid and is lying to you. That 220M of PF Usage is really just pagefile reservations, no real I/O has been done to the pagefile yet and there won't be any unless memory gets tight.
 
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