Computer bogging - do I need more RAM?

[jme5343]

Running W7 on an older (two years?) Shuttle SG31G2 with a Core2 quad 6700 and 2gb ram.

The insufferable thing sometimes takes what seems like forever to perform the simplest tasks.

I check the task manager to see which process is bogging things down and things are usually at 1 or 2 % with System Idle Process at 95%. To my not-as-educated self, that tells me it's not the processor. Could be wrong though.

I could grab 4 GB of Ram for <$50, or should I just look at upgrading? The machine is primarily just for surfing, youtube and the occasional word processing or excel doc. The kids play some internet based games on disney and stuff, but I have run ad-aware and al that to ensure there isn't a bunch of junk in the background

 

[C1]

Nahhh .... save your money - forget the RAM.

My advice is to create a backup image of the OS partition.
Then start disabelling/uninstalling some of the hardware via Device Manager (eg, USB hubs) and uninstalling software applications as per intuition/suspectability (eg, newest to oldest installed). At each instance, verify the system performance. The intent is to attempt to pin point the offending driver or application. (Take the system down to as fundamental/bare bones as needed in this search.)

Once it is found, it should be possible to restore the OS partition and take appropriate action on the specific element/application causing the issue.

 

[upsdriver]

Since you're already in task manager, why not just check how much free ram you have? 2gb of ram isn't much, but it's enough for your tasks.

 

[gsaldivar]

At <$50, I would spring for the extra RAM. That simple upgrade has a good chance of completely solving the lag issue and is probably worth far less than the hours of hassle in trying to optimize the system to work with only 2GB...

 

[LagunaX]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007611%20600006042%20600006066&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=20

$40 free shipping ddr2 800.

Win 7 already uses a lot of ram and ram is cheap if you want to squeeze a little more life out of your aging system.

But I am still amazed on how fast and cheap an i3-2100/h61 or h67 matx/4-8gb ddr3 upgrade is (can be had for less than $200!).

 

[Charlie98]

Also, if you are going to try to eliminate some processes, I would start with your anti-virus software... my business laptop was fairly gagging under McAfee and one of it's processes, once I nuked it (I actually just uninstalled it, I switched to Norton) the computer instantly sped up.

Also, I recently upgraded the HDD and put a clean install of XP on it, and a minimal amount of drivers... no Dell bloatware. 6 years of programs, trash, and websurfing really wadded up the poor thing... now it's back to it's old self. Although it's a bit of an endeavor, a fresh OS install isn't a bad thing...

 

[LagunaX]

Yeah I'd install and run the following:
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/standard
http://www.iobit.com/advancedsystemcareper.html
http://www.iobit.com/iobitsmartdefrag.html

 

[VirtualLarry]

Running W7 on an older (two years?) Shuttle SG31G2 with a Core2 quad 6700 and 2gb ram.

The insufferable thing sometimes takes what seems like forever to perform the simplest tasks.

I check the task manager to see which process is bogging things down and things are usually at 1 or 2 % with System Idle Process at 95%. To my not-as-educated self, that tells me it's not the processor. Could be wrong though.

I could grab 4 GB of Ram for <$50, or should I just look at upgrading? The machine is primarily just for surfing, youtube and the occasional word processing or excel doc. The kids play some internet based games on disney and stuff, but I have run ad-aware and al that to ensure there isn't a bunch of junk in the background

That sounds like something is wrong.

When you looked in Task Manager, did you check off (enable) "Show Kernel Times"?

That can sometimes spike up due to drivers.

Also, when checking the CPU time under Processes, make sure to click "Show Processes from All Users".

 

[jme5343]

Thanks all. I'll try some of the suggestions next time it bogs.

 

[Matt1970]

Yeah I'd install and run the following:
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/standard
http://www.iobit.com/advancedsystemcareper.html
http://www.iobit.com/iobitsmartdefrag.html

Excellent suggestions. I use them all the time on customers machines.

 

[Binky]

You could always make an image of the OS, then completely reinstall Win7. On that system, this shouldn't take more than an hour or so, and most of that time doesn't require interaction (i.e. start it, go make lunch).

If its much faster with fresh Win7, you can just reinstall your programs and pull documents/data as needed from the image. If its no faster, just restore the image.