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Thread ID: 59027 2005-06-19 08:06:00 XP & switching Users - hogging RAM sigmeister (8223) Press F1
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365246 2005-06-19 08:06:00 I run XP Home (w SP2 & all updates), 40Gb HDD, 512 Mb RAM, Zone Alarm, Nortons System Works 2004, ADSL, 64Mb Nvidia graphics.
When we switch Users, we experience an extreme slowing down on the new User logon (causing us to hard-boot). I'm fairly confident it's a RAM problem, in that RAM is being hogged somewhere.
I've also tried diagnosing in Task Manager. Biggest processes are explorer.exe (43K), salm.exe (31k), svchost.exe (26k). These don't look like big hoggers to me....
I've run some small utilities that auto-free RAM. The only good most of them do is tell me that my RAM is getting below 5Mb free, after I've switched Users.
Does anybody have any tweak settings that can remedy this? I've also run XP Powertoys - no help.
It's OK if we log off user, rather than switch user, but we never used to have this problem before, which makes me think I may have tweaked something too much....
Cheers
sigmeister (8223)
365247 2005-06-19 08:14:00 Looks like salm.exe is spyware, or part of 180Search Assistant

Get hijackthis and post a log here.

I would say its this www.pcreview.co.uk

Get adaware or Spybot and do a scan. See if either remove it.

Or see if the tool here removes it

sarc.com
Speedy Gonzales (78)
365248 2005-06-20 11:12:00 Yep, that was it. I'd previously tried to get rid of Search Assistant 180 via Control Panel Add/Remove, but that never worked, so I just forgot about it...... Finally got rid of it using that utility download from Nortons, many thanks.
I also ran Spybot and Adaware (how come these programs always miss adware that the other one seems to pick up, and vice versa...??), and cleaned out another 60 or so bits and pieces.
Seems to be ok now.

Thanks for the advice Speedy.

Rgds
sigmeister (8223)
365249 2005-06-20 11:28:00 No worries Sig HTH :)

Good to hear its fixed .

Yup adware and spybot are good for some spyware/malware .

I wouldnt rely on either to pick everything up tho .

Are you using 1 . 06 SE of Adaware and 1 . 4 I think it is now of Spybot??

I use Xoftspy, which isn't free, and Trojan remover myself, along with Nortons Internet Security . They seem to do the trick for me .
Speedy Gonzales (78)
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