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| Thread ID: 26784 | 2002-11-05 07:46:00 | Review of this RAM clutter FAQ please | roofus (483) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 96167 | 2002-11-05 07:46:00 | Has your computer become gradually slower and slower? Have you run defrag and scandisk but this made no difference? A computers response time to tasks commonly degrade the longer you have the computer. The primary reason for this is RAM clutter. RAM clutter is RAM used up by programmes that you have installed and have attached themselves to the boot sequence. This allows the programme to load up quicker when you want it however it scarifies overall system performance. RAM is used by programmes as they load themselves up to help with the exchange of data from the hard drive to the CPU. So the more RAM you have available the more programmes you can have open at the same time without degrading overall response times. When you run out of RAM your operating system will use virtual memory this is hard disk space that is set aside and pretends to be RAM (hence allowing you to open more applications). A hard disk can transfer information to the CPU at only a fraction of the speed of RAM. So naturally the smaller amount of RAM you have, the quicker you will experience a sacrifice in performance. As explained RAM clutter lowers the amount of RAM available and hence the virtual memory is used within a shorter time. By removing some of this clutter we ensure the computer can open more applications before system performance degrades. The Solution To remove RAM clutter first inspect the applications you have in your taskbar. Are they all required to be there? Do you need that specific application to be able to load up quickly? Common applications that reside in the taskbar that don’t really need to be their include any Real player software, instant messaging software, unnecessary system utilities. To remove them open up the application and search for the “options” or “preferences” within there you should be able to find a “load at startup” button, disable this, press ok to everything and its done. If you can’t find this button load up msconfig. Do so by going to the start-menu --> Run and type in “msconfig”. Go along to the “Startup” tab. In here it shows all the applications that are loaded at startup. Disable any that are not needed. Some of these names are obscure to decide if you need them check out This helpful link (www.pacs-portal.co.uk) The registry is also the management centre for windows. Invalid information in the registry slows your computer also. If you have nortons utilities use windoctor to fix these problems. Otherwise check out Regcleaner (www.vtoy.fi) to solve your problems. Spyware on a computer is used by companies to send information about your actions. Naturally you don’t know it is installed. It is always installed into memory so that activities can be watched. Check out this link (http://www.lavasoft.de) for ad-aware. This will remove these nasty little critters, hopefully resulting in a performance boost. There are many factors which influence the likely hood of performance degradation but RAM clutter is definitely a major cause. A rule of thumb for Windows operating system is 64MB will get things loaded up for Windows 9x, but it won’t take long at all (maybe a few internet explorer windows) until you run out of RAM and are onto using virtual memory. I recommend a minimum of 128MB for Windows 9x and recommend 256MB. For Windows XP 256MB is the recommended minimum with 512MB or 384MB being the preferred option. RAM is relatively cheap these days and can result in a significant performance boost to your system. For this reason it is sometimes referred to the cheap upgrade. roofusÓ |
roofus (483) | ||
| 96168 | 2002-11-05 08:10:00 | Hi... I use a RAM cleaning program - FreeRam XP Pro that you set to free up RAM at set intervals or manually and it does the job well... |
Kahawai_Chaser (166) | ||
| 96169 | 2002-11-05 19:52:00 | Just posting to get back to the top of the page. Kawawai re: your ram cleaning programme Those things such. They just purge the ram, putting most stuff onto your virtual memory which generally ends up slowing you down even more. |
roofus (483) | ||
| 96170 | 2002-11-06 00:18:00 | It would be good to have a FAQ on this topic. Have you considered adding a note about ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1 in [386Enh] of system.ini for Win98 OS. This forces ram to be used before swap file if there is enough ram. Agree that ram free-er uppers dont do much good if you have enough ram, as you say it goes into the swap file. The aim should be to keep the swap file size -> zero as far as possible. |
Terry Porritt (14) | ||
| 96171 | 2002-11-06 00:29:00 | Good point Terry. I will add that too it. | roofus (483) | ||
| 96172 | 2002-11-06 00:31:00 | Most of them sit in RAM themselves, kinda defeats the idea of freeing up ram if you ask me. SD-RAM is EXTREMELY cheaps now. 128MB being about $40, and the performance boost that'll give any PC with less than 128MB would be VERY noticable! Especially NT-Based systems, and PC's that have higher Mhz speed need more RAM to keep up with the play. I did a test not too long ago, a P75Mhz with 64MB RAM vs a 120Mhz with 48MB RAM. Guess which one on boot times, prog loading, which did better in word proccessing and even had higher frame-rate in games (Both using the same Graphics Card). It was the P75! Just goes to show, that more ram beats the higher proccessor speed! |
Chilling_Silence (9) | ||
| 96173 | 2002-11-06 01:05:00 | I'd also recommend making sure that you don't have adware/spyware running on your system (although they shouldn't chew up to much memory). Use AdAdware to get rid of this software crud. |
gibler (49) | ||
| 96174 | 2002-11-06 04:43:00 | There is a nice little utility that doesnt take up much in the way of resources or memory called Swap File Reporter. It's useful for monitoring the swap file size as one plays with memory defraggers, or amount of ram, loading up multiple programs etc. It can be downloaded from here (sac-ftp.externet.hu) as swapfile1.zip, only 27KB. I dont have any adverse criticisms of your FAQ roofus, go for it! |
Terry Porritt (14) | ||
| 96175 | 2002-11-06 04:44:00 | err.....swpfile1.zip | Terry Porritt (14) | ||
| 96176 | 2002-11-06 05:05:00 | Yea, i don't think i will add in any more mention of different utilities. I want to keep it as basic as possible. If someone wishes to explore further it easy enough for them to ask within the forum themselves, or they may take initiative and search the archives | roofus (483) | ||
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