Freeing up memory

billy the squid

Does anyone know how I can:

a) find out which programmes are eating up memory preventing me from playing mp3s on my PC
b) Find out which programes do not need to be running in the background.

I have recently installed the following

Windows xp service pack 2
Window media player 10. I dont think windows media player is the problem because I have also got musicmatch pro and the music stutters along in that too.

Virus scanner Norton Antivirus

Firewall Kerio. Personal Firewall

MSN and Yahoo are installed on the computer but they are set to only load when I want them to. They dont come on at start up.

I have turned off the Windows firewall as Kerio is doing the job of the firewall so that freed up some memory.

I have 256 MB of RAM on this machine

There are a big load of processes listed when i do a CTRL+ALT+Del and I dont know really which ones I should get rid of. or how to stop the unnecessary ones from starting up when I turn the computer on.

Any advice would be appreciated.

edit: I have done defrags and disk clean up irun Spybot search and destroy and adaware, still dont know what it is.

I am of the opinion that it is a combination of SP2 and Windows media player 10 but my finger is pointing at SP2

aidan_walsh

It doesn't do everything (read anything) you specify, but I use RAMpage to monitor the amount of RAM used and free up whats unnecessarily taken up when it falls below a certain threshold.

The default values reflect its age a little, and its as ugly as sin, but it does the job well enough, and is pretty lightweight itself.

billy the squid

What setting would you recommend doodle. 4 MB seems a bit low for a default setting.

Standard Toaster

You've run msconfig? (start/run/msconfig)

Clear the muck from the startup tab. No matter what you untick you won't 'break' anyting. Give it a reboot after and compare.

billy the squid

But I have an always on connection I would need the firewall to start wouldn't I and the virus scanner at least.

I have run msconfig before but anything that would be in the Symatec folder or kerio folder I would leave alone.

Standard Toaster

I'm the same as you.....XP Pro SP2. 256mb RAM....broadband too.
i just did a reboot and with Zonealarm, AVG and MSN messenger running I'm using 176mb of ram approx. Probably one or two other things running but nothing major. Check the services tab in msconfig too for any non-MS apps running.

billy the squid

I did a restart and thanks to the program that Doodle Sketch suggested I have 86 mb free, but the virus scanner is off. The firewall is up though. Norton seems to have been the culprit .

Standard Toaster

I got 92mb free using that nifty little app. Handy so it is

billy the squid

yeah i got windows media player mozilla firefox running will try it out with norton running on my next reboot, oh yeah i have kerio running also.

will rep you doodle sketch when i regain the ability to do so again, and you to edge for the msconfig thing. was worried about what i could uncheck in that

aidan_walsh

billy the squid wrote:

What setting would you recommend doodle. 4 MB seems a bit low for a default setting.

4MB is indeed far too little for this day and age. By rule of thumb I try not to let the total RAM free fall below a quarter of the installed value, and its set to try to regain half that value again.

For example, my system of 512MB, I have it set to recover 64MB when it falls below 128MB.

Standard Toaster

So with someone with 256mb of system memory you might set it to recover 32MB when it falls below 64MB?