Computer memory

[frazhm]

I have a P3 450mhz Win 98 with 64 mb ram which regularly seems sluggish running games that are ostensibly well within its capabilities. My sytem resources rarely get above 75% and then only after I have shut down some systems.
Firstly, how can I achieve higher resource levels?
(My Norton system doctor software says that on boot-up I have 250 ish programmes running, is that reasonable???)

And secondly to improve the sluggishness (see above)I would like to insert more RAM (wouldn't we all oo-er missus!) But can I find out the type of memory to use without opening the case and if I have to open the case what do I look for on the current memory chips. Or will it be a simple case of taking the chips to a supplier and asking for a 128/256 mb version???

Thanking you in anticipation.

:confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: :confused:

[spannersatcx]

Go here and it will tell you what you need for your pc Crucial memory (http://www.crucial.com/) normally very cheap and very reliable.:)

[timmcat]

Wow.. 250 processes running, no wonder you have a slow PC. No, that is REALLY abnormal. I have around 19, and that is too many.

1: Uninstall everything you dont need.. BE RUTHLESS..

2: Run 'MSCONFIG', and disable anything on startup that looks useless. Don't worry, you can re-enable it if something important stops working.

3: You probably need SDRAM on a system with this speed of processor, however if not sure, its probably worth your while taking your base unit into a 'friendly' supplier for accurate ID. Memory is still pretty cheap at present.

[under_exposed]

Lose some of the processes.
Memory has gone up recently. I put a 128MB DIMM in my old machine (233mhz!) for about £30. Its now closer to £40. I got it from http://www.special-reserve.com/ - has an outlet near me.
Its frightning how much memory/disk/cpu modern O/S's need. I was once upgrading a company fileserver from 170MB to 300MB of HARD DISK! Graphics cards will soon have this much RAM on board.
I still think it was a mistake when you could no longer fit your OS, applications and data on the same 360K floppy for your 8mhz 8086 which would boot and load Wordstar 10 times faster than you can boot and get into Word on any Pentium system. The things we put up with in order to have a screensaver and animated cursors.