Q for the RAM gurus?
Thread Starter
Joined: Feb 2000
Posts: 1,993
Likes: 512
From: UK
Q for the RAM gurus?
Advent Pentium 1.8, 512 Mbs RAM, mobo graphics, triple boot (XP Home, W98SE and Linux Pro 8.1. In a moment of boredom I checked the RAM details in XP System Info. Total physical memory - 512, Available physical memory - 286.01!!! No programs running, so it seems a bit of an excessive loss somewhere. Can anyone offer an explanation, please?
The Oracle
Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,902
Likes: 0
From: Naples, Florida U.S.A.
Cornish Jack,
In the Task Manager look under Processes and see what you have running in there. That should tell you what is taking up all your RAM.
If you would like to know what any of the Processes do, refer here:
Windows XP Home and Professional Service Configurations
Take Care,
Richard
In the Task Manager look under Processes and see what you have running in there. That should tell you what is taking up all your RAM.
If you would like to know what any of the Processes do, refer here:
Windows XP Home and Professional Service Configurations
Take Care,
Richard
Joined: Jun 2000
Posts: 1,003
Likes: 0
From: Geriatrica, UK
CJ your RAM status seems OK to me. You say there are no Programs running. But there are lots of Processes running such as refreshing the RAM itself, the anit-virus Service, perhaps a firewall, keeping the Display going, monitoring all the Interrupts and the hardware states etc.
About 50% in use is reasonable. Bear in mind that the less frequently used contents of RAM are continually paged out to the Pagefile.sys in the C: \ Drive on the Hard Disk. This Pagefile.sys should be 2-3 times the RAM. This Paging is a continual process where a lot of the workload is simply devoted to maintain the status quo.
[Edit: This was my 1000th post since the counter was reset. But a good few hundred were lost during the rebuild.]
About 50% in use is reasonable. Bear in mind that the less frequently used contents of RAM are continually paged out to the Pagefile.sys in the C: \ Drive on the Hard Disk. This Pagefile.sys should be 2-3 times the RAM. This Paging is a continual process where a lot of the workload is simply devoted to maintain the status quo.
[Edit: This was my 1000th post since the counter was reset. But a good few hundred were lost during the rebuild.]
Last edited by fobotcso; 6th March 2004 at 03:50.
