How-To Geek Forums Topic: where is my Free Memory ?

How-To Geek Forums Topic: where is my Free Memory ? http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ How-To Geek Forums Topic: where is my Free Memory ? en Sun, 22 Nov 2009 11:41:46 +0000 ScottW on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-/page/2#post-97510 Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:19:29 +0000 ScottW 97510@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Josh, as I read it, the tutorial by Brink at VistaX64 does not claim that disabling QoS frees up 20% of unavailable bandwidth. He explains how QoS works, then explains how to disable it or change the amount. The myth is that 20% of your bandwidth would *never* be available to you unless you turn off QoS. I don't have QoS disabled because I use Voice (and Video) over IP and I don't like it when my calls are dropped! It's good to be wary of tweaks and any programs that claim to tune-up or speed up your system. Doing research is an excellent idea. Say, your registry is looking awfully dirty -- would you like me to clean it for you? :-P josh1 on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-/page/2#post-97476 Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:39:53 +0000 josh1 97476@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Thanks ScottW, the Ram Optimizer that I was playing around with is a small app within Advanced SystemCare 3 freeware version. I wont bother with that function anymore....and this is susposed to be very reputable software? While reading the article at the above link you posted Scott - to do with tweaking myths - there is a section concerning "Disabling QoS to Free Up 20% of Bandwidth" It states that this tweak is a Myth....yet at another site <a href="http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/109326-qos-bandwidth-reserve-limit-3.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/109326-qos-bandwidth-reserve-limit-3.html</a> the author claims this is a valid tweak, and the guy is an Microsoft VMP (valued microsoft proffesional)..anyway I went ahead with this tweak 2 weeks ago...and to be honest not much has changed with my wireless modem connection....thankfully there is instructions on how to reverse this tweak My ISP states that I should receive 7.5mb per sec downloading .. at full strength signal during off peak times I do well to get about 500kb per sec max.. hence my reason for the "Qos" tweak! I`m very wary of tweaks now, and will fully research any tweaks before using them. Thanks again. :) ScottW on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-/page/2#post-97397 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:02:35 +0000 ScottW 97397@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Josh, those RAM "boosters" are worse than just a gimmick -- they will probably degrade performance. See <a href="http://lifehacker.com/5033518/debunking-common-windows-performance-tweaking-myths">this article by the How-To Geek</a> where he describes the myth of the SnakeOil Memory Optimizer. Agantfleabag on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-/page/2#post-97384 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:28:41 +0000 Agantfleabag 97384@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ I understand Irv, i just wanted to know a bit more why the numbers were so different from the previous picture. Now i understand. ispalten on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-/page/2#post-97382 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:09:06 +0000 ispalten 97382@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Agantfleabag, not sure what your question was? "i was curious about how my computer's performence looked." You can't tell from a 'picture' your performance. Even if the CPU is at 100%, you might not be trying to 'do something' and it is a program that is using all CPU cycles available to it. Memory, well, you have 2GB's and I assume 256MB's are carved out for motherboard video card usage and not available to the system. Once you bring in a 'new' program, that is not one that is in the cache, you will use whatever is in the cache first, and could start swapping out other memory. That you would notice as a performance hit. I assume you are running Vista, and if the 64 bit version, 2 more GB's of RAM would really help. If the 32bit version, that additional memory wouldn't all be seen, but it would improve overall 'feel' of the system. Irv S. josh1 on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97374 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 16:29:35 +0000 josh1 97374@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Thanks for all posts my understanding of this topic is much clearer :) Have been watching Taskmanager after using a Ram Optimizer.... I think they might be a gimmick more than anything else ! Agantfleabag on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97365 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 15:42:14 +0000 Agantfleabag 97365@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Hum.. Yeah i was rendering a video at the time so the CPU was a bit high. Curently right now.. my CPU is at 90%-100% O_0 whs on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97360 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 15:20:42 +0000 whs 97360@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ This question is hard to answer. There is no indication at which point each performance sot was taken and what was running at the time. The only obvious fact is that your RAM and Page File are a lot smaller than on the previous shot/system. Therefore is is likely that your system does not have the performance level of the previous system. But the CPU load is, as I said, a function of what is running at this moment and, of course, the muscle of the CPU. Agantfleabag on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97359 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 15:15:02 +0000 Agantfleabag 97359@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ humm.. sorry to go a bit off topic.. but i was curious about how my computer's performence looked. The numbers are much different. <a href="http://s438.photobucket.com/albums/qq101/Brazilianboiii/?action=view&current=7-2-200911-10-57AM.jpg"><img src="http://i438.photobucket.com/albums/qq101/Brazilianboiii/7-2-200911-10-57AM.jpg"></a> ispalten on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97338 Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:34:31 +0000 ispalten 97338@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ The FREE MEMORY is just what has not been used before. Capture from my 8GB system : <img src="http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/7858/capturenzk.jpg" /> See the RED circled areas and the highlighted text. Although TM shows conflicting results, 2GB used in the graph but Physical says much less free, the HELP indicated it includes memory recently used. Since this is a 'swapping' system, the memory loads up sequentially as you load programs. It will mark no longer used memory as discardable, but it keeps track of it in case you need it again. Once you totally exhaust free memory, that discardable memory will be used and depending on how much memory is released and used by another process, your 'free' memory count will change. For 'speed', recently used memory is released last in case you'd need it again. Let us say you had IE running and closed it. All segments it used before would be cached, not discarded. Run another program, out of free memory, if IE was the only thing you ran, it would start discarding those segments of memory. Didn't run anything after closing IE, and started it again, no need to re-load memory, from the 'cache' it would enable those loaded segments. The Widget on the right agrees with TM's graph on the FREE memory I have FWIW. Irv S. Aleeve on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97278 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:27:50 +0000 Aleeve 97278@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Will do @josh1 - hope this topic (apart from the last section) has been helpful? LH on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97276 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:25:12 +0000 LH 97276@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Not at all. Don't worry. Aleeve on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97273 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:17:55 +0000 Aleeve 97273@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Do I detect a touch of sarcasm here? :D LH on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97271 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:09:28 +0000 LH 97271@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Bribery will get you nowhere. whs on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97267 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:02:46 +0000 whs 97267@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ I'll do anything for a guest moderator - LOL. Aleeve on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97263 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:07:25 +0000 Aleeve 97263@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Thanks whs for the tip - edited my post accordingly whs on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97262 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:51:16 +0000 whs 97262@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Aleeve, I observed that Ready Boost does not really give you a lot of a performance push once you have 2GBs of RAM or more. But it can reduce your HDD activity. If you can manage to have enough RAM plus Ready Boost to match the size of your Page File, then there will be a lot less HDD activity - just some for writing the safety copies in case of change. Aleeve on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97257 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:30:32 +0000 Aleeve 97257@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ Possibly unrelated, but you may want to try ReadyBoost to boost your memory? (explained in more detail <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/features/readyboost.aspx">here</a>) Basically, if you have a large flash disk lying around wasting space (anything from the regular memory stick to camera cards and external drives even!) Plug it in and set to ready boost, and use all the space you can/want to If your computer has a lack of RAM, this should help, and even if you have 2-4gb, it will still help, even if you don't notice too much difference whs on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97233 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 16:56:24 +0000 whs 97233@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ I just lookd - I have 4MB free, of 4GBs. At other times I saw 14 and 22MB. So as we said - the number does not really mean anything. I trust Vista to do a good memory management job. ScottW on "where is my Free Memory ?" http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/where-is-my-free-memory-#post-97226 Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:36:38 +0000 ScottW 97226@http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/ josh1, hello. I'm running with only 12 MB "free" out of 2 GB: <img src="http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/8914/taskmanagerperformancet.png" /> This is typical and I have seen the Free number go down to 2 MB. Notice that the Physical Memory usage is 47%, which is typical on my system. As pointed out by LH and whs, these numbers are not very meaningful. What number would be good? Or bad? I don't know. @AST, using the disk cleanup tool, you can delete the hibernation file, hiberfil.sys, which also disables hibernation. This frees up hard drive space but not system memory. If you have more questions about this, please start a new topic.