Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
10 Posts
0
4541
Additional windows won't open
I'm not sure which forum to put this in, as I don't know what's causing the problem.
I hae a new Quad 4 Dell Inspiron 530 running XP. It has 4MB memory (I think XP uses 3MB of it). I get a lot of news-related newsletters from various sources, and like to open all the articles of interest to me in separate windows to read them (as opposed to reading each one as I open it, and then closing it before opening the next one).
I find that after I have 33 such windows open, the computer stops responding to any mouse commands to open a new window, be it in IE, or any other program like Word. If I connect a camera to download pictures, it realizes that I have added hardware. asks me what I want to do (I choose the Camera Wizard), and nothing happens. At that stage, it will not even respond if I doubleclick on the new hardware icon in my system tray to remove the camera safely.
According to the SIW utility that I have running that shows me the CPU and ram usage, I am barely using 1-2% of the CPU, and using about 57% of memory (1873MB used, 1445MB free), and it says that of the 2046mb swapfile, the maximum used is 356mb and 179mb is in use.
Once I close the windows, the machine works just fine. It allows me to open the same number of windows that I have closed.
What could be causing this, and what can I do about it?
TIA.
I hae a new Quad 4 Dell Inspiron 530 running XP. It has 4MB memory (I think XP uses 3MB of it). I get a lot of news-related newsletters from various sources, and like to open all the articles of interest to me in separate windows to read them (as opposed to reading each one as I open it, and then closing it before opening the next one).
I find that after I have 33 such windows open, the computer stops responding to any mouse commands to open a new window, be it in IE, or any other program like Word. If I connect a camera to download pictures, it realizes that I have added hardware. asks me what I want to do (I choose the Camera Wizard), and nothing happens. At that stage, it will not even respond if I doubleclick on the new hardware icon in my system tray to remove the camera safely.
According to the SIW utility that I have running that shows me the CPU and ram usage, I am barely using 1-2% of the CPU, and using about 57% of memory (1873MB used, 1445MB free), and it says that of the 2046mb swapfile, the maximum used is 356mb and 179mb is in use.
Once I close the windows, the machine works just fine. It allows me to open the same number of windows that I have closed.
What could be causing this, and what can I do about it?
TIA.
ieee488
4 Operator
4 Operator
•
11.1K Posts
0
August 7th, 2008 13:00
Oh, I don't know. The 33 opened windows is a good guess. And the solution is to not do that.
bearsfolks
10 Posts
0
August 7th, 2008 14:00
The_Namek:
I use tabbed browsing in IE7 also. I don't think that there is a way to open urls directly in tabs. However, I did try to find the maximum number of tabs that I could have open in a window, and there seems to be a limitation on that also---around 46 or so. The problem was not one of stability, but that XP refused to open any windows in any program.
The issue is not whether I should or shouldn't have so many windows open, but trying to understand what is causing this limitation, particularly when I have so much free memory left. If nothing else, it is a matter of intellectual curiosioty. I have googled this, and cannot find any reference to an inherent limitation of XP.
I'll repost this in the Software/XP side also as you suggested.
The_Namek
2.8K Posts
0
August 7th, 2008 14:00
bearsfolks,
Although ieee488's response was a bit brusque, s/he does have a point. In all seriousness, welcome to Windows. It's been known to lock up if you have tons of windows open or tasks being performed at the same time. One of the operating system gurus might be able to give a detailed answer to your question about the 33 windows if you re-posted in the Software | Windows XP conference.
There's really no reason to have 33 IE windows open simultaneously. Aside from the fact that it doesn't have a reputation for being the most stable browser out there it can be a bit of a resource hog. There could also be a toolbar or some other kind of browser extension coming into play here. If you must use IE there's still no reason to have multiple separate windows open when IE7 has tabbed browsing. Personally I use Firefox & very rarely have more than 7-8 tabs open at a time. If you were to use a tabbed browser & avoid opening all the articles/stories at once you wouldn't have this problem.
bearsfolks
10 Posts
0
August 7th, 2008 14:00
Well that response added to my knowledge by exactly 0%.
What is it about the 33 windows being open that causes it (the number changes depending on whether it is a window or a tab)? Is it a hardware issue or an XP limitation?