UNSOLVED
low system resources
Hello all,
I know this topic has been discussed, but I could not find an answer. I have a dell 8100 with 256mb ram, running windows ME. When I first got the computer (week ago) the system resources were at 62% after log on. If I opened a couple programs it went down to 20+ and then down to 7% where it would crash. I am not running alot of programs, only two or three (msn explorer, word, and system resource at this time (43% right now which is great, but just restarted the system).
I followed all of the tips (and links), like removing almost all of the startup programs in msconfig, I set vcache to 16mb. After doing that my resources on start-up went to 74%, but again after opening and closing a few programs I get a message that resources are low 7-16%. I have even gone as far as to ctrl/alt/del everything off except explorer and systray, and the resources do not go back up.
I did discover one problem while doing the ctrl/alt/del thing one time. I had been running dell's version of music match (only one copy open) and when I went to "end task" everything, I found that it was open about 8 times so obviously there is a problem there.
But my resource problem is there even when I have not been using music match.
I have spoken (by e-mail) to support and all they recommend in cleaning up the start-up programs which I have done.
All of the system tests come out fine, and I am not sure what to try next. This machine replaced a Pentium pro 200 running windows me with 64mb ram, and could open several programs without even a hic-up.
Has anyone else had this severe of a problem with system resources, and more important, does anyone have any ideas on what can be done?
Thanks for any help you can provide
Jim
I know this topic has been discussed, but I could not find an answer. I have a dell 8100 with 256mb ram, running windows ME. When I first got the computer (week ago) the system resources were at 62% after log on. If I opened a couple programs it went down to 20+ and then down to 7% where it would crash. I am not running alot of programs, only two or three (msn explorer, word, and system resource at this time (43% right now which is great, but just restarted the system).
I followed all of the tips (and links), like removing almost all of the startup programs in msconfig, I set vcache to 16mb. After doing that my resources on start-up went to 74%, but again after opening and closing a few programs I get a message that resources are low 7-16%. I have even gone as far as to ctrl/alt/del everything off except explorer and systray, and the resources do not go back up.
I did discover one problem while doing the ctrl/alt/del thing one time. I had been running dell's version of music match (only one copy open) and when I went to "end task" everything, I found that it was open about 8 times so obviously there is a problem there.
But my resource problem is there even when I have not been using music match.
I have spoken (by e-mail) to support and all they recommend in cleaning up the start-up programs which I have done.
All of the system tests come out fine, and I am not sure what to try next. This machine replaced a Pentium pro 200 running windows me with 64mb ram, and could open several programs without even a hic-up.
Has anyone else had this severe of a problem with system resources, and more important, does anyone have any ideas on what can be done?
Thanks for any help you can provide
Jim
Xeon_Itanium
50 Posts
421
0
Posted May 20th, 2001 13:00
You seem to have the same memory as I do but I always get 94%+ when I Boot my computer. You should go to the site mentioned on the other post and removed any unnecesary programs from start up. All I have running at start up is the system tray, pchealth and others to properly run system restore, norton auto-protect, firewall,loadpowerprofile, autoshutdown and that's it. Also you should get Cacheman 4.1 which manages your system rams and resources pretty well. I had a problem like you and it got fixed after I install Cacheman (by the way it's free!). Here's where you can get it. Hope this fixes your problem. http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10102-100-5379469.html?tag=st.dl.10001-103-1.lst-7-1.5379469
- There is no way your system resources should be so low given the circumstances you have described.
First,even though you close programs you may not gain back all the resources that were allocated when the program loaded. You usually lose a little resource even though you have closed the program.
Second,I would look closer at the point you made about Musicmatch opening 8 times. The problem is probably not Musicmatch that is just the sympton. Mutliple copies of programs could be opening up at other times and not all tasks show up in Ctrl-alt-del.
I once experienced a problem with a short in the mouse connection whereby the system kept opening up IE and other various programs multiple times (and degrading resources dramatically) without me even touching anything. You may have either a hardware or a software problem here.
Try to be a detective and see if you can find anything further and post back.
Hope this helps a little.
- There are only 4 things in the startup thet you need to run win me.They are system trya,scan registry,*state mgr and pc health.You might want to check your Norton Auto Protect, but otherwise this is all you need to run win me, Also the 8100's are known to have a memory leak.After you clean up the startup menu and you still have problems , call tech support and see about having the memory replaced.Have your service tag ready for the tech.
- There are only 4 things in the startup thet you need to run win me.They are system trya,scan registry,*state mgr and pc health.You might want to check your Norton Auto Protect, but otherwise this is all you need to run win me, Also the 8100's are known to have a memory leak.After you clean up the startup menu and you still have problems , call tech support and see about having the memory replaced.Have your service tag ready for the tech.
- There are only 4 things in the startup thet you need to run win me.They are system trya,scan registry,*state mgr and pc health.You might want to check your Norton Auto Protect, but otherwise this is all you need to run win me, Also the 8100's are known to have a memory leak.After you clean up the startup menu and you still have problems , call tech support and see about having the memory replaced.Have your service tag ready for the tech.
KayH
1116 Posts
421
0
Posted May 20th, 2001 12:00
Hi,
Your resources free situation is a relative one; some people would do fine with the resources free at 74% that you have; others will not. It's dependent on what is opened after bootup, and apparently what you open is going to need more resources free in order for your system to multitask and to run well for any length of time for you.
Ideally, you would like to get to a position where your resources free on bootup are in the high 80%'s-low 90%'s. How you would go about getting to this figure is going to be up to you and the decisions you make about what you really have to have loaded into the background for convenient access. Really, only System Tray, Explorer, and sometimes some hardware applications (depends on your particular devices) have to be running in the background. The rest is all done for convenience.
There really is no way around your problem, I'm afraid--you have to reach some kind of a compromise between what you would like to have running from startup and the resources free that you need to be able to multitask and to run the system for any length of time. I would recommend that you visit Denny Denham's resource management website here and, with a list of your checked items taken from the list you can get if you go to Start | Run | enter msconfig in the field, OK the run, and choose the Startup tab, see if you can't find more programs and applications that can be unchecked to get you where you would like to be at startup.
Kay