Windows 7 forum: My system is dragging; do I have a memory leak?

Goto Mint Linux download Mint 10 iso 32 or 64 bit,burn image to cd.Reboot and go into bios (press Del F2 ..) change boot order so Cd Rom 1st save and exit, reboot and put in new Mint Cd into CD Rom.Let Mint screen come up choose first line let it work,have a play,very similar to posh Xp.
All ok and got 1GB memory + ,choose install ,answer few simple questions.then slightly tricky bit it asks to install along existing O/S,I choose advanced so can create 1GB Swap area end Hard Drive and then ext4 partition with / (so root) just before that.
After that installed a new fully working O/S in 15 minutes.
Successfully done on XP Laptop and Win 7.
No more bugs Viruses malware defragging memory leaks pop ups etc.Can safely deal with my banks and surf the net.

No No don t thank me just spread the word,and enjoy

My friend has a similar problem. He uses Firefox, and I think I recall memory leaks back when I used it. Now I use Chrome. But that alone is not my friend's problem.

His real problem is that he has three user accounts, and none of the users on his system are at all computer literate. Therefore, I have to keep reminding them to log out at the end of their session. Every time he tells me his computer is slow, I'll come over to look at it, and he has two or three users logged on, each running instances of Firefox with a dozen or so tabs open. This virtual memory disk swap creates a huge backlog!

I work with a windows application that has a tendency to gobble up resources if left running for too many days..

Quick fix:

Hit Ctrl-Alt-Del

Select Start Task Manager

Select the Processes tab

Sort the info by Memory in descending order.

Amything thats hogging enough memory to be making a real difference will likely be in the top four or five results.

identify each process (via your search engine of choice, although Windows 7 is quite good at making it more understandable than previous incarnations) and, if safe, shut each process down. The application will also shut down leaving you able to start it up again and keep track of its resource demands..

with issues like this you must give details on your computer processor,memory, and what are you doing/programs running etc...

I have had many operating systems created by microsoft. from windows 3.o to vista. vista is the worst..I still use windows 98se. windows XP for me is the best they ever made.

It is very possible you have a virus infection .

AVAST is a solid reliable low resource antivirus program.. all my computers have this . never had an infection or issues. windows 98 or vista..

scan for infection with this . also this is a free software program with basic features..more features it has a fee.

Couple of things that I have not seen mentioned (or, at least I haven't read them yet) was what is the configuration of this machine? Memory leaks were a common thing under Windows 95 and some in Windows 3.1 days but under Windows 98 and later they were becoming like the dinosaurs - extinct.

It could be the hard drive where Windows has the pagefile (aka swapfile) if necessary has become old/worn down or major league fragmented - unless of course it's on a SSD or flash drive that was 1 concern. But if you watch taskmanager too, it gives an indication of RAM in use and that might be an item to watch.

Another thing is you could have flaky/disagreeable memory modules that do not talk well to one another and that would cause instability really fast.

One thing I might suggest is (you may hate this) but start with a clean system (fresh rebuild) and install 1 application/program at a time - give each a few days to see what happens - this might nail down your culprit albeit a lengthy time it would take to do it. It could even be a flaky power supply sending unclean power to the system - have you had your system hardware diag'd recently?

Memory schmemory. Turn it off overnight and your memory will be free when you boot in the morning.

I don't mean to be rude, but why aren't you turning off your computer overnight? Unless you've got some really vital work for it to do while you're asleep there is simply no excuse to leave it on, even in sleep or hibernate mode.

Millions of people leaving their computers on overnight unnecessarily wastes tons of electricity. I hope it's not because you don't want to wait 1 or 2 minutes for it to boot on in the morning -- because that's one of the lamest, most selfish excuses I've ever heard.

I would ! I have practiced this shut down , and power TO DEVICES SWITCHED OFF , to all computers/electronic devices including TV components.

you save some money on the electric bill ..

THE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE TO CONSIDER WITH THIS IS FIRE !

Some of us have remote offices that need to be accessed by remote auto administration through VPN of course; and some of us use entertainment equipment that won't allow you to use premium content if you don't at least use the power saving options built into your system. Most DRM schemes will work in sleep mode so the RIA notification utilities can keep your premium content running.

Not everyone can shut down every night. Restarting during the day is the only option.

That's true i_cat. We do turn everything off ! Never thought about hurricanes, Randy Walker (I live in WA Australia) but power outages & spikes do happen here.
Anyway hope original poster gets problem sorted & gets a relatively simple answer to memory leak.

...was configured in. 32bit or 64bit.

In 32bit, memory leaks are called 'dumped' memory. It will happen a lot if the mainboard of your PC is way too slow in FSB for the applications of the 'Right Now's time' world of ours. Keep your RAM at the proper speed of your mainboard and, you will be OK.

In 64bit, same thing happens but way less often. But, the same, exact problem persists. Make sure your RAM cards are in the proper DIMM slots for an insynchronus Double Channel status. Hint: Mainboard manufacturers uses different colors for their DIMM plastic slots. In the 'Right Now' world, Triple Channel is a reality not to ignore. Make sure your mainboard of your PC has the latest in both RAM cards and Bios for it, also. Look to flash the newest Bios for your PC's mainboard, it might do the trick right off the bat.

Good Luck at properly synchronizing it's FSB configuration!

Hey, Trey. I am running VISTA OS. If you download Advanced System Care (free version) from CNET and look in the utilities section under Tuneup you will see an entry called SmartRAM. The explanation of SmartRAM states that "IOBIT SmartRAM monitors your system in the background and frees up memory whenever needed to increase the performance of your computer". It seems to work. The reason I know this is because I am running a gadget called CPUmeter. This gadget shows CPU and RAM usage in real-time and it is minimalized. BTW, I haven't noticed any degradation of system performance due to SmartRAM.

When you choose to make libelous statements maybe it would be a good idea to provide some proof to back them up. I personally don't know from nothing about IObit. All I can say is that I use their products and they work to my satisfaction. I included SmartRAM in my post to this thread because I think it is relevant to the discussion at hand.