I would like to talk about RAM. I have 3GB ddr2 ram and should be able to play just about any game I want to without freezes but I can't. even when the pc is at it's most idle state (excepting resident scanners and what not) I am constantly using at least 27% if my ram. heck right at this moment I'm using 41% i only have a browser, windows media player and task manager open. a few months ago I never had this problem. I routinely run maintenance programs and still can't free up memory. I shut down processes that I don't need or use (like groovemoniter) and still nothing. I have noticed however that most of my processes are svchost.exe and that is what is eating up precious RAM. is there really a need to have so many instances running all the time?

any pointers or insights on this would be great.

svchost.exe is normal and is used by your system and services. I have 7 instances running at this moment.

To check them out, use a program such as Process Explorer which will give you a much better insight into what your PC is doing than Task Manager does.

Info and download link on this page - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinte...s/bb896653.aspx

(scvhost.exe - note spelling difference - is bad and should be investigated further.)


Cheers

thanks but how many instances are too many i have upwards of 20 goin' on. also you wouldn't happen to know how to see what programs are running in the backround besides using process explorer or task manager would you? if so can they be disabled?

You might have a look here:

http://www.blackviper.com/

I would recommend using the safe options first.

that vista for you, but it shouldn't be causing game crashes, something else is wrong

3 gigs is an odd number, did you order it that way or was memory added to the original setup?

what cpu?

what video card??

what games are crashing?

I boought it at best buy and it came with 3gigs ddr2 Ram

it has an amd 64 x2 dual core processor

graphics card - nvida 8600 GTS

I know some of the games crash due to bugs (gothic 3) butothers crash and the pc tells me it ran out of memory.

why is 3 gigs odd?

This tutorial may help
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial129.html

I've recently read something about asynchronous DDR2 settings that enable a system to run different size modules in dual channel mode. As I recall, it stated that it's faster than not running in dual channel mode, but slower than having matched modules in synchronous mode. I've seen quite a few of these systems and chalk it up to a marketing gimmick. The reasoning (I suppose) is that it's better to have 3 gB that the customer can see, than to have 4 gB where the customer can only see 3.26 gB of it. And, it'll decrease the service calls from customers asking "Where's the rest of my RAM?"

I suspect the matching 512's might not play well with the matching 1 gig sticks

each motherboard/chipset/bios would be different tho

intel claimed to be able to keep dual channel working with non matched pairs, I had one guy who kept quoting it but every time he removed the old smaller pair his computer sped up

Another poster pulled his old lame ram and installed premium low cas ram in an amd64 computer, voltage was fine but he kept crashing mid way thru a long heavy duty video conversion, the single core cpu was not overheating, memtest86 could run for days no errors

He upgraded his bios and the problem went away

what??? you'll have to either dumb this down or educate me here. are you saying I can tell the cpu to use one processor another to work on a single app?

there's no dumbing down this ram technology, it's extrememly complicated and even after years of experience it can be intimidating

many technicians still just rely on plug and pray to test or fix problems

I use a program called cpu-z

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

to compare the cas levels of each stick

you might also have some luck optimizing vista

have you checked for the latest video drivers?

Hey Blood

Try running a Spybot or spyware killer of your preference. Some hidden spywares will present as running items. Then reduce the number of items in your boot up. I have found on many different types of machines that more is not better. For example, why have a app start up unless you use it everytime you boot?

There are more aggressive tasks to use if this does not work.

Good Luck.