"Out of memory or system resources" - what's causing this?

[Michael Moser]

A while ago I started to get the error messages "Out of memory or system
resources". Close some windows or programs and try again" when pasting
things into Outlook. First this appeared only occasional, but recently
this is showing up practically every time I paste something into
Outlook.

Since I have a machine with 2GB of RAM and ample space for the pagefile
(which I haven't maxed but have it "managed automatically", so it could
grow to whatever the system considers required) and since my .pst file
is down to 65MB (it has been >100MB several times in the past), I don't
think this is really a memory issue. Rather I suspect, that some other
system setting (GDI, icon-cache, or something of that sort) is
overflowing.

Any idea or hint what could cause that problem? Or how to diagnose this?

Michael

 

[Rich Barry]

Michael, how many programs do you have automatically starting when XP is
loading up?

 

[Michael Moser]

Lots! I just counted the active ones on msconfig's Startup tab and
reached 45 active ones (and maybe 20 that I have disabled).
But why should that be a problem? These gadgets should make the system
run slower (and maybe less stable) but can they also make it run out of
memory? After Startup Taskmanager reports about 500MB of mem used, but
as I said: I have 2GB, so there should be plenty of room left, shouldn't
it?

Michael

 

[Plato]

A while ago I started to get the error messages "Out of memory or system
resources". Close some windows or programs and try again" when pasting

"Out of Memory" messages may be incorrect. The real reason may be Out of
Hard Drive Space.

 

[johndog]

I am having the same problem as Michael after opening many programs. I have
1GB of memory, and process explorer shows the page file about 50% committed,
and there is even plenty of physical memory available. The Kernel pools are
nowhere near their limits (P 130/160, N 38/210). And my most filled hard
drive has over 5GB available on it. And yet I seem to be running out of
resources.

To demonstrate the problem, when I use Outlook and create 5-6 new message
windows (doing nothing in any of them), on the last, it will present an
error message indicating a failure related to memory. At this time, if I
run a batch script or something the script may even fail to instantiate
cmd.exe. Indications of low memory abound. If I close a few windows again,
I'm ok for a little while.

As Michael, it appears that I have plenty of memory and drive space. What
else could be the issue?

John