RAM never fully used

MPS · Jan 6, 2008

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best performance
or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4
GB, see snapshot below.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Robert Martin · Jan 6, 2008

I would suggest a better video card.
Matrox makes video cards for exactly what you do.
A GeForce 8400 is LOW end gaming card.

MPS · Jan 6, 2008

Robert Martin said:
I would suggest a better video card.
Matrox makes video cards for exactly what you do.
A GeForce 8400 is LOW end gaming card.

MPS said:

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best
performance or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max.
2.4 GB, see snapshot below.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Click to expand...

Thank you Robert but, rather than getting another card and introducing new issues I'd like to know
where my current 50% RAM goes all the time when TaskInfo states "Free Ph KB 853.068"

Is it blocked by the nVidia-card as shared? The why is it 'Free"?

Any clues?

Maria

Robert Martin · Jan 6, 2008

Vista uses prefetch, maybe it's using your memory.

On my system with 2gb I see similar information like yours.
Right now I have 8 apps running. Including TV on my second monitor.

You'd be amazed at the difference a good video card will make
in dealing with switching between apps.

You wouldn't put $35 dollar tires on a Ferrari would you?

MPS said:
Robert Martin said:

I would suggest a better video card.
Matrox makes video cards for exactly what you do.
A GeForce 8400 is LOW end gaming card.

MPS said:

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always
having 6-8 apps active, Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail,
Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista Sidebar etc. some 60/70
processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best
performance or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black
screen patches, some pics are slow, some apps respond sticky so I
suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I
find that RAM is never utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free
Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4 GB, see
snapshot below.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full,
say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Thank you Robert but, rather than getting another card and introducing new
issues I'd like to know where my current 50% RAM goes all the time when
TaskInfo states "Free Ph KB 853.068"

Is it blocked by the nVidia-card as shared? The why is it 'Free"?

Any clues?

Maria

ray · Jan 6, 2008

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best performance
or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4
GB, see snapshot below.

As previously noted, on a 2gb system, 700kb free is about .03% - meaning
that memory used is 99.07%.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

MPS · Jan 6, 2008

ray said:
Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best performance
or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4
GB, see snapshot below.

Click to expand...

As previously noted, on a 2gb system, 700kb free is about .03% - meaning
that memory used is 99.07%.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Click to expand...

Come on man, back to school -- do your sums...

700.000 kB = 700 MB = 0.7 GB on 2 GB > = 35% or more unused
853.000 kB = 853 MB = 0.853 GB on 2 G > = 41.7% or more unused

See the snapshot above in Red -- any clues as to why?

Looking forward

Maria

PaulB · Jan 6, 2008

I would read what you wrote before suggesting that someone return to school.
You wrote "700kB".
"When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find
that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at
1 GB in use on max. 2.4"

--
Paul

MPS said:
ray said:

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best performance
or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4
GB, see snapshot below.

Click to expand...

As previously noted, on a 2gb system, 700kb free is about .03% - meaning
that memory used is 99.07%.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Come on man, back to school -- do your sums...

700.000 kB = 700 MB = 0.7 GB on 2 GB > = 35% or more unused
853.000 kB = 853 MB = 0.853 GB on 2 G > = 41.7% or more unused

See the snapshot above in Red -- any clues as to why?

Looking forward

Maria

ray · Jan 6, 2008

ray said:
ray said:

Vista Home Premium
2 GB RAM
2x 320 GB
Dual Intel 4300 1.8 GHz
2 Monitors on Dual View

Hi all,

I am using this machine very intensively on the Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active,
Maxthon Browser with 35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
Sidebar etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows automatic management, so not best performance
or best display; just highest CPU speed set.

All is running well but , when switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.

When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo 6.0 I find that RAM is never
utilised fully; always around 700 kB Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4
GB, see snapshot below.

Click to expand...

As previously noted, on a 2gb system, 700kb free is about .03% - meaning
that memory used is 99.07%.

Obviously I would like Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than swap.
It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some 50%.
Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming RAM?
But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?
How can I correct that?

Looking forward,
Maria

[System Pane]

CPU Clock MHz 1.804 % Idle Pri Threads
% CPU 13,60% % Idle 86,40%
CPUs Number 2 Queue for CPU 0
Processes 61 Threads 786
Thread Sw/s 9.464 HW Ints/s 2.495
Total Ph KB 2.094.976 Free Ph KB 853.068
File Cache KB 155.680 File cache peak KB 233.812
Free Virt KB 2.184.120 Committed KB 2.244.704
Paged Pool KB 99.768 NonPaged Pool KB 54.384
Max Swap KB 2.402.176 Swap in Use KB 1.024.440
Page Faults/s 963
Page Ins KB/s 0 Page Outs KB/s 33
File Read KB/s 117 File Write KB/s 27
File Reads/s 66 File Writes/s 23
Client Read KB/s 0 Client Write KB/s 0
Srv Transmit KB/s 0 Srv Receive KB/s 0

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Come on man, back to school -- do your sums...

700.000 kB = 700 MB = 0.7 GB on 2 GB > = 35% or more unused

700 kB is NOT 700 MB. 700 kB is (approximately) 0.7 MB. Hence, 700kB = 0.7
MB = 0.0007GB.

853.000 kB = 853 MB = 0.853 GB on 2 G > = 41.7% or more unused

See the snapshot above in Red -- any clues as to why?

Looking forward

Mariaï»¿<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16587" name=GENERATOR>
<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<DIV>"ray" <<A href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</A>> schreef in
bericht <A
href="<DIV>> On Sun, 06 Jan 2008 11:28:34 +0100, MPS wrote:<BR>> <BR>>>
Vista Home Premium<BR>>> 2 GB RAM<BR>>> 2x 320 GB<BR>>> Dual
Intel 4300 1.8 GHz<BR>>> 2 Monitors on Dual View<BR>>> <BR>>>
Hi all,<BR>>> <BR>>> I am using this machine very intensively on the
Stock Exchange, always having 6-8 apps active, <BR>>> Maxthon Browser with
35 tabs open, Windows Mail, Word, Teletext Browser, networking, AVG, Vista
<BR>>> Sidebar  etc. some 60/70 processes, all under Windows
automatic management, so not best performance <BR>>> or best display; just
highest CPU speed set.<BR>>> <BR>>> All is running well but , when
switching apps I sometimes get black screen patches, some pics are <BR>>>
slow, some apps respond sticky so I suspect a RAM underrun.<BR>>>
<BR>>> When testing using System Task Manager as well as IARSN TaskInfo
6.0 I find that RAM is never <BR>>> utilised fully; always around 700 kB
Free Physical RAM unused. Swap sits at 1 GB in use on max. 2.4 <BR>>> GB,
see snapshot below.<BR>> <BR><FONT color=#ff0000>> As previously noted, on
a 2gb system, 700kb free is about .03% - meaning<BR>> that memory used is
99.07%.</FONT><BR>> <BR>> <BR>>> <BR>>> Obviously I would like
Windows to always fill my 2 GB RAM to the full, say 95%, rather than
swap.<BR>>> It does not do that, it is always wasting RAM space for some
50%.<BR>>> Is this perhaps my nVidia GeForce 8400 GS videocard claiming
RAM?<BR>>> But then why would TaskInfo state 'Free Ph KB'?<BR>>> How
can I correct that?<BR>>> <BR>>> Looking forward,<BR>>>
Maria<BR>>> <BR>>> <BR>>> [System Pane]<BR>>>
<BR>>> CPU Clock MHz      
1.804       % Idle Pri Threads<BR>>> %
CPU              
13,60%      %
Idle              
86,40%<BR>>> CPUs Number        
2           Queue for
CPU        0<BR>>>
Processes          
61         
Threads             
786<BR>>> Thread Sw/s        
9.464       HW
Ints/s           
2.495<BR><STRONG><FONT color=#ff0000>>>   Total Ph
KB       2.094.976   Free Ph
KB          
853.068</FONT></STRONG><BR>>>   File Cache
KB     155.680     File cache peak
KB   233.812<BR>>> Free Virt
KB        2.184.120   Committed
KB         2.244.704<BR>>> Paged
Pool KB       99.768     
NonPaged Pool KB     54.384<BR>>> Max Swap
KB         2.402.176   Swap in
Use KB       1.024.440<BR>>>  
Page Faults/s     963<BR>>>   Page Ins
KB/s    
0           Page Outs
KB/s       33<BR>>> File Read
KB/s     
117         File Write
KB/s      27<BR>>> File
Reads/s       
66          File
Writes/s        23<BR>>>  Client
Read KB/s  
0           Client Write
KB/s    0<BR>>> Srv Transmit KB/s  
0           Srv Receive
KB/s     0</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Come on man, back to school -- do your sums...</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>700.000  kB = 700 MB  =  0.7 GB on 2 GB  > =
<STRONG><FONT color=#ff0000>35% or more unused</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV>853.000 kB =  853 MB  =  0.853 GB on 2 G  > = <FONT
color=#ff0000><STRONG>41.7% or more unused</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>See the snapshot above in Red --  any clues as to why?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Looking forward</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Maria</DIV></BODY></HTML>

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RAM never fully used

MPS

Robert Martin

MPS

Robert Martin

ray

MPS

PaulB

ray

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