Taskmanager

[Evan Clark]

When trying to play games that require a generous amount
of RAM to run smoothly, one must close several programs
in the taskmanager to free up RAM to play the game. My
question is this: what programs and system utilities can
you close so that the computer runs faster and better
without having an error message come up and tell you that
the computer will shut down because a specific program
has "unexpectedly terminated?"

 

[Chris H.]

How much RAM do you have on your system, Evan? Unless you've tweaked your
PageFile, there shouldn't be a problem. The ideal thing is if you're going
to be playing a game is to turn off your anti-virus and any other programs
(like Messenger) which might be running in the background. Task Manager
isn't the ideal place to control programs.

Try going to Start/Run and typing in "msconfig" without the quotes. Go to
the Services tab and at the bottom you'll see "Hide All Microsoft Services."
Put a check mark in there and you'll instantly see what is running. Those
are the items you'd want to eliminate during game play, not system
processes.

 

[Paul]

First of all, I recommend 512 mb of ram for Windows XP.
Next,have you shut down all programs in your system
configuration utility that start when windows boots up? If
you haven't, click the start button, click run, then
type "msconfig" (without quotes) and select the startup
tab. The only programs I leave enabled here are my anti-
virus, which I turn off manually before I play games, and
the software I need to run my cordless optical mouse. Any
others will start when you need them; you just don't want
them running in the background. I also tend to disable my
screen saver as well.
Also make sure you have no ad-ware or spy ware on your
system if you want to play on-line. You can do that by
downloading ad-aware from: http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
Some file sharing programs may not like this or you may
have to delete them to get rid of ad-ware/spy ware.

 

[Evan]

Well, I don't have that much memory in my computer, only
256 mb of pc800 rambus. I really want to increase my
memory, however rambus is really expensive. Do you have
any advice in which you could tell me where I could by
this specific type of memory for cheap. Dell has high
prices and that is really the only site I know of. Also,
if I were to find a price that I found acceptable, how
much memory should I buy? Thank you.