Computer Memory qusetions for Guru(s)???

This is the Semi-wizbang box at "work" (home office at Dads house two blocks from my home).

A Gateway box with a 1gig AMD Athlon, 128ram, 30gig HD, Running Win2000 and running Norton Anti-virous TSR.

I recently grabbed and installed FreeRAM XP Pro 1.22 as we have always had "not enough memory" issues. FreeRAM is showing us anywhere from about 41% free down to single digits.

Many programs used to be in the startup. I killed AOL Messenger, and several other TSRs.

In the tool tray at the bottom we have from left, Creative SB Live!, on AC power, Volume, Intellipoint, Norton Enabled, FreeRAM, and Enternet the DSL connection.

There is a TON of stuff in "Settings - Start Menu - Programs" but much of it is stuff we use.

As I type this (on IE 5.5) I am seeing 16mb (12%)... Whoops, 13mb 10%!!!!!

WHERE IN THE HELL IS ALL THE RAM AT??? I only have have like 48k at home on an old K-5 166 using Win95 and I NEVER have as much trouble as this machine!!

Hmmm...so this is a laptop then?

I doubt that Windows 95 is using 48k of Ram but it's possible I suppose. Are you saying 16Mb free or 16Mb used? Either way I wouldn't worry tooooo much about it but 128 Mb of ram is simply not enough (You hear me Star?) if it's a Desktop machine kill the "Running on AC power" and slap in some more RAM...it's cheap these days you know. If it's a laptop I'd still consider more ram an easy fix--it'll just be a slightly more expensive fix.

My dad runs Windows 2000, a ton of TREs (Including Gator...ick! ick! ick!)--his memory usage usually hovers at just over 100 Mb. WE have 512 Mb installed (for those times when I do Digital Video)

Runs like a charm. This Laptop has a whopping total of 96 Mb...it's not enough, even with Lunix.

In Windows 2000 hit Control+Shift+Esc to bring up the task manager, then go the the second tab "Processed" and do a sort by memory usage. Task manager actually chews tons of memory, so if you have task manager open and using 10 Mb you have to remember that your total usage will be about 10 Mb less when you close Task Manager.

No this is a desk top.

Control shift esc just gets me the same thing as clicking start. I can't find anything labeled "Processed".

Windows 2000 uses much more memory because it's a multitasking operating system, whereas Windows 98 is basically just DOS. Memory's cheap.

Now as to why it crashes so damn much - that would be mostly from development focused on "features" rather than reliability, because we live in a feature oriented society. "Salt of the earth, you know, morons."

crashing often? My 2k machine (this piece of crap) crashes VERY rarely. I leave it on for a week or two at a time, just sitting here, running seti@home, and every couple days I'll surf with it (my surfing habits involve opening up at LEAST 5-10 windows), and it doesn't crash. It's great. When I had 98 on here I would just leave it for a couple days, then when I went to use it, it would crash.

Spud

PB Joe,
Get some more memory! it's cheap and win2k really needs 256M to run well - no matter what MS says! also, you may not get a true reading of free memory, as the operating system will suck it up for disk caching, etc.

btw, what does the freemem program do? does it just show available memory or does it try to free up memory also?

also, you can increase the virtual memory settings - they're usually set too small. one rule of thumb is 2-3 times what your memory size is - so try making it 256-378M and see if that helps.

is your system crashing or do you get low virtual memory warnings or none of the above?

Yes, it is possible to run Win2K on 128MB of RAM, but it won't run very fast or well. The simplest Win2K install is going to use at least 80 or more MB of RAM just sitting there - the Win2K kernel (operating system core), hardware drivers, services etc needed just for the OS to run require around that much memory.

At least 256MB is recommended - more is better. A desktop doesn't generally require as much as a notebook, so 256MB should be ok though.

Graham

This will speed up your browser, well sort of

click me

I'm at home right now. Charles is right it is 48M on this old slow dog. I guess it would be cake to pop the side off that Gateway and stuff some more Mem in.

Why in the Hell didn't Gateway pretty much demand we buy 256 or more of Ram??? And speaking of that, will the memory be propritary and expensive?

Shouldn't be. While we're on the subject I'd like to mention that I'd never buy a Gateway, I only do IBMs...that is, I Built it Myself. Anyway, I assume that it takes DDR memory but who knows. I think if you go to www.crutial.com you can figure it out and then buy memory that's cheaper then theirs--but don't buy dirt cheap memory...I don't care how cheap you are, cheap cheap memory is a bad investment. It's like playing Russian Roulette--it's like Botach...only worse...

Explination? When you buy brand name memory (PNY, ValueRam from Kensington, Kensington, Viking, Crutial, Samsung, did I miss any?) all the memory chips are matched so it works well. Cheap memory is made from cheap, unmatched chips. if you're lucky it will be fine. If you're not lucky it will make your system as unstable as a elephant on a flag pole.

As some of you may know, I'm a Macintosh fanatic and use one at home. In my professional life, I'm a Microsoft network administrator. It has been my experience that Win 2K is not happy with less than 256MB of RAM, the more the better. MS claims less, but that's about all you can do, run Win 2K, not much else. RAM is fairly cheap right now. I have been getting my memory for both PC's and Mac's from these guys for over 10 years without any problems: Data Memory Systems

You can call them on the phone and tell them what you have. They will send you the correct RAM module. You might want to open your computer up and see how many RAM sticks you have and if there are any open slots. You might have to take one out to put a new one in, but I think most desktops have at least 4 slots. Depending on how new the system is, you may need PC133 or DDR RAM. There are several types of DDR RAM, it seems to be about twice as much as PC133. Your user manual might say which one it needs or check the Gateway web page for your model. The manufacturer usually charges a lot more for RAM than other source. I think that Saaby meant these guys, they are also good too. Crucial Technology

Yeah, what he said...

Nothing less than 256 MB. It's dog slow at 128 MB.

You probably have a few services that can be nuked. Here is a very useful site for W2K services W2K services

Another bookmark for too much MS info is: MS

Saaby, don't assume he has DDR. Those motherboards can use either SDRAM or DDR.

Joe, you're in luck, Office Depot has some seriously CHEAP(!) stuff. PNY isn't the best, but if you're willing to go for it, $13 (after rebates) for 256 MB PC133 (SDRAM) is a great deal.

EDIT: Crapski!! The $13 deal looks like it ended tonight (10/26). Their new price is $23 for Kingston stuff. Yes, if you want to spend the few extra, crucial is the way to go, but it's your hard earned dollars.

I have 1 full Gigabyte of RAM installed and running without any problems in both Win98SE and Mandrake Linux 8.2 Powerpack (Enterprise Kernel 2.14.18-mdk). I keep as much windows startup junk out of memory as possible, as well as limit the number af applications running to as few as possible. No problems. The only bottleneck, is win98's system resources (64 KB).

48K ram?? Not on your life! More like 48 MB. The old CTX notebook I had (with win98), had 32 MB ram in it.

Hit control+alt+delete and hit task manager. In windows 2000 Control+Shift+Escape should do the same thing.

PB Joe, Definitely get crucial ram I don't reccommend less than 512 total. Check how many free slots you have before ordering. Piece of cake to install. A must have app is cacheman the best mem manager around. Available cacheman

Free memory slots is not the issue, it's how much the motherboard will take. You can not use more memory than the motherboard will take, it will crash on startup.

I'm trying to order 512M from Crucial as I type this, but the DSL connection is being a snot!

Done!