A lot of ram being used that is unaccounted for

[Marsmallos]

lol I post a lot in this place

But anyway, I often find that my computer is very slow, but I've done virus-scans, I recently cleaned up the registry, I have defragmented, uninstalled old shit that I don't need for more discspace etc. However, I noticed when I bring up the Taskmanager that I am using a lot of RAM, a lot more RAM than all the processes visible in the taskmanager are using.

An estimate is that the processes running are using an absolute maximum of 350 MB ram (well really it's probably less than 250), so why does my computer say that I am using 792 MB ram? That is 79% of my normal RAM, and that is while the computer is standing idle, with only MSN and stuff running in the background. And that is at least 400 mb RAM that is unaccounted for in the Taskmanager. Can there be hidden processes that eats all my resources? (not viruses obvioously since I scanned). My computer would be a lot more bearable if I could free all that memory that I am apparently using (apparently, since the sum of the memory used by the processes visible in the task manager is a lot less than the total memory that is used)

Is there any other way than the Taskmanager I can check what is using my resources/is there any way to fix this?

 

[Samael88]

Dude, it sure looks like you got a lot of crap on your comp

Steam.exe=Steam
msnmsgr.exe= msn messenger.
svchost = this is a windows network process!
iTunes, that you got to know what that is

This happens when you put to much programs on your comp, they will all stack up and become much memory usage!

 

[Marsmallos]

Yes I do know what all those processes are, I googled them, the issue was that the memory used by all (and I mean ALL the processes visible in the task manager) those processes together was a lot less than the "memory allocated" in the bottom of the screen

Steam.exe=Steam
msnmsgr.exe= msn messenger.
svchost = this is a windows network process!
iTunes, that you got to know what that is

Dude, I am not dumb

 

[Slapshot136]

the "total memory used" includes memory that the system isnt using, but hasnt decided to delete yet, due to the fact that a program may soon need that memory again, for example, when you start firefox the first time, it loads stuff into memory and is slow, however when you close it, it's not using that memory anymore, but the system does not delete it until there is a need for it, and if you then go and start firefox again, it should be faster then the first time you started it, i hope that made sense

 

[Rapmaster]

There is a checkbox there for 'show processes from other users' that will show you processes running under ... other user accounts (including System processes.)

Even with that I believe it's still normal for the numbers not to add up. Windows of course uses its own memory and it allocates memory for caching - which can be released if something actually needs it.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/312628

Things look even crazier under Vista or Windows 7 because they will chew up almost any memory that is available in order to do caching (basically because unused memory isn't helping you at all, is it?)

 

[Marsmallos]

Thanks for your replies. The main reason that I am concerned is that even if it works like Slapshot136 said, it still allocates even more memory once I launch any applications. Lets say it has allocated 800 MB ram when standing idle but a lot of it is unused at the moment, if I start a game, like World of Warcraft (uses about 500 mb RAM) it increases the allocation with 500 MB, going up to 1300 MB. And that is a big problem, because I only got 1 GB of ram, and using the swap file (?, it is called Växlingsfil in swedish, it's the part of your disc that the computer can use as extra memory anyway) makes the computer run sloooooowly.

WHat I need is to find a way to use all that seemingly (yeah seemingly, if you look at the numbers, not if you look at a computer painfully chewing through difficult requests such as opening the start menu or writing this forum message in firefox) unused memory instead of making the computer go over the normal RAM limit whenever I want to do something more advanced than sit and admire the empty desktop, like running a program or two

 

[Rapmaster]

http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.htm