Computer help - too much physical memory in use!

seeker

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 11:38 am

I tried googling for help but the results were way too overwhelming. Took a couple of tips but they didn't help at all. When I have literally nothing open, it's about 40-50%. Once I open an internet browser (I usually use Chrome but seem to be having the same results with IE) it shoots up to somewhere like 80%. I can't seem to get anything done! I ran antivirus and malware scanners, disabled all chrome extensions, disabled anything in startup that I could figure out was nonessential (not going to tamper with the things I don't understand, though.)

Hoping someone here is technologically competent enough to help because I'm getting desperate!

doctorima

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 12:03 pm

Check to see what programs are running in the background, and also check to see what programs automatically load at startup each time you reboot, and disable any that you don't need. If this doesn't work, you may need to buy more RAM, which isn't too expensive.

imasoftov

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 12:07 pm

Iymnok wrote:

Store all pictures on a cloud, videos too.

Pictures and videos only take up RAM when being viewed. Otherwise they occupy space on disk, not memory. So storing things in the cloud is helpful if low on disk, but not if low on memory.

seeker

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 12:11 pm

I did check for background programs, though I'm not entirely sure what to look for because there are things that are supposed to be there and I don't know which are which. For example when I look at processes, much of the memory is being hogged by things beginning with svchost.exe - I don't know what those are. And one is MsMpEng.exe which sounded odd to me so I googled it and it turns out it's a legit part of the MS operating system. Then there's search indexer - why in the world is that constantly at work? And of course once I open chrome that doubles the usage. Why is chrome using SO much memory? As I said I did check for malware and I did disable extensions.

How new is the problem - well the computer is old. I got it as a hand-me-down. But when I got it it had been wiped clean and was running well. That was, I don't recall exactly, probably about a year ago. At some point it started to slow down but this issue where it sometimes barely functions because the memory is too busy pretty much just started.

doctorima

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 12:33 pm

In such situation, I've had good luck with a program called CCleaner. Download it and run it once a week, and it will clean up a lot of stuff that you're not using and that's needlessly tying up system resources. You can customize what it does and doesn't clean. Do you know how much RAM your system has? If less than 4GB, it may be time for an upgrade.

water_bear88

Thu, Sep 14 2017, 1:03 pm

I opened task manager yesterday because my computer was running especially slow- I forget what was hogging all the physical memory but I googled and it was related to a Windows update. I've also noticed my antivirus seems to be getting heavier and heavier with time- I find I need to change providers every couple of years.