Free up memory??? - what can I do

[valve90210]

I’m after some advice and help, and having done some searching, I can’t find quite what I’m looking for.

I’m trying to free up as much memory as I can because I’ve only got 512MB of PC2700 DDR RAM and even when I have nothing running on my computer I only have about 200MB of free memory, and I’m not quite sure how I can free some more up.

Currently in my system tray I have:

Creative disc detector:
I can’t find anyway of disabling this. I’ve tried searching the net but all I’ve found says to right click on the icon, select properties then unclick enable. However when I right click and select properties, nothing happens.

Norton Antivirus
I have this disabled but it still sits there in my tray, I assume because I still have it set to scan my emails.

Nvidia nView
This is quite useful I suppose though I don’t ever really change my screen res so if I could get rid of it from the tray to free up a bit memory I would.

Intel something or other
This is related to my network card and is fairly useful to check my network connection etc so I happy leaving it there.

That’s all I have in the tray, but when I open up Task Manager and look at the processes that are running, there are masses of them!!!

I’ve tried disabling some of them from the startup tab of the system info dialog, but they just keep coming back..

I’d post up the full list of them but I’m at work and although I emailed the list to myself here, the email has not arrived. I shall add the list when I get home later, but in the meantime does anyone have any ideas about how I can free up any memory.

I realise that really I could do with more RAM and I fully intend to purchase some more but before I do I want to remove anything that I don’t need running in the first place.

My system specs are:
P4 2.8Ghz
512MB PC2700DDR
BFG 7800GS OC AGP
80gig HDD & 120gig HDD
DVDrom
DVDRW
Pinnacle Systems Studio DC10+ video capture card
Soundblaster Live 5.1


Thanks in advance for any help anyone can give me.

Valve

 

[valve90210]

My processes

Here are the processes I have running when I have nothing else open (ok in this example I have internet explorer and Photoshop but nothing else.

I don't know what most of them are but serveral I have tried to disable from the System config utility but they just come back.

any help would be much appreciated

Valve

 

[valve90210]

Thanks for the help guys, I've gone through my list of processes and found one or two which I can probably get rid of.

I'm planning on getting one 512MB stick shortly then when I've got a bit more money available get mysaelf another 512mb stick to give myself 1.5gb

The memory I currently have is PC2700 running at 166mzh, is this DDR333 RAM??

If I was to buy a single stick to put with this, would it matter that it was not the same make, just so long as it is the same speed memory???

Valve

 

[valve90210]

RIght, I'm gonna order myself some more memory at the weekend, just want to check, what exactly I'm needing.

This is the memory spec info for my mother board (taken from the mother board manual...what a great read...)

So would the "OcUK Value 512MB PC3200 184pin DDR Memory (MY-002-OK)" be ok or would I be better off shopping around to find some matching speed PC2700 stuff??

Valve

 

[valve90210]

I've decided to go for a 512 stick at the moment and when I've been paid next I'll add another one to give me 1.5 gb.

Broon, thanks for the info about cutting down the number of processes, I'll give it a go.

Valve