High Memory Usage, idle

JamieT

JamieT

JamieT

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Joined
6 Dec 2008
Posts
187
Hey everyone, My pc has been acting really sluggish and slow when running programs, games, etc etc. I've been running a few tests here n there n come to notice my ram usage seems to be running at 40% idle, I'm using 4 gig geil black dragons, I'm not sure but this seems to be a tad high and i think it could be effecting how my PC is performing, recently it seems to chug here n there, I've tried updating the BIOS but it never seems to find the update (through the bios) And the tool provided for 64 bit windows says it won't work on my operating system, I'm using an Asus P5Q SE/R My previous mobo was an Asus P5Q Pro and the ram usage on that was seemingly lower

Surely just a small downgrade in mobo really couldn't effect my system this much could it?

My rig set-up is:

Asus P5Q SE/R
Q6600 OC'd to 3.1
4gig Geil Black Dragons
ATI Radeon 4870 512
OCZ 750W PSU

Any insight on what my problem could be would very much help and would not go unappreciated.
 
40% ram usage in vista is normal, its usually between 30-40% due to the pre-caching features that are meant to make it run smoother, have you checked the overclock is stable?
 
Yep the OC hasn't let me down ran prime for a good 5-6 hours what baffles me is on my old mobo it was around 20 ish now on this one its 40% about 96% when running low spec games, surely it shouldn't be using 'all' this ram? i run Vista in the lowest form of detail, e.g win 98 style.
 
If you are referring to doing a mobo BIOS flash through Windows using Asus Update... imo DON'T! In a lot of cases it just kills the board as it'll erase the rom and then fail to write the new BIOS and you'll be left with a dead mobo.

I would suggest you download Process Explorer (available on MS TechNet) - it'll show you far more info then Task Mgr will as it'll show you exactly what processes are using what RAM etc, that should assist you in tracking down what's going on. The trouble with Task Mgr is that you get loads of "svchost.exe" instances showing and there's no info as to what prog is calling the process. Process Explorer will do this for you. My Vista 64 is running at 14% memory usage (although I have pre-fetch and super-fetch disabled due to being on SSD's)
 
Yeah that's my point i had a lot lower usage on my Asus P5Q Pro which lead me to believe now changing mobo's something isn't right, thank you for the info and suggestion, is there a way to make this ram read faster? I mean i've noticed a lot of freeze framing aswell in either benchmarks or games in the distance, Is this due to it being at stock or is it something else? I'm not amazingly good at OCing my experience lays at minimal at the moment.
 
In your OP you say you have 4Gb Geil Black Dragon, but what is your RAM's rated speed? Is it 800MHz or 1066MHz?

If you can do a screenshot of CPU-Z's Memory and SPD pages that'll give us more info to help you with.

If you don't have CPU-Z it can be found here.
 
From what I can see there everything looks good with your RAM. It is rated at 800MHz and is currently running just slightly overclocked at 830MHz (as the Memory page is showing current frequency is 415MHz, but of course as it's DDR2 it doubles).

The FSB:DRAM ratio at 5:6 gives an FSB of 345MHz and your Q6600 has a default multiplier of 9 hence your OC at 3.1GHz.

According to some specs that I've found online it should handle between 1.9 and 2.4v (although to me that sounds very high and I'd stick to 2.1v max as the Asus boards do tend to overvolt just a tad).

It'd be worth checking your BIOS and trying the DRAM Voltage up to 1.9v and see how that goes as I imagine that it's currently set to 'Auto' and that'll default to 1.8v

If at 1.9v it's still seeming slow then go up another notch, but as I said I'd stop at 2.1v

Anyway let us know how you get on :)
 
Thank you no end for your time and consideration to help others, I'll test it now and see how it goes, I'll keep you posted in a few.
 
Aha silly me, Thank you, It does seem less sluggish now, Although still in games i'm recieveing low fps, thought this was my cause, how wrong could a guy be eh! i know this is the wrong section to ask but will OCing my card boost performance what so ever? 30 fps ish roughly in 'most' games :)
 
Yes OC'ing your card can help however it's worth keeping an eye on temps of course as the 4870's can run quite hot. Also make sure you have the latest drivers. As a matter of interest when you swapped out your mobo did you reload your system or did you let it 'find' it's new hardware etc?

What games are you getting those fps in?
 
I'm using a custom cooler i bought from OCer's works wonders the temp under maximum load doesn't push over 48 degrees, the max i've seen it is 50 with my radiator and case fans set to low, I've got the latest drivers installed, When i got my new mobo i got new HDD's so i installed everything myself from CD, And updated from then on (bios still the same as that post put me off updating the bios) My low FPS is on, Spellborn, Call of Duty, Burnout3 (burnout only when a lot of cars are around) Fallout3 in the open lands, World of Warcraft, Age of Conan, I know a lot of these are online based but even so 30ish fps under a little load can't be right surely? When playing spellborn my FPS won't budge over 20-25, Aoc i got a maximum of 32. Burnout sits about 40 free roaming, Racing i get about 25-30
 
Yeah it does seem a little low to me hence all the questions!

I'd go for OC'ing your 4870 then and see if you can bump up your framerate a bit more there then as everything else seems good. Sorry I can't be of much more help than that, but good luck! :)
 
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