I have this shitty computer. An IBM Netvista 2257 with WinXP SP2 on it. It only had 256mb of ram so I got a free stick of 128 to add to it. Not much but it helped. But my major problem is that the ram is good, and my entire system is running a lil smoother now BUT a game Called Infantry droped about 10 FPS and every second or so it kinda jumps like it stops on a single frame for a split second so my screen is constantly jumpy because of that... its not major but its VERY noticeable and VERY annoying. Why would adding a stick of good new ram increase my overall system performance yet cause this single app to decrease in performance dramatically. 10 FPS might not be much to most... but I was only getting 50 fps to start with... 40 or less really sucks... EDIT> I have 384mb of ram but only have an available 132mb... This is from the system info: Total Physical Memory 384.00 MB Available Physical Memory 132.64 MB Why does XP seem to like to use more ram as its added... it seems like every chip I put in only a small portion is available to be used... like XP keeps eating it for itself... Any ideas/comments? Thanks for any and all help...
It's more than likely, that you have a program running in the background that is either using up your resources, or it has a memory leak. Check your startup options, and remove any unnecessary programs that have added themselves to the list. That will free up a lot.
Did u mean Startup Directory Folder? Or something else... cause I know about 31 processes start up on boot and stay on without me even doing anything... that seems a lil high to me... I'm no computer whiz... I know a bit about some areas but I only know what I self taught or picked up on from solving these kinds of problems with help. So if you don't mean the Startup Directory which for me only contains Adobe Reader... please tell me how to check. Thank you.
Most likely someting is eating resources like a virues. Go over to trend micro site and run their free online virus scan. Also make sure all the sticks of ram are the same rated speed. if the new one you put in is a lower speed the the bios will atomatically turn down the speed of the other two to match the new one...:>
Start, run type in msconfig Uncheck all unnecessary programs, and look for oddball programs you know you haven't installed yourself. Then, off to what Ozzy has mentioned.
Yea I figured out the msconfig.exe thing and startup tab and I DID turn a few things off which did help... something thats weird tho is this. HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current Version\Windows:run HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current Version\Windows:Load Now these 2 wouldn't seem weird to me if the "Startup Item" name wasn't a bunch of boxes and symbols... I'm guessing SP2 patcher is normal right? Dumprep 0 -k | HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current Version\Run And nother suspicious one because of the odd spelling and such is this: " /WinStart | "\" /WinStart | HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current Version\Run I'm currently using Ewido and Avast as protection on my comp... and they cleaned it up nicely... but for thorough scans my CPU crashes as usual... I think my CPU is messed as it did this after a fresh format and windows was reinstalled and I didn't have my cable modem plugged in. And both sticks of ram are crappy pc133.... yea... this computer sucks. This motherboard has a socket 370 processor... intel celeron (ew) 1ghz... so that like a pentium 500mhz heh. Thanks for all the help and please tell me if the above descriptions are normal or if they should be disabled. Thanks again.
