Curse

Shadow · Apr 06, 2008, 04:03 PM // 16:03

Lately, I find myself with a technical issue; window's low virtual memory alerts. My time in GW consists mostly on setting up to death level charr for the LDoA title, but I have had very minimal success with the charr method because it seems to simply be too taxing for my PC without me to babysit.

I will elaborate. If I were to sit here at my computer all day, Guild Wars, would work just fine (doing whatever, including death leveling charr, of any amount). But if I abandon it, the GW.exe process begins to pig out on my system resources until I receive the virtual memory resource warning, followed by GW itself crashing.

What is causing this, and how might I be able to fix this issue?

Zan Usi Quan · Apr 06, 2008, 04:25 PM // 16:25

You'll simply have to sit at your PC all day long!

on topic;; I have the same problem, sort of, I'll be upgrading my RAM soon, so hopefully that will fix it

Brianna · Apr 06, 2008, 04:29 PM // 16:29

Well, obviously this has something to do with your computer being idle, there might be settings to adjust so it doesn't do this, but I don't know of any potential settings of that sort.

Lawrence Chang · Apr 06, 2008, 04:44 PM // 16:44

Right Click on My Computer - > Properties -> Advanced Tab -> Performance Options -> Advanced Tab -> Under Virtual Memory, hit "Change"

Ive had this problem before. Your virtual memory SHOULD be ~ double of your total system RAM. Basically, virtual memory uses your harddrive as fake memory to free up some fo the load of your actual RAM. For example, if your have 256MB, virtual memory should be ~ 500. As for me, since i have 512MB, mines is set to 1000. Make your min/max the same.

EDIT: Obviously, if you got 8 gigs of ram, you probably never had the virtual memory alert pop up, hence you don't need to do this.

Lord Xivor · Apr 06, 2008, 05:10 PM // 17:10

Yep, so for my 8gigs of memory, I have to have 16 gigs of virtual memory. :-S

Almost need a separate hard drive for VRAM> :-X

Tarun · Apr 06, 2008, 05:53 PM // 17:53

How much RAM do you have and what is your page file set to?

Shadow · Apr 06, 2008, 06:15 PM // 18:15

512 MB of RAM, Total Page file size for all drives : 946

I'm not sure if the latter answers the question, since that doesn't.. match with what's displayed? I don't know. Here's a screen shot:

astro reaping · Apr 06, 2008, 06:52 PM // 18:52

first change your initial size to that of your max size...
rule of thumb is x3 on memory..see mine..1gig memory
min/max 3000

2nd disable any none essential programmes running or loading in the
back ground..gw is laggy enough without software u dont need running
adding to it...for that goto start/run .. type msconfig and only disable
programme u no u dont need running in the boot up option

3rd see how many processors u have running..ctrl/alt/del...i have 23 with
0% cp usage but in the services.msc i have everything disabled cept
essential windows services...

4th - do a spyways scan..u never no what shity malware is running in
the back ground..if u cant afford a good 1..try spybot search and destroy
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html

next clean your pc...other issues cause lag...
empty your prefect folder in windows - clean the temp folder...
to also stop windows saving so much crap, lower the space it
allocates...80 meg is the max, but windows default can be 1gig
or more...

next enable not to save encrypted page - and enable empty temp files
when browser is closed...

then use a system cleaner to clean the drive-repair registry entrys
then defrag...if u dont have the tools i can post u diskeeper pro 10
and tune up unilities.....

final run a full pc scan at this site.. www.pcpitstop.com - reg required
and if u followed all the above..your pc should run like shit of a shovel..
ps dont forget to update to latest graphics driver as well

Pasha the Mighty · Apr 06, 2008, 07:11 PM // 19:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by astro reaping

next clean your pc...other issues cause lag...
empty your prefect folder in windows

I think he means the prefetch folder, and I must say, don't do it. Your prefetch actually helps programs startup faster, deleting it is totally useless.

astro reaping · Apr 06, 2008, 09:28 PM // 21:28

incorect
http://www.windowsnetworking.com/art...efetch-XP.html

Gaining Speed: Empty Prefetch on your XP System
A little known tweak that can help you gain some performance on your XP Professional (and Windows Server 2003) related systems is to periodically empty the prefetch folder. The prefetch folder is used to help speed up the loading of programs; XP will load programs it thinks you need before you ask for them yourself.

Since applications are nothing other than data (files, folders which make up the programs), they are susceptible to the same form of punishment all other data on your system is open to… defragmentation, as well as just residing on your hard disk, if needed, the program must be called from the disk and loaded into memory. If XP (or 2003) tries to prefetch applications you don’t regularly use, then you may be wasting memory. In this article, we look at how to speed up performance by emptying the little known prefetch folder and allowing XP to start the prefetch determination and archiving process over again.

The prefetch folder is used for speeding up your system. The way it does this is by doing the following:

Windows XP is configured to prefetch application and program components so that when you load them to memory; it appears to be very quick.
When XP does this the first time, it winds up copying portions of the program to the prefetch area of your local disk.
When XP boots up, XP will prefetch portions of the files you use the most.
XP loads all associated files, libraries, and pointers necessary to run the program in advance, the preloaded subset makes your system appear quicker.
Prefetch when unattended can also slow down your system. This is because over time

XP will retain a copy of a portion of a program in the prefetch folder even if you only use it one time, which is not good. Since you may not use the program again, you may impact the performance of your system by having portions of a program you do not use loaded in your system's memory.
XP systems with very low hardware resources (such as memory and hard disk space) will definitely be affected by an over-bloated prefetch folder.

http://keith.geekstogo.com/Prefetch.htm
The windows prefetch folder is there for one reason - to optimise application loading. XP uses pre-fetching to load drivers, services and the shell into memory before they are needed.
XP continually studies previous boots and optimizes the load pattern for the necessary files. This process is also applied to applications on the system. Every application is analyzed by the system when it starts up the first few times. It then creates a virtual ‘memory-map’ of what the application requires during different times of running and saves this information into the Prefetch folder. Once the mapping is done, the application loads much faster. The prefetch data is stored for the previous eight boots or application launches.

A problem with this is that XP isn't too smart about what it caches -- which includes one-time use setup files and Windows updates, as well as multiple copies of the same applications. This can lead to prefetch bloat and slower boot times.

Prefetch and Layout.ini - the most optimal prefetch order data is written to the Layout.ini file in the WINDOWS\PRE FETCH directory. You can open this file in Notepad to see the order in which XP thinks the files should be arranged physically on the disk for the fastest boot. Defrag also reads this data and arranges the files accordingly. In fact, XP automatically runs defrag when it detects an idle computer and tries to change the layout of the files.

The prefetch folder may accumulate inapplicable data, especially if you change your configuration a lot. There's no harm in emptying it. Simply delete all the files in that folder; Windows will rebuild it as needed.

you were saying?

Shadow · Apr 06, 2008, 09:42 PM // 21:42

Thank you for all your help. I will try what was suggested, but still one thing reminds. As I mentioned, GW.exe consumes more and more of my PC's memory if left alone. This isn't normal, is it?

Tarun · Apr 06, 2008, 11:00 PM // 23:00

Set your pagefile to Windows Managed. Do not empty your prefetch or do any of what Astro said to do, unless you want your computer in worse shape than it already is.

If you prefer, you can set your pagefile to custom, but set it to 2048 for min/max (which is 2GB).

Admael · Apr 06, 2008, 11:13 PM // 23:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shadow

Thank you for all your help. I will try what was suggested, but still one thing reminds. As I mentioned, GW.exe consumes more and more of my PC's memory if left alone. This isn't normal, is it?

Yep, sadly I can't explain it... you'd have to move around to 'refresh the frames' so your RAM can drop the memory it has accumulated, otherwise it'll just require more RAM over time.

I've experienced this first hand when I was afk farming LB points, could never understand why before.

astro reaping · Apr 07, 2008, 03:30 AM // 03:30