memory sucking os

[vikrant]

as u can see my systems resting heart rate is 300mb

in otherwords 300 mb of my pc's physical memory is utillised by my system{os} {including antivirus,windows build etc}
is it normal ?? {the screenshot is taken after fresh boot up}
300 mb just for the os and usual necessary processes. {i have included list of processes}


if its not then how to minimize it ,??and what could be reasons of this mess{virus??}
thanx in advance

[Spart]

300 MB is really normal. I have even more processes running than you have, about 300 MB in use.
Windows XP and antivirus softwares eat most of it. I don't know if there's any way to "fix" it,
otherwise than shut down all the unnecessary things. =/
There are some programs that free memory, but they're just useless, tried once and it didn't help. So you just need a lot of RAM.

[Incinerate_IV]

No, thats not normal for normal 32bit XP. Check your memory useage right after you start up the computer, and see if it's still that high. If it is, you better stop some programs from starting up when your computer starts. Go to Start, Run, they type "msconfig" without quotes, start up tab, and uncheck as many programs as possible. I just leave only my anti-virus unchecked. Also try to scan for spyware/virus, that can help too.

[vikrant]

ive managed to reduce it up to 200 mb ,but it has drastically slowed down my booting time .
is their any program which will analyse the memory utillization,and will imprve the performance,

[Incinerate_IV]

Are you sure the boot time slowed down? When you stop programs from starting up, the boot time should be faster. :hmmm:

[vikrant]

i think i must have switched off some system process ??

[Pent uP Rage]

There are quite a few things in the ProcExp that you could kill. Windowblinds takes up a fair bit of memory. I used it a bit, but axed it after I saw it's mem usage. You can also disable wuauclt.exe. That's Windows Update. Disable that and update manually.
Also, if you don't use Messenger you can disable that as well. Do it in msconfig, BUT be warned it may reset itself without your knowing, consent, or approval. BUT, you can find it in your Programs folder and rename the .exe from msmsgs.exe to msmsgs1.exe and it will not be able to start up at all. But if you want to use it, you'd have to change it back.

[robinhood]

Google windows services guide and disable all the ones you don't need (95% of them are completely unnecesary)

Aqquire a lighter firewall and completely do away with anti-virus for 2 reasons; its always scanning your disk so your never gonna get good performance and 2, you'd had to be a real dumbass to catch a virus anyway.

Sygate firewall and peer gaurdian is what years and years of virus, internet and computer experiance has rendered me with.

Also optimize the way windows handles your RAM like turning off paging executive ect ect. Look on google for guides to this stuff.

[Erik]

completely do away with anti-virus for 2 reasons; its always scanning your disk so your never gonna get good performance and 2, you'd had to be a real dumbass to catch a virus anyway.

I disagree.
With the great number of exploits in Windows you can still get a virus real easy, especially if you download porn and "other material".
And once you get infected it can be a great pain to get clean again.

But there are virus scanners and virus scanners.
Most (if not all) commercial scanners are extremely demanding on resources.
But with some free scanners you hardly know they are there.

I'm using antivir.
It consumes less than 5MB, and I haven't noticed any speed reduction.

About the original question:
IIRC a clean install of Windows XP consumes about 150MB.
Your 300MB is normal, considering the fact that you are running several background processes.
Don't worry too much about it: most of it will be swapped to virtual memory when you play M2TW.