[cyri23]

So I know the basic theory that vista will use more memory if available. Example: I had 2 gigs and it used 30% and now have 4 gigs and it still uses 30%.

But the problem I am having lately is that my finance and I have our own user accounts and originally I thought the excessive use of memory was do to her being logged in still while I was. Now after logging her out and then logging myself in with no start up changes in months I have roughly 68% memory usage.

Well this is all corrected with a reboot and it will shoot back down to 30% but if all programs are close and 2nd user is logged off shouldn't that extra memory usage go away. I am trying to prevent a reboot every time I switch users because it just nullifies the reason for having multiple users and logging them on and off.

Any ideas?

[Elvandil]

Why do you feel the need to reboot and decrease memory usage? What practical consequences do you see from increased memory use?

[fairnooks]

Try paying absolutely no attention to how much memory is being used for one full week, do everything you normally would or want to and see if you run into any problem that can be linked to memory use. Sometimes you have to put black tape over the lights that don't mean much.

[pmasley]

Vista uses memory different from any of the other NT OS's. Vista looks at memory like this, unused memory is wasted memory. It loads what it needs at the start and then tries to anticipate what you will do next. It would rather load the memory than use the page file. After about two weeks of constant use, you will notice two things. The memory usage is quite high and your harddrive will not thrash as much due to the lower use of the page file.

[cyri23]

I guess I could have gone into a little more detail on why I thought the less memory usage would be beneficial.

After I log off my 2nd user account and the amount of memory usage remains high it seems that the programs I load on my user account is lagging slightly.

I online game, watch movies, edit videos, and various other things. I can sometimes find myself leaving open 5 or so programs and once and when memory usage has already increased as much as it has with all these other programs open in just continues to increase as high as 85-90% memory usage of 4 gigs.

At this point the simple launch of my web browsers seems to be slow loading the program. My browsers only use about 1% usage but tied together with other programs running I thought this might be a direct result of the excessive usage left behind when I log off the 2nd user account.

I understand what you are all saying by the extra use of memory has no adverse effects because unused memory is wasted memory but when I think about the fact that I log off the 2nd user and the memory is still in use where did that memory usage go to? I can't account for it under
Task Manager > Processes (Tab)
Even if I choose a system file, right click and Perform Administrative Tasks to show all the system files running it doesn't equal to the actual amount running.

[DaveA]

When you log off it does NOT start from scratch. ALL of the systems services and processes are still running. It is this way on all OS's, the only way to get a clean set of services and processes is to RESTART the machine.

Vista manages memory differently from XP and earlier OS's. It will take CONTROL of the RAM but call it into use only when needed.

The control freaks are going to have to learn that Vista will do the memory control better than they can.

[pillainp]

Cyri23:

Please read through this entire article, especially the part entitled Vista is a Memory hog.

Indeed, I do suggest you try out the little test with Memtest that is mentioned in that particular portion of the article.

This is in now way an endorsement of the article in question, althought I consider it a quite complete and accurate assessment of Vista.

[Orumph]

You can also get Process Explorer to see if any processes are shewing up CPU cycles.
Some processes do not show in task manager that will show in Process Explorer.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb896653.aspx

[calvin-c]

Originally Posted by DaveA

When you log off it does NOT start from scratch. ALL of the systems services and processes are still running.

Not quite-any processes & services running under your user account will end. I think (like you said, Vista is different & I don't have it here at work yet so can't check to be certain).

However none of the standard services run under a user account (that I can think of) so it's probably more of a technical difference than a practical one.

[cyri23]

Thanks for all the help and replies I will check into all these different tips and post back findings after about a week of checks.