Sometimes it feels like everything on your PC has slowed to a crawl. Your applications take a long time to open, files save slowly, and web pages take ages to load. Then, just as your frustration is reaching its apex, you get an error message: Your system is running low on virtual memory. This isn’t as bad as it seems. With a little explanation and some help from Soluto, you can get your PC’s memory problems under control.
Your PC’s total system memory is made up of physical memory, in the form of random access memory (RAM), and virtual memory. This is different to “storage,” which is comprised of hard drives and other devices that are non-volatile and retain their contents when the computer is turned off.
PCs use RAM to run programs and operations. By default, the PC saves all the bits of information about apps and processes you run onto this short term memory. When there is not enough physical memory to complete a task, the PC uses virtual memory. In this memory management scheme, the PC can swap data between RAM and a temporary space on the hard drive, known as a paging file. Moving data to a paging file in secondary storage makes RAM available for new tasks and data, but it can result in delays.
Hard drives, and thus virtual memory, are much slower than RAM. Accordingly, the more RAM on the PC, the faster some processes will run. That’s also why increasing RAM is usually a more effective solution to slow PC woes than increasing virtual memory with a larger or an additional paging file. However, RAM is expensive and not all PCs can be upgraded. Luckily increasing virtual memory is not your only option when you are low on memory.
Soluto can help you make sure your programs run well and your PC utilizes its physical memory and virtual memory efficiently.
How can I monitor RAM on my PC?
1. Check how much RAM you have installed.
From the Hardware section of the Soluto dashboard, you can see how much RAM is installed on the PC. If there is a low amount (less than 2 GB RAM), you might want to look into a computer memory upgrade and purchasing additional RAM, especially if you use graphics-intensive apps. The minimum required RAM for Windows 7 (64-bit) and Windows 8 (Consumer Preview 64-bit) is 2 GB RAM. If adding RAM is not an option for you, Soluto can help you get the best possible access performance out of your current RAM and virtual memory.
2. Find out which applications on your PC are using RAM.
Programs that run in the background can use up RAM without your even knowing the apps are running. The Background Apps section of the Soluto dashboard shows you exactly which programs run during startup and then continue running while you use your PC. Soluto has gained a unique understanding of all of these programs using crowd-sourced data from our users. This allows us to provide useful descriptions and recommendations on what to do with each program based on the experience of millions of users. We can tell you whether something is Safe to Remove from Boot, Potentially Removable, or Required and therefore can’t be removed.
Soluto also shows you what actions other users took for each program. With one click you can then either Remove an Application from Boot, so that it does not run during Windows startup, or Delay the application so that Soluto automatically launches it a few minutes after boot up is complete. When you choose to remove an application from boot, you prevent it from automatically running in the background. This way you can prevent apps you don’t use from needlessly consuming your RAM.