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jachrisco2001
01-11-2002, 12:54 AM
I am running Window 98 on a Pentium III, 1 Gig. with 256KB RAM. It freezes sometimes even when only a few files or web pages are open. Ctrl+ Alt + Delete often takes a long time to bring up the end task dialog or has no effect so I have to switch off the power.

How can I establish if my 256Kb Ram is working at as such, or resolve this problem? There are also messages some times indicating memory is very low. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Jacofool

Gernot
01-11-2002, 08:43 AM
I have exactly the same problem with WIN 98 SE. The forum experts have blamed the Grafic card with a Geforce 2MX pro chip. I overclocked it a bit but it was even worse, so I returned to the default settings. Now I think it is a certain problem of WIN 98 because it never have happend to me when I use WIN NT. We have to live with it, I guess. BTW, clean and defrag the system decreases the problem from time to time.
Gernot

reghakr
01-13-2002, 12:28 AM
We need to know the exact error messages.

Here are my general maintenance and speed-up tips:

Tap the Alt_Ctl_Del keys at startup and see what listed in the task list. post back with that info.

If it's running that poorly, right-click on My Computer, click the Performance tab and verify the File System and Virtual Memory are 32-bit.

Click the Virtual Memory button and make sure that Windows is managing the virtual memory. Move your swapfile to a partition with more space, if possible.

If those are OK, try these steps to eliminate unecessary program running:

The things that make the computer slow are the many unecessary items that automatically startup when Windows starts.

Right-click on the icons in the tray area, open each, go through the options to turn off the "tray" or "run at startup" feature.

For the others, go to Start>Run, type msconfig. Leave systray, scan registry, Load Power Profile (both), your virus scanner and firewall if you have one.

Go to Start>Run, type sysedit. Look over the autoexec.bat for unneccessary lines, click the win.ini and check for programs loading here:
[windows]
load=
run=

Open Explorer and navigate to c:\windows\temp and delete all files here. Empty the Recycle Bin.

Open Internet Explorer, go to Tools>InternetOptions, click the Delete Files and Clear History buttons. Click the Settings button, then set a reasoble size for the temporary internet files cache. I'd suggest 40MB for a 56K connection, as little as 10MB for a cable or DSL connection. If you have more than 4 folders under this key:

C:\WINDOWS\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5

If you're familiar with DOS, you can do this:
It will totally clean everything.

Click Start, click Shut Down, click Restart In MS-DOS Mode, and then click OK.

At the command prompt, type the following commands, pressing ENTER after each command, and pressing Y if you are prompted to confirm folder deletion:

cd\windows
smartdrv
deltree cookies
deltree history
deltree tempor~1
exit

The neccessary files and folders will be rebuilt at startup

Right-click on the desktop, make sure Active Desktop is turned off, then click properties and click the Effects tab. turn off Animate windows, menus, and lists.

Close all tray applications and hit Alt_Ctl_Del and end task on all items except for explorer and systray, disable your screensaver, then run scandisk, then defrag.

If you don't know what an entry is or what it does, post back.

If you're using Microsoft Office, look up this Knowledge Base article to kill the Find Fast Indexer.

<a target="_blank" href=http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q158705>How to Disable the Find Fast Indexer</a>

Finally, don't use those so-called RAM boosters

reghakr

Gernot
01-13-2002, 10:35 AM
Thanks for the tips reghakr. My system works like newborn. Minimal RAM and CPU usage. Great! What was the initial ignition? I don't know. But it works. Highly recommended.

reghakr
01-13-2002, 09:40 PM
Gernot,

No problem, it could have been one of those programs running in the background.

I like a clean machine and if it's not neccessary, it goes.

reghakr