Enough Computer Memory?

Is this you? “My computer seems to be getting slower and slower!” Or, “Sometimes certain applications take a long time or significantly longer than usual to load!” Or, “I have to reboot often to keep my computer running fast!”

There are many reasons why a computer seems to slow down over time, and indeed, some are real and can be dealt with depending on the cause. But first, the user must understand the difference between a slow internet and a slow computer. These two reasons can show up with similar symptoms, and differentiating between may be a bit difficult. The main difference is that a slow computer will do everything slowly, such as starting new programs (not browsers), or you cannot switch between program quickly, or the file manager Explorer is also quite slow. On the other hand, a slow internet response shows up as very sluggish browser windows, not downloading from the Internet in the normal fashion and speed, and clicking on links in the browser which takes too long as well.

Assuming that the computer is slow in general and not just with internet transactions (such as when opening web pages, or downloading from the internet, or watching internet videos, etc.), then a computer slowdown is usually due to three main reasons:

1. Not enough memory in the system, and/or

2. The hard disk drive is quite fragmented, and/or

3. Some application has usurped the CPU and there is no bandwidth left to run much of anything else

In this article, we’ll tackle the first reason: Not enough memory.

Let’s start at the beginning...

What is computer memory? It is very similar to the memory in your head, except when you power off your computer, the memory gets all clear out! There are other types of memory such as in a flash/thumb drive, which retains its memory always, called non-volatile memory. But computer memory is volatile and forgets everything when the power is cut off. All programs, which run on the computer, can run out of memory, including Windows, the operating system controlling your computer.

How memory works and why it’s important

Each time you start up a program or even another tab in a browser, the program or tab calls for more memory to be used by that application. So, if you run your computer with several browser windows open, an email program in use, plus other MS Office programs like MS Word or MS Excel, all of these applications need to be loaded into memory at the same time! If you do not have enough computer memory for the typical load of programs you run, this will cause memory swapping.

Memory swapping means that when there is a request to load a program, or part of one, and the system has to make room in the memory to load it. The system does this by removing some other program that is already in memory, which is currently not being used, and writes all of it or part of it out to your hard disk, which is called ‘swapping’. The system swaps out the old for the new! Accessing the hard disk is about 1,000 times slower than just running programs in memory, so you can see how this will slow down the system. The more swapping there is, the slower the system will appear and function.

How much memory is needed?

The best amount of memory to have in your computer is enough to hold all the programs you normally run at the same time, and have little or no swapping going on at all. Concise numbers are hard to give in general since each user uses the computer differently, with varying loads and varying program usage. However, there is a way for you to check while the system is running to see if it is congested due to memory bottlenecks or not.

Check how much memory is being used

Simply, start up the Task Manager, which is Windows’ way of showing you what is going on in your system.

To start the Task Manager, right click on the bottom tool bar where there is nothing (do not right click on any icons that are there) and then click on ‘Start Task Manager’ (Windows 7) or ‘Task Manager’ (Windows 10). Clicking on this will start the Task Manager and will put a little active icon (if changes based on CPU usage) in the lower right hand corner of your screen (not in an application window). This will depict the CPU utilization at any instant in time. The more it is lit up, the more the CPU is being used.

We will stick to the supposition that the system slowdown is due to a lack of memory and not because some application has decided to hog the CPU (which some browsers can do). The Task Manager looks different between Windows 7 and Windows 10.

• In Windows 7 (where just about everything for system management wise is simpler), click on the tab in Task Manager that says ‘Processes’. There are sub headings within this tab, and these just put the data shown in order based on that heading. Task Manager comes with the default of ‘Image Name’, which simply means the list is in alphabetic order, which is the way it should be normally. There is a summation at the very bottom of the Task Manager window, one is about the CPU utilization, and the other is the memory usage.

• Windows 10 Task Manager is a bit different from the Windows 7 version, but essentially holds and shows similar data. For the Windows 10 Task Manager, it comes up in ‘Processes’, but the order of this is very arbitrary, and it is hard to find anything in this tab. The tab here selected should be ‘Details,’ which shows everything that is currently running on the computer in the same fashion as the Windows 7 Task Manager. In Windows 10, the CPU and memory utilization info are displayed toward the top right and not at the bottom as is done in Windows 7.

In both cases, the memory percentage in use is the key here. How important the memory percentage in us shown will depend on the systems total memory. A system with only 4GB of memory (the minimum standard 5-7 years ago) showing 75% memory utilized will more than like be thrashing with swapping since 25% is 1GB, which is not very much memory today at all! So, big programs are likely to make this system thrash with swapping. On the other hand, if your computer has 32GB of memory, then at 75% utilized, this leaves 8GB of memory available, which is plenty, and therefore there is likely no memory swapping going on at all.

Estimating memory needs

Trying to estimate how much memory you need? Here are some general guidelines:

1. Today’s minimum memory should start at 8GB (not 4GB as it did in the recent past), due to all the applications getting larger and becoming less memory concerned, and with the tendency to constantly expand over time (they tend to not give back to the system temporary memory usage).

2. If you are a fairly heavy user on the computer (more than 6-8 icons of opened applications at the bottom, with a rich mixture of applications, go to at least 12GB or 16GB of memory.

Installing memory

In desktops, this is quite easy to do, but it is a bit more involved with laptops. Desktop memory (DIMM or DRAM) comes in 2GB, 4GB, 8GB, and 16GB memory sticks (yes, they look like flat sticks!). Laptop memory (SODIMMS) comes in the same granularity as desktop memory. With laptops, memory comes preloaded with 4GB, or 8GB, or 12GB or 16GB of memory. Laptops typically have only 2 memory slots, and hence can achieve up to 16GB of memory. Almost all of today’s laptops come with Laptop memory that can range from 4GB to 8GB to 12GB to 16GB (in increments of 4GB). A few high end laptops can go all the way up to 32GB of memory (not many), but these have 4 memory slots.

Laptop memory is called SODIMMS, and desktop memory is just Dimms or DRAM. Laptop memory is almost always more expensive. It is also harder to install. On the older laptops, there was a panel that you could unscrew on the bottom of the laptop with a small screwdriver, and just slip it in another SODIMM. In newer laptops, however, manufacturers have removed the user replaceable battery and the access to the memory section as well, making the bottom one solid piece, so you would have to remove the back panel for these, which for most people is just not doable. So, buy your laptop with as much memory as you can get, and afford!

If you have an older laptop....

Some older laptops allowed you to lift up the existing memory to be able to add or insert the new ones. But there was a tendency for the manufacturers to install two smaller memory SODIMMS, since two memory stick are almost always less money than one of the equivalent total size. This makes it more expensive for you to upgrade because you would have to replace what is there since there were no open memory slots. For instance, a 4GB laptop may have had two 2GB memory sticks installed (making it cheaper than just one 4GB memory SODIMM stick), and to get to a max of 8GB, you would have to replace both of the existing memory sticks with two 4GB SODIMM stick, thus achieving the 8GB memory total. The ‘better’ laptops would come with one 4GB memory SODIMM, and all you have to do to increase memory is add another one! This same issue applies to laptops that can go up to 16GB of memory. If it currently has only 8GB of memory – perhaps there are two 4GB SODIMMS. You would then have to replace both 4GB SODIMMS with 8GB ones to achieve the 16GB total. A laptop with 12GB of memory will have an 8GB SODIMM and a 4GB one. Upgrading this to 16GB means throwing away the 4GB and replacing it with an 8GB SODIMM.

Just remember...

One last word on computer memory - just as systems change over time, getting better, faster, etc., so does memory. The computer industry trucks along with a certain type of memory for all computers made then, but eventually a new type of memory is made to meet certain new computer requirements and capabilities. Currently, there is DDR3 memory for the older computers, and everything made in about the last 4-5 years uses DDR4 memory. No doubt, one day there will be DDR5! The point here is that you must stick to the type of memory with which the computer came.

Not enough memory? Try Task Manager

One final word on the Task Manager - if you think you are having a memory issue at any moment in time, you can always ‘kill’ any application running that is using a lot of memory, or for that matter kill one that is using a lot of CPU as well. Most of today’s applications continue to grow and grow by continually using short term memory, and never giving it back to the system. This includes Windows! Browsers do the same thing, and generally continue to grow. The list given in the Task Manager shows the amount of memory each process is using. You can usually right click on an entry that is using a lot of memory (or the CPU) (this is relative to the amount of memory the system has to begin with) and select ‘End Process’ or ‘End Task’ in Windows 10 or Windows 7, and then ‘OK’ on the next window. Most browser windows and even the Windows processes will reset themselves and reduce their memory usage greatly, then start up again just fine.

Warning!

Do not end a task or end a process with Task Manager if you are updating something on your system! While your system may be fine, you risk your system not updating correctly or programs working correctly.