Sudden increase in RAM usage?

[Lemon]

Just a heads up, I'm gonna say "RAM usage" quite a lot so bear with me.

So, I've noticed that my computers RAM usage has suddenly increased and I don't know why. I wouldn't have much problems with it but it affects my gaming sessions. Let's say I'm playing Dark Souls III and I'm browsing the internet at the same time looking up information about items, weapons etc. or maybe listening to a podcast while getting thrrough an area and all of the sudden my browser closes/crashes and if I am using steams own web browser it crashes the game itself as well.

Currently my RAM usage is at 75% and I had no apps open, I just turned my PC on and opened task manager to check the RAM usage. before this sudden change my RAM usage after turning on my PC was about 20 - 25% so I don't think this is normal for the RAM usage to just jump up by tens of percents, I even have a few apps now set to sleep until I open them.

Does anyone have any idea what this could be about? I checked my system multiple times incase of a virus or other malicious program. I did some cleaning and deleted unnecessary programs, I even checked some programs that I didn't know anything about with the Security Task Manager (STM). What could this be all about?

I appreciate all advice I can get, thanks in advance!

[Grogwind]

Did task manager show any programs/process’s using large amounts of memory?

[Lemon]

Originally posted by Grogwind:

Did task manager show any programs/process’s using large amounts of memory?

I currently have steam and Chrome open and it says that Chrome is using > 550 MB and steam is using > 110 MB, those are currently the highest values showing up. All the others after those two are using < 20 MB.

I'm not sure if Chrome is supposed to use that much RAM, I've read a few articles but they say it's normal but I can't tell if it's true or false.

While I've been writing this, Chromes usage has gone from 550 to 615 MB. Total usage is now 86%

And just to clear things out I have 8 GB of RAM and the "memory" part in the task manager is RAM right, I'm not being an idiot?

[ReBoot]

Youre not an idiot, memory and RAM are synonymous in the task manager.
Chrome eating ridiculous amounts of RAM is a well-known fact.
You can sort the peocess list by RAM/memory usage. Do it and see what else is eating all the RAM.
Also, the task manager shows a detailed RAM usage breakdown. Check that.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

Youre not an idiot, memory and RAM are synonymous in the task manager.
Chrome eating ridiculous amounts of RAM is a well-known fact.
You can sort the peocess list by RAM/memory usage. Do it and see what else is eating all the RAM.

I have it sort processes by memory usage, Google Chrome and Steam are the only ones using more than 100 MB, the others are barely getting over 20 MB. A few programs that follow google and steam are:
- Task manager: 21,9 MB
- Avast Behaviour Shield: 21,6 MB
- Avast service (32 bit): 18,3 MB
- Windows Explorer: 17,6 MB
- Service Host: Diagnostic Policy Service: 16,1 MB

I have no idea what changed so suddenly. Just a few days ago my memory usage was 40 - 50% while in-game and now it's nearly 100%

[ReBoot]

Maybe its just the game itself using the memory? When you you say "in-game", have you checoed with the game running? Which brings me to the next topic. Drivers eat RAM too. If you, for example, switched from using the dedicated GPU to iGPU for whatever reasomn, then its driver will use heaps of RAM. Check the memory usage breakdown in the task manager.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

Maybe its just the game itself using the memory? When you you say "in-game", have you checoed with the game running? Which brings me to the next topic. Drivers eat RAM too. If you, for example, switched from using the dedicated GPU to iGPU for whatever reasomn, then its driver will use heaps of RAM. Check the memory usage breakdown in the task manager.

I just opened DS3 to check how much memory it uses and Task Manager is saying ~1000 MB and now the total usage is at 90%. I decided to open Chrome too and it's using 300-ish MB, M usage at 94%. Closed both Chrome and DS3, total usage at 76%.

But about the iGPU, what is it and how is it different to dedicated GPU?
Task manager shows a few things related to the GPU driver and the current version is Radeon 18.8.2 - Up to date. But the things that Task manager shows are:
- AMD User Experience Program Master (M usage 9,9 MB)
- Radeon Settings: Host Application (M usage 9,7 MB)
- AMD User Experience Program Data Uploader (M usage 3 MB)
- AMD User Experience Program User Session Info Collector (M usage 2 MB)
- AMD ReLive: Host Application (M usage 1,8 MB)
- AMD User Experience Program Launcher (M usage 0,4 MB)
- AMD External Events Client Module (M usage 0,3 MB)
- AMD User Experience Program GPU data collector (M usage 0,3 MB)
- AMD ReLive: Desktop Overlay (M usage 0,2 MB)
- AMD external Events Service Module (M usage 0,1 MB)

[ReBoot]

I want you to check the mwmory usage breakdown as in "physical memory cached, kernel memory paged" and all that stuff, not by process. ALL process memory is user-mode memory, i want ypu to check if a kernel-mode driver happens to eat loads of memory.
iGPUs are different as in "they suck for gaming". One of the downsides is that they have next to no dedicated VRAM so the driver has to allocate system RAM to put graphics data somewhere.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

I want you to check the mwmory usage breakdown as in "physical memory cached, kernel memory paged" and all that stuff, not by process. ALL process memory is user-mode memory, i want ypu to check if a kernel-mode driver happens to eat loads of memory.
iGPUs are different as in "they suck for gaming". One of the downsides is that they have next to no dedicated VRAM so the driver has to allocate system RAM to put graphics data somewhere.

Ok so I'm assuming that the memory usage breakdown is the "Performance" tab in Task Manager?

In use (compressed): 6,6 GB (112 MB)
Available: 1,4 GB
Commited: 8,4/14,2 GB
Cached: 1,4 GB
Paged pool: 105 MB
Non-paged pool: 4,4 GB
Free: 60 MB

Am I now giving the right info or am I still in the wrong place?
Also how do I know if I am using a iGPU instead of dedicated GPU? Also what is a kernel mode driver and how do I check if it's using a lot of memory?

PS: Sorry for asking so many questions, I'm not very knowledgeable when it comes to this kind of stuff.

[Donna Pinciotti]

Depending how how many tabs and what you have open in chrome it can take up a couple of gigs for.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by Donna Pinciotti:

Depending how how many tabs and what you have open in chrome it can take up a couple of gigs for.

I usually have only one or two tabs open (Youtue and x game wiki/forum)

[ReBoot]

This is the right information. Now i just need to read up on the exact meanings of those terms as im a guy who doesnt keep every detail memorized all the time.
As for iGPU, that was more of anample case. You may not even have one. Does your laptop have hybrid graphics?
As for the modes, read up on https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protection_ring
Thats a good overview. By the way, thumbs up for asking questions! Youve no idea how i hate it when people prefer ignoring terms they dont know blindly assuming that wont be important. Which it is. You asking questions means you have a working brain. You may lack factual knowledge, but the ability and willingness to to learn trumps pure factual knowledge any day of the week.

By the way, ive read it up after posting. Your non-paged pool is ridiculously high. Something is eating a huge lot of kernel memory. No wonder you dont have a process eating all this up. Did you install any drivers yourself or have you let Windows handle them? If you installed them yourself, check for driver updates.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

This is the right information. Now i just need to read up on the exact meanings of those terms as im a guy who doesnt keep every detail memorized all the time.
As for iGPU, that was more of anample case. You may not even have one. Does your laptop have hybrid graphics?
As for the modes, read up on https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protection_ring
Thats a good overview. By the way, thumbs up for asking questions! Youve no idea how i hate it when people prefer ignoring terms they dont know blindly assuming that wont be important. Which it is. You asking questions means you have a working brain. You may lack factual knowledge, but the ability and willingness to to learn trumps pure factual knowledge any day of the week.

I'm currently using my desktop computer, I rarely use my laptop for gaming, maybe when visiting friends or something like that. Another question, what are hybrid graphics, do you mean the company or something else? If you wanted to know what my graphics card is, it's Radeon R9 280X, got it for free from a friend as my first graphics card, though I have noticed it has started to slowly "die" I think, so I'm looking for a new card, I'm thinking about getting a GTX 1060/70.
Could my GPU affect the memory usage, somehow?

Btw, thanks for helping me out. It's always nice when someone is willing to use their own time to help me out with my stupid problems.

[ReBoot]

Your problems arent stupid and, let me emohasize that, youre not behaving in a stupid way. Youre behaving like a smart mind lackimg factual knowledge. Which is the perfect way to ask for help. So its fine.
Hybrid graphocs is using 2 GPUs, a lame integrated one and a powerful discrete one to harness the advantages of both. Only laptops use that though, your desktop doesnt have it for sure.
Now back to your peoblem. A driver is at fault. Have you installed any drivers manually? If yes, see if theres updates.

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

By the way, ive read it up after posting. Your non-paged pool is ridiculously high. Something is eating a huge lot of kernel memory. No wonder you dont have a process eating all this up. Did you install any drivers yourself or have you let Windows handle them? If you installed them yourself, check for driver updates.

I installed my GPU drivers myself and I recently checked updates for drivers with Avast and it did update a few drivers. I'm gonna check for updates again but I'll use windows' own device manager. Other than that, is there anything else I could do?

[Lemon]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

Your problems arent stupid and, let me emohasize that, youre not behaving in a stupid way. Youre behaving like a smart mind lackimg factual knowledge. Which is the perfect way to ask for help. So its fine.
Hybrid graphocs is using 2 GPUs, a lame integrated one and a powerful discrete one to harness the advantages of both. Only laptops use that though, your desktop doesnt have it for sure.
Now back to your peoblem. A driver is at fault. Have you installed any drivers manually? If yes, see if theres updates.

I just checked for updates and windows found one, it's an update for itself, called "2018-09 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 1803 for x64-based Systems (KB4457128)".

I didn't find any other updates but I'll double check after this one has installed.