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Hi guys,

I’m sorry, but a new problem has arisen. We now cannot get ADSL sync over the line although our telephones are working. You know what it’s like trying to get repairmen over Easter so we have to wait on the phone comapny, which looks like it may be ten days or more. So, for the time being, we have no internet connection at all (I’m writing this from the next-door neighbour’s machine).

When we have connection again, I’ll continue with this if that’s okay? In the meantime, thank you to all who responded and for all your great suggestions. It’s appreciated.

Brian

I don’t quite buy the memory limitation idea, yet. I’m running Windows 7 Pro 32 Bit at work with 2GB of RAM. I run as many as 10 programs at the same time, even including a Windows XP VM on VirtualBox that’s alocated 512MB of RAM. Yes, I run into the limitations of the 2GB a lot. I’ve been running this config for over a year and its never crashed, nor has it exhibited symptoms as those described by Brian. Simply closing programs gets memory back, and system performance back. I only shut it down on Friday nights before I leave for the day.

That said, I still think there may be issue with the page file, or some program that has an out of control memory leak. It is not unheard of to have a corupt page file. Although I personally have not seen one for a very long time. Brian, instead of setting a static page file, set it to Zero. That will force Windows to ignore the page file. After reboot, go to Explorer and look for pagefile.sys off of C:. If its there, delete it. Then go back and reset it so that Windows creates and manages a pagefile. If that doesn’t fix it, then you may want to open Task Manager before running one of these down loaders, then clicking the Processes tab and sorting by memory usage. It’ll change dynamically as you are working. You might be able to see what’s eating up memory.

Thanks to both of you, Satrow and Doc,

I’m going to try all of your suggestions but, Doc, something you wrote reminded me of something I forgot to mention originally and which might hold a clue:

You wrote: “simply closing problems gets memory back” … which, of course, should be true. However, that doesn’t happen for me in this scenario. Even if I manage to close down the downloader before it quite gets to the stage where the PC locks up, that memory is not returned, nor is the memory returned from any other process closed while the downloaders are running with actively downloaded queues. I’ve never heard of anything like that before, especially with Windows 7, which is why I’m so stumped.

I also didn’t mention that I know it isn’t a hardware issue per se – e.g. RAM modules, CPU or video card – because I have XP installed in a separate partition on that disk and the problem never occurs there. As a matter of fact, I have been reduced to using XP whenever I have a big queue to download until I get this problem solved. Of course, it could possibly be a driver issue – I do have an Nvidia card and the drivers are notorious for resources issues – but there have been no blue screens nor anything appearing in the event logs or Device Manager. It’s exasperating.

Brian

Check through the event viewer.
There has got to be an error generated somewhere as a result that may shed some light on this.

Thank you Clint,

as I wrote above, there is never anything in any of the event logs which is even remotely relevant to the problem. It is all so weird: why just with those three downloaders and only when they have a large enough running queue – say about 20-30 200MB downloads – to trigger the problem? It beats me.

Brian

I’m not yet convinced it’s the lack of page file; I’ve a netbook here running W7 that has no PF (SSD) and when it hits the RAM limit, the program requesting more RAM simply disappears without a trace. No errors, nothing.

Start > Run > Dxdiag will give you the current PF usage.

Thank you, Satrow, for the Run shortcut.

I agree that it sounds like there is no paging file. Did you check to verify that Windows is in fact managing the page file? It might be worthwhile to set a static page file up, reboot, run it for a while, then change it back to letting Windows manage it.

The second thought I had is turning off real time scanning on your security programs and seeing what the behavior is.

Thank you, Doc. I will try that static page file idea. In the meantime, checking shows that Windows is managing the current page file. That real time scanner idea is a good one, but I’ve already tried it. It made no difference.

Brian

Lack of system resources could mean much more than RAM; Handles, Threads, TCP/IP, etc. connections all have limits. Try limiting the number of connection the download managers use, maybe down to 25% of the current settings and test again. If it still happens, open Task Manager to the Performance tab and make a note of the listed usage under the System panel, bottom right. Then open the Resource Monitor from the button below and check for the number of TCP connections in the graph under the Network tab.

There are probably more clues you could use to track down the problem in the System and Application logs.

Thank you, Satrow,

I will try the limiting of threads and connections idea, although my intuition tells me that, particularly in Win 7 which automatically manages and optimises connections, the number of connections in the download manager should not matter.

One of the most frustraing things about this weird problem is that there is never any indications in any of the event logs of anything even remotely relevant, not even when the system eventually freezes up and I have to hard-boot.

Brian

@joeperez and @tedshemyers. It was from reading the Microsoft documentation at their support site and through my Technet membership that I discovered the fact that KB971033 is included in SP1 so I am not guilty – as charged – of not reading about it. In any case, that was not what I meant by “stealth”. I was referring to the fact that an update which was previously offered as an optional and refusable update is now included in SP1 with no such option, and is not an update which is necessary for the smooth or secure running of the system, and was motivated by the fact that Susan Bradley, if I remember correctly, in her original review at the time of KB971033 more or less recommended not installing it.

It seemed to me that other Windows Secrets readers who took that recommendation from her then, and who had not read the documentation, might like to know that it is included now.

@tedshemyers: “leaping to conclusion often result in hard landing” ~~ (Charlie Chan)

I notice that no-one has yet commented on the fact that Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 includes KB971033 – the Windows Activation Technologies update – an update that was previuosly offered as an ‘optional’ update which people could pass up on installing. In Service Pack 1, its installation is silent, automatic and irreversible.

I am not by any means advocating software piracy, but Microsoft should not offer or include updates of that type by ‘stealth’. Who could forget the misery inflicted on countless legitimate users of Vista by similar WGA updates which wrongfully illegitimized their systems and which necessitated for them extreme measures, sometimes lasting for weeks, to get activated again, a problem still going on by all accounts. Based on that experience, I was not prepared to install KB971033 when first offered, even though my system is legitimate, and am danged if I will allow it in SP1. I wish there were a way to manually update SP1 so that updates and hotfixes which were previously not accepted could be bypassed. Besides KB971033, there are a number of inclusions in SP1 which are problematic.

Thanks StuartR and Me Too. I will give Acronis True Image a try. Also, Me Too, I found your response re Updating Drivers to be very balanced. Thanks for that. Both of you have a wonderful Holiday Season and a very Joyful and Prosperous New Year.

moon1130

Thank you for the good wishes, moon1130, and I wish you all the best, too. It’s great to be of some help, sometimes, to nice people like you.

Brian De B

Thank you Brian, your posts is one of the very best I’ve seen. You explained things so clearly and I will take your advice and remove my registry cleaner and not install RegScanner.

It’s going to be a pleasure having you a member of this forum and I look forward to hearing from you again.

Gloria

Gloria, that is a lovely thing to write and I thank you very much for it. Here’s wishing you (and your Hosts file – heheh) and all you love a safe and wonderful Christmas and New Year season.

Brian De B

Do you have any suggestions on how to perform an inventory to identify which of my installed programs rely on which version of .Net?

Mate, that is a VERY good question and I wish I had an answer for you. As far as I know, there is no list somewhere of those developers who have incoporated .Net technologies in their applications, much less which versions of .Net they might have used. I am also unaware of any developer who has written an application that would provide such an inventory on a case-by-case basis (or any other basis), but you have certainly prodded the little gray cells of mine to look into developing such an app if it is even possible (I can see nightmare scenarios of reverse-engineering popping up).

All I can suggest is that you get busy with Bing or Google search and scour the web for ideas, lists and notations. Try also searching the Microsoft site and the Microsoft Developer Network site (MSDN) for anything related to .Net. You could also look at the websites of all the third-party processes you have installed. If .Net Framework reliance was built in, the developers will mention it in their web pages.

I’d also suggest that, from here on in, whenever you install something new that relies on a particular version of .Net Framework technology, that you make a note of it at the time.

I wish I could be more help, but thank you for the interesting question.

Brian De B

I have read a little about Acronis True Image. Is it easy to use? Does a user’s guide come with it?

I regard Acronis TrueImage Home as one of those absolutely essential Windows applications that everyone should have on their machines. The most current version, TrueImage Home 2010, is very intuitive to use, very stable and also includes a couple of very useful extras, particularly the ‘Try and Decide’ Module which works, in effect, like a virtualisation sandbox so that you can try new drivers, applications, tweaks and so on before you decide to keep changes that will be added to your real system. If the moderators will allow the mention of another website, I happened to notice that BitsDuJour will have Acronis TrueImage Home 2010 on offer for a 51% reduction to $24.99USD on December 22. BitsDuJour is not the seller, Acronis is, and all transactions are made with the developers sites of software on offer. BitsDuJour merely hosts the offers. http://www.bitsdujour.com/previews/

I endorse what Stuart R wrote.

##On the subject of updating drivers, while “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is generally good advice and, in most situations, can be followed, in the case of drivers it should not be set in concrete. Those drivers which come with the system, from Microsoft and its partners, are being updated all the time and if you subscribe to having your system updated by Microsoft through Windows/Microsoft Update (as of course, being a canny PC user, you do) you will go through at least one driver update under the hood at least every Patch Tuesday. There are good reasons to update drivers, including taking advantage of new technologies introduced by vendors through constant testing and in response to bug reports, security updates and enhancements, conflict resolution – that is, discovered conflicts with other third-party software or Microsoft software – speed enhancements and so on. The best advice is to bear in mind that old saying quoted, but also to do a little research of respected blogs and forums where new driver updates are analysed and either recommended or put down as inconsequential. Remember, Bing search is your friend (Google Search used to be before it became the main portal to the Empire of Satan – lol) and so, whenever a new driver appears for an important piece of technology you have installed or an item of peripheral hardware (almost always worth updating when available, especially video cards and printers) search in Bing (or Google if you’re brave) for what others are saying and make up your own mind. (Sorry to conflict a little with advice by the Moderator but the original poster did ask for opinions on this.)

I hope this helps,

Brian De B

Tried Avast to check for any Trojans and found no viruses.

Ran Spy Bot, Spy Blaster, up dated them and ran them again and found nothing.

Tried using another browser such as Firefox and Flock etc and still ran into the same problem.

I have the latest updates to Adobe and Java.

Could this be a sign that some hardware in my PC is failing?

Hi Paulie, it’s very unlikely to be an incipient hardware problem because, if it were, you would see these types of errors pop up more frequently and with all sorts of applications, instead of being limited to a few specific instances as you state.

This is puzzling. If the problem were confined to IE, I would almost bet money on it being attributable to a badly-behaving third-party add-on or Toolbar in IE, but you say that the identical problem happens in Firefox and Flock.

(1) Could you post a screenshot of the error message you get, next time the problem happens in Firefox, please, as well as the information from the Event Viewer, as you did with IE?

(2) Also, as a long shot, could you tell us whether this problem has only recently arisen and if you were formerly able to access Google Earth and Maps in IE and Ff? If so, is there anything third-party you have installed recently which is common to both Firefox and IE – such as an add-on, toolbar, bookmarks synchronizer, link-checker, or like that (something that would have installed both IE and Firefox versions)? Perhaps a Java update? (Come to think of it, a recent Java update, or Flash viewer update, could well be very likely candidates as the problem.)

(3) I assume you are using legitimate instances of Google Earth and Maps (if you also have them as apps on your hard drive). If so, have there been recent updates to those you remember, which could also be the culprit.

It is unlikely to be a malware problem, but on the off-chance, try running a free scan from a grown-up security application. Malwarebytes Anti-malware has a free version (MBAM http://www.malwarebytes.org/) as does SuperAntiSpyware (SAS http://superantispyware.com/). ESET also has a free online scan (which will require an Active-X enabled applet) and it would be VERY hard to find a better security application (in fact, I don’t think it can be beaten). http://www.eset.com/onlinescan/

You could also run a HijackThis log and post it here if any of those three security apps I mentioned find any problems – even if they eliminate them. The HijackThis log will show exactly what is running on your system and what may be causing conflicts. HijackThis download

Good luck and I hope these suggestions help.

Brian De B

I looked at RegScanner and was pleasantly surprised at what it does. I’m thinking about giving it a whirl, thanks again for suggesting I try it.

I found Hosts and it was read only which I changed. I got a message that I needed to choose a program to open Hosts, after selecting Notepad the file opened but I don’t know how to delete them using Notepad.

Please post the method I should use.

Gloria

Gloria, please don’t use RegScanner or any other so-called third-party registry ‘cleaner’. Certainly never pay for one. You don’t need them – they are unnecessary, often counter-productive, occasionally very dangerous and not worth the price (even the free ones). While the legitimate ones – those that do not contain boatloads of malware and/or adware – are mostly harmless (but even they can be dangerous when used by anyone who is not registry/process/API-IDE savvy) it is a fact that they will do nothing that your Windows system does not already do, all by itself, without help and much more efficiently and safely than any third-party cleaner can do. The bad ones – when they don’t contain nasties – will claim to have found ‘hundreds’ of ‘bad registry entries’ (which is the equivalent of third-rate security software boastfully claiming to have fixed ‘hundreds of malware infestations’ when all they’ve done is murder poor, innocent and harmless cookies) and then, after scaring you, make you pay up before they’ll fix those ‘problems’. I promise you, you don’t need ANY third-party registry cleaners. The ‘problems’ they were originally needed to fix disappeared with the introduction of Windows XP and now with Vista and Windows 7, all three of which are more than capable – and designed for – fixing themselves. The thing that commercial registry cleaners do best is pick your pocket. Resist.

On the Hosts file, if you must edit it, open it in Notepad, delete the entries using the normal Notepad editing methods (backspace, highlight-select and delete, etc) and press Control+S (for Save) on the keyboard or choose ‘Save’ from the File menu.

It would be useful to know the purpose of the Host file: as others have said, the entries are IP addresses for specific websites, plus text commenting in specific places and formats. The IP address ‘127.0.0.1’ is, in effect, your own machine. So that, any URL in the host file which is pointed at 127.0.0.1 will not leave the machine for the wider network – this is often done to prevent certain applications or processes ‘phoning home’. Instead of DNS lookup finding the IP they are trying to connect to out there in the net, they are pointed back at 127.0.0.1 and so the external connection at the application-prescribed IP is never made. In other cases, some malware can ‘hijack’ the Host file so that when, for example, a security application tries to update, the malware has set it up that that application will go to a bogus address as identified in the IP on the left hand side (as is 127.0.0.1). In yet more cases, it may sometimes be more efficient to setup in the Host file an IP to which a certain application always connects – useful if difficulties are experienced with DNS lookups.

It is the case that your PC will work just as well as it always does and connect to the web through whatever DNS lookup addresses are set in networking controls or your modem/router if there is nothing at all in your Host file (other than the very first 127.0.0.1 example). Unless you, yourself, put any of those entries in the Host file, I would delete them because whatever did is up to no good. I would then run a very thorough system scan by your security applications (ESET for preference) and keep an eye on the Host file. If entries re-appear without your intervention, and without your security application alerting you, then you have a problem (inefficient security software being part of that problem).

Good luck,

Brian De B

Wow! Thanks for that detailed reply. One last question. Do you know if one of the .NETs should have installed the Windows Communication Foundation (WCF). It is installed on my notebook and both that and the desktop are running XP SP2. They both had .NET1.1 and 2.0 installed but WCF is not on the desktop. And I wonder why 3.5 was failing to install saying 3.0 was not installed if they are independent of each other (and that’s another stupid thing). Thank again.

Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) is part of the .Net Frameworks core technologies and is always installed if .Net (any version) is correctly installed.

May I ask, have you ever installed and run any of the many so-called ‘registry-cleaner’ applications (those that claim to ‘clean up’ your registry, tweak it, optimize it, etc)? The reason I ask is that these dreadful applications are notorious for removing essential temporary entries that various instances of .Net create between sessions and which are needed for .Net versions not only to work properly but also to install or update properly. When you add to the complexity of the mix the added issues of installing Service Packs (I notice you are only at SP2? why?**) and their impact on .Net installations, mixing the mash with a third-party application rooting around in the Registry is a recipe for shedloads of trouble. If you have never used a ‘registry cleaning’ application, then congratulations – you are VERY wise. If you have, please uninstall or at least NEVER use any such third-party application you may have, ever again. Those applications are unnecessary, often are counter-productive, are very often dangerous, and even when free are not worth the price. None of them – no matter how attractive or insistent the advertising or grandiose the claims made for their ‘benefits’.

**on the matter of SP2, is there a special reason why you have not installed the SP3 update? While it is true that if your XP SP2 PC is fully up-to-date with all available security updates, hotfixes and patches, then you pretty much have most of what SP3 will deliver, it is also true that installing SP3 will also give one or two things your system will otherwise not have and, more importantly, will also affect how newer security patches and hotfixes are provided for your system and certain updates for drivers and many third-party applications, too. The SP3 update also makes the relevant changes in the correct order and priorities that JoeP alludes to in his reply. Consider installing SP3, but not until your .Net woes are sorted out and you are happy with the way things are running. If you do eventually install SP3 for XP, my STRONG advice is to download the standalone installer from Microsoft to your hard disk. Create a restore point. Setup a checkdisk startup check as described earlier. Reboot and allow checkdisk to run. When back at your desktop, set another restore point. Reboot into Safe Mode, non-networked. When in Safe Mode, turn off all security applications and any running System Tray/Notification Area background applications (if any launched in Safe Mode – check using Task Manager’s processes tab). Launch the standalone SP3 installer and let it complete. While still in Safe Mode, set up checkdisk again (I know this seems overkill but I promise that ‘an ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure’ is true). Reboot into normal mode allowing checkdisk to complete during startup. Back at your normal desktop make sure that everything is working smoothly, your system will update, and your .Net applications will run. Remember those Restore Points you set? This is where they will be handy if you find any problems. You can restore to one of those two previous points without having to do uninstalls, use cleanup tools, and so on. If you do need to Restore, and then try to install SP3 again, use the same method described here.

Good luck.

Brian De B