How much RAM?

[ozcoltsfan]

I am not real computer savvy but I have had a Toshiba Satellite for about a year. The last 2-3 months it started to really slow down and work poorly. All I really do is browse the internet, word and download video's occasionally. Oh but I also have this one program that I need on 24/7 which may take up some memory.

I have Vista and had 2x500mb RAM. So I looked in to it and went out and got a Kingston 2GB Ram and for about a week I had no problems, my laptop had a new lease on life. Then it started to slow down again. It's still better than it was but not by a great deal.

Should I get another 2GB for Vista? To make 4GB? Will this allow it to run smoothly and have more than 3 applications open at once without it starting to struggle?

Any help is appreciated, Thank

 

[seanoff]

its windows.

you need to backup you data etc, format and repartition your HDD re-install everything, restore your backups and off you go. It will be much faster.

There's all sorts of things going on, the HDD has data all over the place, the registry is probably a bit rooted, etc etc.

Sorry, but this is the only way to really fix it.

 

[giantroo]

If data is all over the place, do a defragmentation to clean up the disk.

If you do a full backup and repartition, use your Vista cd and restore your backup. That saves you reinstalling everything again.

 

[sblack]

4GB would be wasted as well, unless your using 64bit, which I doubt. You could throw in a 1GB stick, but do the things the guys above said. Defrag and so forth

 

[spitlizard]

its windows.

you need to backup you data etc, format and repartition your HDD re-install everything, restore your backups and off you go. It will be much faster.

There's all sorts of things going on, the HDD has data all over the place, the registry is probably a bit rooted, etc etc.

Sorry, but this is the only way to really fix it.

Steady on, there's plenty of things to do before taking the drastic measures above.

1) Download, update and run malwarebytes and spybot ( there are others but I reckon these are the two best)
http://malwarebytes.org/
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html

2) Download, update then run a registry cleaner called eusing (freeware)
http://www.eusing.com/free_registry_cleaner/registry_cleaner.htm

3) finally do a defrag of your HDD, after this if your system is still slow then I would look to upgrading RAM. For the record, if you are using a 32bit OS then the highest you can go to is 3G I think.

 

[ozcoltsfan]

Thanks for the good advice!