Abnormally high memory usage on Windows 10

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I finished building my first computer and I've had this problem for about 2 months now. I first noticed the high memory usage when I tried playing GTA V. I have 8GB of RAM. I would launch GTA V through Steam and close all other programs, but a low memory warning would pop up and block my view and GTA V would crash almost immediately after the first storyline scene.

A friend of mine told me that I shouldn't be having this low memory problem and advised me to see what Task Manager had to say. Google Chrome (program using the most memory somehow) seems to be sitting around with a few hundred MB with extremely high memory usage. As of now, the high memory usage problem has worsened to the point where I can have one Google Chrome tab for a random Youtube video, and the browser will crash because of high memory usage.

After searching around for a solution to my problem, I tried using poolmon and found that "drivers\netio.sys" is using the most memory (around 4.7 GB). However, I don't know what to do with this information.

How can I fix this?

Joe

Posted 2015-10-16T21:47:52.973

Reputation: 43

Here's a screenshot of the memory usage error: http://puu.sh/kMJHC/dc26ab16ec.png

– Joe – 2015-10-16T21:48:39.670

That error is caused by low virtual memory... – Ramhound – 2015-10-16T21:50:54.093

If you know what driver is using lots of memory use the appropriate software to NOT load it, something like Autoruns, would get the job done. – Ramhound – 2015-10-16T21:52:53.290

This seems like a good time to download Process Explorer to get an idea of what process(es) are using all your memory.

– a CVn – 2015-10-16T21:54:27.017

1@Ramhound no, he has a 5.2GB non paged pool memory leak – magicandre1981 – 2015-10-17T06:32:50.943

I'd wonder why use a 32-bit app on a 64-bit OS – Tetsujin – 2015-10-17T13:11:54.277

@Tetsujin - There might not be a 64-bit version of the application. It was 10 years until Microsoft by default changed how Office would be installed due to compatibility reasons. Given the amount of memory a 32-bit process can use on a 64-bit operating system, depending on the program, there might not be a valid reason to make it a 64-bit process. – Ramhound – 2015-10-17T17:18:17.480

@Ramhound - I guess I'm just too used to Mac, where 32-bit is now the exception rather than the rule – Tetsujin – 2015-10-17T17:35:44.413

@Tetsujin - It is the exception on Windows that an application isn't offered for both. 9/10 AAA video games that have been released in 2015 have been 64-bit only applications. The majority of 32-bit applications that exist only exist because their author's simply do not offer it, for instance, any of the Sysinternal tools – Ramhound – 2015-10-17T17:59:31.670

@Ramhound - it helps that on Mac there simply is no 32-bit version of the OS to have to dual-code for. Anyway, my initial mistake was just that, an error - I have no desire to play platform wars, so I shall gracefully retire from the discussion. Thanks for your input :) – Tetsujin – 2015-10-17T18:06:23.680

@Tetsujin - I could careless about platforms. There is a reason 32-bit applications still exist though – Ramhound – 2015-10-17T18:28:03.847

@Michael Kjörling Explorer shows this: puu.sh/l2IoH/3395230de6.png – Joe – 2015-10-30T02:31:28.137

Answers

3

You must use xperf to trace what causes the usage. Install the WPT from the Windows 10 SDK, open a cmd.exe as admin and run this:

xperf -on PROC_THREAD+LOADER+POOL -stackwalk PoolAlloc+PoolFree+PoolAllocSession+PoolFreeSession -BufferSize 2048 -MaxFile 1024 -FileMode Circular && timeout -1 && xperf -d C:\pool.etl

capture 30 -60s of the grow. Open the ETL with WPA.exe, add the Pool graphs to the analysis pane.

Put the pooltag column at first place and add the stack column. Now load the symbols inside WPA.exe and expand the stack of the tag that you saw in poolmon. Now find other 3rd party drivers which you can see in the stack. Look for driver updates to fix it.

According to the ETL file, the high pool usage comes from the Wfpn tag.

This tag is used by Windows Network Data Usage Monitoring, which was added in Windows 8 and also caused memory leaks there.

To disable the driver, run this command from a cmd.exe, started as admin:

sc config NDU start= disabled

After a reboot the issue should be gone.

magicandre1981

Posted 2015-10-16T21:47:52.973

Reputation: 86 560

Thanks, everyone. I'll try all the suggested methods to fix my problem. – Joe – 2015-10-19T05:05:28.417

Do I capture 30-60s of the grow by using the program called "NotMyFault" (mentioned in the video in the link for xperf)? – Joe – 2015-10-30T02:37:15.240

And this is what was returned after I ran the command you provided: http://puu.sh/l2KxE/eb804d5f4b.png. I'm not sure what to do from here.

– Joe – 2015-10-30T02:47:09.597

the output shows that everything was fine. Now zip/RAR the file C:\pool.etl to reduce the file size and upload the ZIP/RAR. – magicandre1981 – 2015-10-30T05:15:02.697

@Joe have you uploaded the zipped ETL file? – magicandre1981 – 2015-11-03T18:12:46.737

Yes, I have zipped the ETL file. – Joe – 2015-11-09T01:55:26.177

https://mega.nz/#%21EQQXWC4B%21QDmW1gQr_hQW3hLt8VN661-mzrBC6IQ9hoVLrP9ZgMY – Joe – 2015-11-09T02:02:22.277

ok, I added what I see from the ETL to the answer – magicandre1981 – 2015-11-09T05:21:49.220

Asked: 2015-10-16T21:47:52.973

Viewed: 3 035 times

Active: 2015-11-09T05:21:29.823