I have a new Dell quad core, 2 meg 1066 ram and dual 8800 GTX video cards. (I get a solid 20-30 fps).Here's the Problem:Every now and then, my system crashes due to that "Low memory" warning. I noticed it only happens when I am looking at extenral views (say looking left or right during an approach for an extended time >10 seconds) or looking at the airfield view (Shift ]) when finding my position at the gate. I noticed my system memory uses up 60-65% for FSX when I first start FSX, but each time I look at an external view, it (system memory) builds up by 1-2%. After I quit that view, the system memory stays atthe new level, thus looking at multiple views wil eventually bring me up to 85% of system memory being used and that is the crash point. Any insight on this?? Will 2 GB more of Ram help.

Using Vista on a 32 bit processor?Phil Taylor mentioned those memory issues in a Blog post. It is related to Vista keeping an image of the graphics cards contents shadowed in main memory. That image may take up to 768 MB of your precious RAM! Now the problem is that 32 bit windows limits an application's address space to 2GB. And no more - mot a single bit.The solution is to patch the FSX.exe binary to allow for 3 GB of address space for the application (and to boot Windows with the /3GB switch). That reduces the likelyhood of this out-of-memory situation to occur. But you will need some swap space on HD when having 2GB of system memory only.Alternatively there is a hotfix for Vista that somehow reduces this memory usage greatly for applications that don't actually need it.Blog posting herehttp://blogs.msdn.com/ptaylor/archive/2007...other-ship.aspx

Increase your page file ?A process can never return used memory to the system - though itcan reuse that memory. Will 2Gbytes more help -only if you increase the page file !

Thanks for the responses:1. Yes I am running 32bit Vista2. I ordered 2 GB more of ram for 4 MB totalWill I be OK now?How do I icrease the page file? - I am not too computer savy.Paul

I noticed that 20% of my ram is used for things like the following:These are the biggest hogs.svhost.exeMcshield.exeexplorer.exeSearchIndexer.exeWinMail.exedvm.exeThen FSX takes up 45% more.From the list above, is there anything anyone sees that can be shutoff or eliminated. This computer is only for FSX.

It is "irrelevant" what "dormant" processes use of RAM as theywill get paged out of the system. (That is what the page file isfor !!!) I guess it could be argued thatyou could theoretically hit your page size limit - but unlikelyunless you set the page file too small. You mainlyget a hit when these dormant process do something - so you pauseas many processes as possible. Of course, do not kill processesunless you know exactly what you are doing. Things like crapcleanerwill help - and so will an up to date spam/anti-virus. Careful with the above svhosts.exe : necessary for Dynamic link libraries DLL loading - it is absolutely required; one broken system if you do stop it.mcshield.exe : you run mcafee anti-virus : you have a choice of an anti-virus or a virus (or spam). These are usually well written and will yield to FS. stop at your perilexplorer.exe : you will get real problem stopping this, it always auto-starts again. It is the main MS file desktop process. If you do manage to stop it then you won't be able to run FS :)SearchIndexer.exe : MS has a process that pre-indexes files to make them easier to locate quickly. There is much discussion on whether this is helpful, especially since FS uses some 40,000 files. I have little experience with Vista where there is little discussion on issue with this process. Windows 95/98 used to have problems with its indexer - it was recommended to stop it, under XP it was pretty good and best left alone. You should try and find more on this one as I cannot find a technical note.winmail.exe : this is your email lookup for the mail server. Probably best left alone unless you know what to do with email.dvm.exe : this is the MS windows "digital volt meter" but is really just a process that display things like the time etc on the desk top. The Areo desktop does seam to increase dvm.exe resources so presumably they are using this tool for some more display. Don't use the Aero display in vista machine running FS (or any other pathological process for that matter).Tom

Wow Tom:Great explaination! I won't mess with any of this stuff then. I can afford a system crash. My extra of 2 GB will be here shortly. I report if it helps.ThanksPaul

So per my post, I went from 2 GB of ram to 4 GB. NO difference in performance, but I was OK on that anyway. But the system memory STILL says 64% is being used. If I double the RAM, shouldn't it be half. I am wondering if I am still at the max and subject to the crashes due to low memory - I hope not.

Vista 32 doesn't see all of your 4GB - about .75GB is wasted - due to limitations of 32 bit OSs. It pains me to think of how many otherwise high-spec computers out there are in the same situation.The easiest option is to install FSX SP2, which enables 2GB+ awareness of the app. You also have to put a switch in your boot.ini file to enable the OS to do its end of the 2GB+ application bargain. The details of this switch can be found on Phil Taylor's blog, but be aware as there can be nasty side effects of using this method. In my case, my system became unstable and it still didn't fix OOM issues for me.The harder option is to switch to Vista 64. I have done so just recently and, even with only 3GB RAM, I am unable to get FSX to OOM, even in previously renowned OOM sinkholes like ZBAA.Gary

Go to to the download driver page on the Nvidia website. On the top left corner is a link to the recommended Windows Hot fixes for Nvidia Cards. One of them fixes the system crash problem!

As was said above, you will need a 64bit O/S to use the 4Gb of memory. You should be able to upgrade to Vista 64 at no charge (at least, I think you can, call MS).Yes, you can use up to 3Gb of physical memory in a 32 bit O/S, but the problem you will run into are drivers that are not designed to handle this and "assume" hard coded memory address space. What happens when you do this is the driver's virtual memory drops and stability goes poof.If you want to run FSX with 4Gbs, you will need a 64 bit OS, and install it on 2Gb only to avoid problems. Add the other 2Gb when it's installed completely.Hope this helps,E.

These OOM crashes have nothing to do with physical ram or page file. The op system and the program keep a updated forecast of how much memory the program might need in the future. If this "note pad" talley gets above 2 gigs, a 32 bit operating system will just shut down the program. If you have 10 programs running, EACH program can have up to 2 gigs of this "note padded" memory allocation. That means (with 10 programs running),the ops system can have up 40GB of ram "allocated" for program use. Ya gonna fix that by adding ram? Once again . . . These OOM crashes have nothing to do with physical ram or page file. They are entirely about this note pad talley kept between the op system and the program. Sadly, this is often called Virtual Memory . . . but then again, so is just about anything else related to memory! Adding physical memory or page file capacity will not help this.64 bit system can have up to - way more - of this "talley thing" going on. (Is it 8 terabytes of addressable ram available with a 64 bit op system?) That's why I opted to go with the 64 bit Vista this time . . . because its only a matter of time. "Pay me now or pay me later" that hard lesson of dealing with New Frontier is telling me. Might as well get this transition over with now. So far, its all working fine, basically.Oh BTW . . . These OOM crashes have nothing to do with physical ram or page file. (Just in case you missed it!)