explorer.exe using most of my RAM

OK, dyncache posted, hopefully it will work during testing .

Yes, unfortunately this has a set of side-effects (because it's causing the cache manager to be uber agressive) and can slow down login as it's starting. Unfortunately, the only way to tell if the developer is causing this (or if it's a Windows issue - these still exist in this area) is to look at the source code for copying these files initially to see what flags are used. Certain flags that can be passed when copying the file(s) by 3rd party apps using the CreateFile API - like FILE_FLAG_RANDOM_ACCESS and/or FILE_ATTRIBUTE_TEMPORARY. If the file creation / copy is done via CreateFile with these (and a few other) flags, it will cause cache pressure that the cache manager isn't likely to be able to clean up (and this is documented in these links). Explorer itself doesn't use these flags when creating files, but 3rd party apps might. So, if that image is mounted via CreateFile (just a guess, but it seems possible) and they pass any of those particular flags to the CreateFile API that causes cache pressure, that would be responsible. If they are not, then this is indeed one of the places in Windows itself where certain file copy operations can cause cache pressure that the cache manager can't handle properly (without using something like DynCache).

Send me a PM if you're still interested, and actually need this for Win7.