Sudden rise in physical memory usage.

[BeardedCow]

Hello,

I am running a pretty good PC, with Windows Home Premium x64. All of a sudden I have noticed a sudden drop in my computers responsiveness and so I tried to figure out what was wrong. So I looked at task manager and noticed a high phyiscal memory usage, and then preceded to do all the regular stuff of scan with MalwareBytes, turn off unwanted services and start up programs. Nothing seems to be working. Here is a screenshot of task manager and resource manager.

I just don't understand what is using up all the memory.


SPECS

Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_gdr.120503-2030)
BIOS: Ver: CHG_712.rom vCHG7.12
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2600 CPU @ 3.40GHz (8 CPUs), ~3.4GHz
Memory: 6144MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 5364MB RAM
Page File: 13364MB used, 1221MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7601.17514 32bit Unicode

 

[ignatzatsonic]

I can't enlarge that pic to get a decent view.

6 GB of RAM. What is that---a 4 GB stick and a 2 GB stick?

What malware/anti-virus/anti-spyware stuff do you have running when the PC is bogged down?

Since I can't see the pic, I can't see anything about running processes either.

Have you upgraded any software lately--or installed new software?

Is that a 13 GB page file?

 

[BeardedCow]

Question 1) True.

Question 2) I have Norton 360, though I have had that since first getting the computer and so I don't think it is that causing this issue.

Question 3) For me the image is really large when I click on it. http://i.imgur.com/r5nPz.png here is a direct link, if that will help.

Question 4) I did recently do windows updates, but that was before the problem occurred and it didn't get better, or worse.

Question 5) That is what the 'DxDiag' gave me, is that unusual amount?

I am no computer expert so sorry if I am not answering correctly.

 

[GeneO]

Could you sort the screen by the working set column with the largest on top. It is cut off so not all processes are showing. Skype is using a lot, but no excessive.

 

[BeardedCow]

There is nothing really above 160k, and that is svchost. Everything else is <100.

 

[GeneO]

What is unusual is the something is using 9.4 GB of paged Kernel memory. I would remove all of your programs from the start menu and also any non-essential non microsoft services. Then add them back one by one.

It could be a misbehaving device driver.

 

[GeneO]

Do the following.

Start up task manager and go to the processes tab.
In the View menu at the top, choose select columns. Check the "Memory - paged pool" and "Memory non-paged pool" boxes.
Check the "show processes from all users" box.
Post a snapshot of the processes display with those columns showing.