So my Firefox is going really slow (i.e. typing in text fields has a delay sometimes when I only have three or four tabs open), and it's taking about 250MB of RAM all the time. How should I go about fixing this? As far as plugins go, I have StumbleUpon, RealPlayer browser recorder, some Java stuff, and a .NET Framework assistant that's not compatible with this version of Firefox (3.6.8).

Also, in possibly related news, I'm often getting warnings in games about my paged pool memory being low or out. It started happening with just Starcraft 2 at first, and now it's moved to other games. I'd like to fix this, too. Some guy on a forum somewhere said to go into the registry and change the page file size to 300-some megabytes (I found the field to be set to 0 when I got there), but this didn't solve the problem.

Sounds like you have 2GB RAM or less and leave your browser open while playing. Not recommended.

As for Firefox try to clear the cache. If you never restart your computer (hibernation is not the same as shutdown) you should do that.
If these don't solve the problems reinstall firefox.

Actually, I have what was sold to me as 4 GB of RAM (but is actually about 3.25 usable because they like rounding and the OS eats some). I usually just put my computer into Stand By, though. However, I've been rebooting much more often than usual because of problems with things starting up properly (i.e. Starcraft 2 getting stuck attempting to connect to patch server, Steam not connecting to the cloud or not booting games properly).

Just so people know, relevant specs are 2.8GHz dual core processor, 4GB RAM which I think is DDR2 but may be DDR3, and ATi Radeon X1800 video card ( D: ) running on 32-bit Windows XP.

In related news, clearing the cache doesn't appear to have sped it up at all. I may see if it's my computer by trying Chrome.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Sep 7 2010, 8:54 pm by FatalException.

Check for viruses, uninstall the incompatible .NET Framework assistant, after following Nude's steps. If this doesn't work, reinstall, or try another browser (please don't go back to IE) to see if it's really Firefox.

Ok, so Google Chrome is approximately a THOUSAND BAJILLION times faster, so it's definitely a Firefox problem. Also, Task Manager says Chrome's using about half the memory of Firefox. I think I'll just switch to Chrome for now unless someone can convince me otherwise. >.>

So about that paged pool memory... I have a feeling that an extra 100MB of RAM isn't going to suddenly solve all of my problems. Should I be checking on the size of the page file? Can I do that outside of regedit?

Post has been edited 5 time(s), last time on Sep 7 2010, 9:23 pm by FatalException.

You just installed Chrome with no add-ons, but you kept Firefox in its broken state and with all the plug-ins, of course it's faster... As I said you should reinstall Firefox. Possibly you need to do a clean uninstall first.
Just 1 thing to try before reinstalling FF: disable all the plug-ins.

However Chrome is faster than Firefox, especially when starting up. But that's because it has less features. But it's not a bazillion times faster, and if it is, something went wrong that needs fixing.
If you like Chrome and the features are sufficient for you there's little reason to hold onto Firefox though. It's all about preference.

When you use a 32 bit OS instead of 64 bit you can only address up to 3.5GB of RAM. It has nothing to do with "rounding". 250 MB is reasonably low for an OS.
If you have 4GB (3.5GB) of RAM you shouldn't run out of pooled memory at all. Set your pagefile to a fixed 1GB (min and max) for best performance.
That makes me think that it indeed could be a virus of sort. Run Malwarebytes' Anti Malware.

Quote from NudeRaider

That makes me think that it indeed could be a virus of sort. Run Malwarebytes' Anti Malware.

Who's good? I'm good.

No, jk. If Chrome runs fine, then it's most likely a FF problem. Again, try removing some addons, like the browser recorder. I don't know what that's supposed to do, but it sounds very much like it is taking a lot of memory. If it's saving a video of everything you do, you might wanna just get rid of it.

Or, you could just stick with Chrome. I tried it out once, when I loved FF, and it was faster and better with the multiple-processes and restore-on-crash that restores most, if not all, the info.

Switch to Chrome I see no reason at this point, other than possibly better support for brand-new web-features, to stick to Fx.

afom

also, this happens to me when I'm crunching numbers. But honestly it sounds like your computer is full of fuck and needs a good cleaning. You don't need a pagefile. It's worthless to most people with 4 GB of RAM. When firefox is being slow, what's using your processors?

4 GB of RAM, as stated by the specs, would be exactly 4 GB. Hardware devices with directly addressable memory (graphics cards are one such device) push your memory addresses past the 4 GB mark where 32-bit Windows can't access it through normal means. When you use a 64-bit version, it can access that memory that has been pushed past the 4 GB mark. That's all there is to it.

This is technically off-topic since the title is "fix firefox" not "replace ff". Also from what I've heard you can't customize Chrome's UI which is a "reason" for me.

But lets move on. I agree that your computer seems filled up with junk and needs cleaning. But there's only so much cleaning can do so if you know you installed many programs just to try them out you should consider reinstalling windows since Firefox is not the only program with problems. This would also be a good time to upgrade to a 64 bit OS so you can use those 0.5GB of RAM (not really needed actually), but be aware that some older programs just won't on 64 bit. Maybe dual boot 32 bit Win XP and 64 bit Win 7.