Hi Again,
Can anyone explain why every few days I get a lil box appear saying something like -your virtual memory
is getting low and windows (will do whatever) enhance it or something. Sorry of being vague with all the details. Is it a concern anyway?

Thanks

I think this pretty much explains it.

First of all, you have two different problems:

#1. Insufficient memory errors
#2. System Resources Dangerously Low

These normally have entirely different causes and it is extremely rare
if not unknown for one problem to cause both types of errors.

First, the insufficient memory errors.
There are 3 primary suspects for this type of error:
- hard drive is full
- a maximum limit has been placed on the virtual memory or virtual
memory is disabled
- a false or misleading error message and some entirely different
problem is involved.

Hard drive is full:
Open My Computer, right click on Drive C: and select Properties. If
there is less than 200 mb of unused space then the drive is for all
intents and purposes full and you need to remove stuff or get a bigger
drive.

If there is more than 200 mb of free space showing then run Scandisk
just to make sure there are no data structure problems that are being
interpreted as a full hard drive.

Also if you are running Norton Utilities or Norton SystemWorks then
you may be using the Norton Protected Recycle Bin. This application
(which I personally consider to be worse than useless) can fill up
your hard drive with files that you thought were long gone and
forgotten, and it does so in such a way that Windows is fooled into
thinking the space is free. If you are using it, go into the settings
and clean out the accumlated files or, better yet, turn it off
completely.

A maximum limit has been placed on the virtual memory or virtual
memory has been disabled:
Open Control Panel - System - Performance - Virtual Memory and ensure
that the "disable virtual memory" item has not been selected. Also,
look carefully at the grayed out values for minimum and maximum. The
minimum value is not life-threatening but the maximum should/must read
"no maximum". If it doesn't, click on the "let me specify" button,
go to the maximum entry and scroll up the value as far as it will go.
It should read the same as the amount of free space on the swap file
drive. Click on okay as needed to exit. Then go back in again and
verify that the now grayed out value reads "no maximum". Shut down
and restart the computer to put the new settings into effect.

A false or misleading error message and some entirely different
problem is involved:
There are a number of possible causes of this type of error. Perhaps
the most common is one that reads "Your computer does not have enough
free memory to defrag the drive" which actuall happens because your
hard drive has been formatted using too small a cluster size.

If the other suggestions do not help, then the best way to diagnose
this type of problem is by researching the actual error message in the
Microsoft Knowledge Base. Therefore please post the full message text
verbatim together with a description as to exactly what application
and which tasks you were using at the time the message came up.

As to system resources, Richard Harper has given you some good
information on this and to supplement this I have prepared the
following:

System Resources refers to two 64K blocks of memory that Windows
allocates to programs for tracking purposes. These blocks are called
User Resources and GDI Resources respectively and Windows reports
whichever has the least available free space as the value for "Free
System Resources".

The value of Free System Resources should not be a concern unless and
until you start getting "System Resources are getting low" type
warning messages, which generally happens at about the 10% level. In
test circumstances it has been shown possible for a computer to
operate at full performance with System Resources showing zero percent
free.

System Resources are totally unrelated to the amount of RAM installed
in your computer and adding more RAM will not affect the System
Resources (unless you start running more applications because you have
more RAM).

System Resource usage is determined by the number and type of
applications that you have running on the computer. Certain types of
applications have been shown to be especially demanding in terms of
System Resource usage:
- "Eye and Ear Candy" such as Active Desktop View As Web Page,
sound effect schemes, animated mouse cursors and desktop icons, and
fancy screen savers.
- Web browsers, as each open browser window requires additional
resources.
- Multimedia applications of all types
- System monitoring utilities such as Norton SystemWorks.


If you are running any 16 bit applications (DOS or Windows 3.x) then
Windows 95/98 will treat the System Resources allocated to all of
these applications as one block and will not release any of them for
reuse unless and until all of the open 16 bit applications have been
closed.


Also, when an application is loaded it is quite common that it will
also require some additional Windows components to be loaded as well.
However, when that application is closed Windows will, by design,
retain the Windows components because they are likely to be needed
again. Therefore the resources initially allocated when an
application is opened will not all be released when that application
is closed. Most, but not all.

Many thnx for your info I will look into it tomorrow as it is almost to go to bed as it is 10.30 pm as I writethis.
But I must say I don't have the confidence in myself to do what you suggest but will attempt tomorrow evening. I am still trying to get involved with my pc. I think these messages started when I was downloading multimedia stuff and even saving them in a folder-so maybe that is the culprit and I should just delete them-maybe. Thanks again