Prevent Win98 from keeping RAM

Actually I am using a third party's software called Ram Booster and it works quite well.  I just wanted to see if there was anything else I should be doing to fix this problem. Though I suspected what your response would be I just wanted to verify that since it appeared that Windows wasn't releasing the ram like I thought it should I didn't want to resort to another program to do something I thought Windows 98 ought to.  I'll wait and see if I get any other responses before I chalk this up as another glitch in a somewhat funky OS.

First off WinDoze sucks ...as well as Microsoft ..WinDoze is the klunkiest OS I've ever seen ...noctrnl is correct about it being a huge kernal and a leaky file system ..also it depends on what kind of stuff you are running there is a such thing as TOO much ram.I recommend getting rid of your ram watcher progs becuase those basically eat up ram also and I none of them ever helped for me. (I've also had this problem and I'm only running with 96megs)Secondly you should check and see what kind of file system ol' WinDoze is running ..I think by defualt it runs on a server setting or something. You can access these settings by right clicking on the "My computer" icon and then clicking on "properties" under the scroll menu that comes up ..then look under the performance tab and click the file system button, there's a scroll menu that has different file system settings  this should be set to "Desktop Computer" and the Read-Ahead-Optimazation slider should be set to full.Click ok on everything and restart your computer, this should fix your problem but if not then it's something else eating up your ram.If ya want something more stable try Linux.;-)

Ransom21 - everything checked out as you recommended.  Didn't have to make any changes.  Sounds like there is some evil monster lurking around in my computer that eats RAM and is too big a pig to give any of it back. No wonder so many folks are going to Linux.
Any other suggestions?  Have to admit that RamBooster v1.5 seems to work well and I no longer receive those stupid "resources are dangerously low" alerts.

Wonderful work on windows bashing all.  
So if I follow the current logic of this thread that no matter how much mem someone has windows will report system resources are low after an hour of internet use?
Think about that for a moment.....Wow was that an ignorant statement.
Your problem lies on your hdd not your OS.
Running with that much ram turn off your virtual memory in device manager.
Set your internet cacheing to about 3% of your hdd.  Clean up as much unneeded files as possible.
Yes windows does have memory leaks, yes there are better OS's out there.  But neither of these statements are going to help you with your situation.
Good luck and happy computing.

Changed the internet cache settings as recommended based on my using a 10 gig hard drive, and turned off virtual memory.  Now the computer locks when it re-boots to the desk top and comes back with an out of memory error.  Regardless of that, while I have always spoke highly of this most helpful site and the folks that offer their services, I am shocked and disappointed that anyone would refer to another person, or comments they made as IGNORANT. (WE were referring to a non-entity called Windows as being less than perfect).  Though this is not the proper forum to discuss an issue such as this,  I  still couldn't let this slide.  As much help as I've asked for over the past year I have to admit that THIS WAS A FIRST.

Actually reffering to the statement I had typed as ignorant not the individuals that made a valiant attempt at helping you solve a complicated issue.
"So if I follow the current logic of this thread that no matter how much mem someone has windows will report system resources are low after an hour of internet use?"

Your system apparently needs the virtual mem for no know reason.  
Try stopping TSR's from loading at startup by typing MSConfig on the run line click on the startup tab.  Take check marks out of all TSR's that are loading.
On restart see how well your system resources are responding and then start adding back in the TSR's one at a time to isolate the item that is killing your memory.  

Again,
The statement of ignorance was not directed at the individuals but at the thought process I had put together from their statements.
They are quite right in their assertion that windows as an OS leaves a lot to be desired, but, short of you learning a whole new OS to solve this situation they did not offer much help.

Thnx

Ag you have some good points but i didn't mean my comment about linux as a solution to his problem ..only as a suggestion..i just started out on linux and it's very exciting to learn something new ..and it's worth a look at because linux is growing to be a very popular .

Ransom,
Actually if Linux was much more user friendly it would be an excellent solution for alot of our wows caused by MS. Unfortunately that may still be a good 2 to 3 years away.
You are absolutely right that linux is growing in popularity but only with those of us that have been in the arena for sometime.  First time users generally steer away from non stadard OS's.  
Agian I appoligize if my comments are offending.  The intention is not there.  Just having problems with the communication of ideas.
:>)

To Argonauts - Thanks for the explanation on the comment.  Nothing more needs to be said.  Tried your suggestion and ran msconfig.  Unreal the number of TSRs that were loading.  Though I've tried to keep up with what I "thought" were loading to a minimum, had no idea until I looked at msconfig/startup that there were so many unnecessary programs being loaded automatically.  Cleaning that up seems to have stabilized the "leaking", at least according to the memory utility I've been running.  This seems to have taken care of it.
Thanks again,
Don

Don,
Wonderful to hear.
I am not sure if you have rejected the first answer so that you can assign the points to me or not.
Thanks,
Brian

Brian,
Well, didn't reject the first answer because I kind of answered it with another question and commented that I was already using third party software to monitor the ram leakage.  Don't see any available options to reject the first response.  Any ideas?
Don

Don,
At the bottom of the screen it should have a section that allows you to accept or reject the proposed answer.  Since n0ctrnl had already locked the question I am not able to submit as an answer so that you can grade my performance.
Thanks,