TSGL: Is IE7 a RAM gobbler?

[Don Penlington]

Ian wrote:
>i just opened ie let it sit for 2 minutes on
>www.yahoo.com only that one tab open and it's sitting at 45,880k and using
>35-45% cpu use.>>


And Russ wrote:

<<I have IE7 open with 5 tabs (5 separate web pages). It is consuming 4008k,
 > about 4 MB memory.>>

I don't know if this is any help, but I have Maxthon which is an IE-based 
browser using IE6. (I've no wish to update to IE7 yet).

When I open 4 web pages, Maxthon sits on about 4500-4800 Kb of memory and 
zero CPU usage. If I open MSN search page as a 5th tab, memory usage shoots 
up to 12000-14000Kb and remains there. CPU usage remains on zero, after 
jumping momentarily to 2%. When I close MSN, memory usage goes back to 
4500-4800Kb.

All pages are static--ie fully loaded but lying idle.

It seems therefore that the web site you have open may well affect the 
amount of memory consumed quite drastically.

I've often thought that some sites seem to need a lot more browser/CPU 
grunt than others, but until sparked by curiosity after reading your 
emails, I'd never before bothered to investigate. I've no idea why this 
should be.
Ian--are you certain the pages are fully loaded? Perhaps you'd suspect it 
with sites like Yahoo--who are probably using push technology which would 
create a lot of unseen firewall activity. This, in turn, would be 
communicating with the browser, thus it shows up as browser usage. 
Maybe---I'm just guessing.

If all sites, regardless of color or creed, are consuming inordinate 
amounts of memory or CPU resources, then there are probably deeper 
underlying issues on the individual computer.  (eg Nortons security suites 
would be a primary suspect).

I don't know whether the various types of internet connection would have 
any bearing on this subject.

To answer Ed's original query, nothing I've read indicates anything 
inherent in IE7 by which might be regarded as a resource hog.

Don Penlington


 From the Beach at Surfers Paradise in sunny Queensland.
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