1.7.5, Vista, large speed and memory "leak".

[lux44]

Hi! First and foremost - thanks for the truly great application!

My setup: Vista Home Premium 32bit, 2GB RAM, 3Mbit internet connection. UTorrent 1.7.5, settings by wizard.

The problem: uTorrent can't sustain large download speed because of a memory "leak". Upon startup the speed reaches reasonable levels (couple of Mbits), but after a couple of minutes it drops to tens of Kbits and remains there (unfortunately I don't yet have the screenshot of a drop).

On the following screenshot there can be seen 3 things (the update speed of the graph is set to Slow):

1. The leftmost drop in memory consumption happened after I manually closed uTorrent (the speed had dropped to 30Kbits before that).

2. After I started uTorrent again (and it checked the file), the memory consumption starts to rise. Right after it reached the peak, uTorrent finished the file. So the speed didn't drop this time.

3. Soon after the file was finished, the memory was freed (uTorrent continued running).

Is this a known problem? Is there a workaround?

Regards and keep up the good work!

[jewelisheaven]

Not a memory leak. Do you have Ctrl-P -> Advanced -> Disk Cache -> "Reduce memory usage when cache isn't needed" checked?

Sure your physical RAM usage changed, what about a picture of the uT process RAM usage?

[lux44]

> Do you have "Reduce memory usage when cache isn't needed" checked?

I'll check tonight.

> what about a picture of the uT process RAM usage?

It was about 38 MB.

Just in case - I'm not complaining about memory usage or memory leak. What bothers me is that the speed drops. And it seems to happen soon after the "RAM usage" reaches peak. I'll try to capture better screenshots of the problem by tomorrow.

[Firon]

It's the windows system cache. Probably you're just downloading faster than your drives can write properly, and the system cache stores this extra dl. When RAM fills, stuff slows down.

[lux44]

Well, I can't reproduce it. Maybe because I'm re-downloading the same file.

When I get the screenshots, I post them here.

Regards and sorry for your time.

[jewelisheaven]

Not a problem But that's what those settings are for.

Firon's right about the reason why though. If it was a memory leak we'd be telling/helping/forcing you to get rid of the malware which hooked into the uT process

[lux44]

Downloading some random new stuff I was able to reproduce it. I also upgraded to the latest alpha/beta along the way.

Progressing nicely until sudden drop:

uTorrent disk cache statistics at the same time:

The magical speed barrier at work. uTorrent achieves larger speeds from time to time, but only for a moment:

My disk cache settings and below that uTorrent disk statistics some time after the speed drop:

Right after the restart of uTorrent I get megabit speeds again.

I don't think I'm write-bound. Also the picture didn't change a bit even if I disabled disk caches completely.

Any ideas, suggestions?

Regards

[jewelisheaven]

I'm sorry but I can't see anything in those images. Can you use BBCode to link a thumbnail to the full-size image?

I see the disk stats overlaid onto your download graph in the last picture (5)

I see your cache settings in #1 (thank you)

I cannot make out a drop in #2, but from the WTM backdrop I presume simultaneous to the memory being freed your download stops while the information is being dumped to disk.

#3 switches to the statistics pane instead of and bandwidth graphs.

It is 4 which most interests me because of the multiple statistics panes presented.

If your main observation is about a speed drop areyou sure you are still D flagged on the same peer?

Also if you are unsure of any mal/ad/spy ware injecting itself into uT, please download/run/paste a HiJackThis log into a post

[lux44]

I'm sorry but I can't see anything in those images. Can you use BBCode to link a thumbnail to the full-size image?

I updated the post. I'm sorrry to confess that I overwrote full-size images in most occasions , but shots #2 and #4 are OK.

I think I can re-capture everything and include every stats pane available.

are you sure you are still D flagged on the same peer?

How to check for that?

[Firon]

Like I said before, it's the Windows system cache. Nothing you can do about it except wait for the 1.8 builds that bypass it.

[lux44]

Like I said before, it's the Windows system cache. Nothing you can do about it except wait for the 1.8 builds that bypass it.

Do you mean that

a) memory consumption reflects the use of Windows system cache (I 100% believe that)

or

speed drop is because of Windows system cache? (I find it hard to believe, because disk IO is not very high).

Regards

[Firon]

a) yes

yes

The thing is that when your drives can't keep up (or so Windows thinks), it starts filling the cache. When it gets full, your speed drops.

[supageek]

I have the exact same problem. Im running UTorrent 1.7, vista 64, and 4 gigs of ram. If i leave my pc on for a while with utorrent running my memroy usage goes way up, right now its using 3500mb's and I dont have many backround programs running except for avg, speedfan, logitec setpoint, and a couple other programs. When utorrent isnt running my memory usage is around 900-1000mb's. Is there a fix or going to be a fix in future releases? Any help would be much appreciated.

[DreadWingKnight]

get a process explorer dll list supageek, I suspect something hooked in improperly.

[jewelisheaven]

Like DW said http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?pid=289958#p289958 is an explanation of exactly what that will entail.

[supageek]

Thanks for the reply but I dont have any of those programs running in the backround. I also disable services I dont need such as indexing, superfetch, windows firewall, etc. I am not an expert nor am I a complete noob when it comes to windows. This is a Utorrent specific bug and from the looks of it I am not the only one experiencing this problem.

[jewelisheaven]

If you will not help us help you, please don't post.

Asking for a list of loaded DLLs is essential in diagnosing any problem with uT, if it is.

Your problem may not be like the others above, but if you refuse to help us help you, you're only hurting yourself.

[supageek]

Still having the same problem. I can run anything on this computer and still have about 2gigs of ram remaining. But if i leave utorrent running for a few hours itll eventually use all my memory, I do not have this problem unless utorrent is running.

[DreadWingKnight]

And you're still refusing to cooperate I see.

[Switeck]

Without more information (what has been requested above), we can only blame the other, unknown software on your computer.

...My guess, it's probably "hostile" commercial software -- but it could be viruses/trojans.

[jewelisheaven]

You forgot rootkits, which are not necessarily either virii nor trojans

Hey supageek, since you won't provide any information, how about trying the new builds of the 1.8 line? They include mechanisms to bypass said windows cacheing system. And if you run it self-encapsulated http://utorrent.com/faq.php#How_can_I_share_my_torrents_between_user_profiles.3F you can have a "testing 1.8" version of uT to play with while you still "suffer" the presumed windows cacheing dissonance with 1.7.5 stable.

[j3d1]

Been reading these forums and now have something to contribute.

Using uTorrent 1.7 (latest).

I have updated XP with auto update and latest patches, re-patched tcpip.sys (http://www.lvllord.de/).

I have been having this problem as described in this thread and another (WinXP) for a couple of days. I have done scans and found one trojan (killed yesterday) and the problem persisted. Did another scan today and found AdTool.Win32.MyWebSearch (riskware), cleaned this out and the problem persisted.

Installed uTorrent 1.8 Beta, memory leaking issue persisted.

Then I re-ran the uTorrent speed guide (ctrl-g) and changed the settings to a lower bandwidth upload.

Since then, I have had no problems with memory leakage (5hrs). Downloading is full speed, and mem usage is 26M-30M.

Hope this helps.

[Firon]

You have to go into the disk cache options and enable the system cache bypass.

[cros]

I'm having the same/ similar problems. I'm using Vista. I'm not sure when this problem started occurring, but here's what happens:

Again, I'm using Vista with 4gb ram. Everything works fine. I can have tons of web pages, be running a game in the background, and watching a movie and the system runs fine. But once I open uTorrent it my system starts to hang. The movie I'm watching will freeze first usually, then almost everything will be frozen.

As mentioned above I do have the "Reduce memory usage when cache isn't needed" checked.

I can open uTorrent, then close it quickly without experiencing any problems. Actually, if I don't have any torrents that are downloading then there will not be any problems. I've tried starting a torrent with absolutely nothing running, and as soon as I start a torrent the problems occurs.

Please let me know what I can tell/give you so that you can help me. Thanks!

[Firon]

If your entire system is hanging, it sounds like your hard drive is developing bad sectors. Windows hangs like that when it hits a bad sector on a drive.