v2.01 build 18833: Extreme mem usage or mem leak?

[djanssen1]

(Note: I saw this issue also in 2.01 build 18786).

Seems that uTorrent is using an extreme amount of memory. I've never seen it do this before in older versions. I can easily reproduce it. All I do is launch uTorrent and am sharing a 2GB file (This also occurs during download, doesn't just have to be seeding). System memory usage continues to increase ~2MB every few seconds.

I'm running Win7 with 1GB, highly optimized system (I'm a SW engineer). Typically, the system stays around 300-350MB idle. When system gets close to 1GB physical RAM limit, slows due to disk thrashing of course. I shutdown uTorrent and all memory is released. This only takes ~30 min to reproduce.

uTorrent is mostly using default settings. I've tried with both disk caching option enabled and disabled with the same result.

Here's a couple of screenshots:

[DreadWingKnight]

Is the utorrent.exe process the one eating all the ram?

If not, it's windows' disk cache being stupid.

[djanssen1]

I re-ran the test with Windows read caching option disabled in uTorrent. That seems to avoid the extreme memory usage increase so far, so it's most likely Windows cache eating up all the RAM. I didn't notice older versions of uTorrent perfoming this way, even after having it on for days. For now, I guess I'll keep Windows caching disabled and stick with the built-in one.

[Firon]

You need more RAM, 1GB is waaaay too little.

[HFerr]

I've seen this once in 2.0.1, dunno in which build, when I had the local peers problems. I closed utorrent to get my maxspeed back and when I tried to restart it it won't run. It was still running and eating +320MB RAM, the usual is 10-30MB. I could kill the process though. Never happened again and at some point I changed back to 1.8.5.

[Firon]

Unless utorrent.exe itself is using up the RAM, it's Windows' system cache. There are options to bypass it.

[jkcsho]

I'm having the same memory problem as djanssen1. Except it climbes about 200 to 300 kilobytes a second. Up to around 800mb to 1gb. I am running uTorrent 2.0 build 18488 on windows 7. I have 2 320gb sata 2 running in raid-0 as my primary hard drive, 1-1.5tb and 1-1tb. 4gb ddr2 800 memory and amd phenom 9750(2400x4). Tried the disk cache thing and no luck. Any ideas?

[Tumello]

Using 2.0.1 Build 18973

Getting a huge mem leak as well. Steady climb over an hour or so and maxes out 3gigs of ram.

Win 7 System as well.

[DreadWingKnight]

Is the utorrent.exe process the one eating all the ram?

If not, it's windows' disk cache being stupid.

[Tumello]

Process PID CPU Private Bytes Working Set Description Company Name

System Idle Process 0 66.86 0 K 24 K

Interrupts n/a 3.84 0 K 0 K Hardware Interrupts

DPCs n/a 1.54 0 K 0 K Deferred Procedure Calls

System 4 4.61 116 K 3,832 K

smss.exe 288 420 K 1,036 K

csrss.exe 420 1,924 K 3,832 K

wininit.exe 484 1,448 K 4,068 K

services.exe 536 5,516 K 9,264 K

svchost.exe 684 4,076 K 8,568 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

dllhost.exe 3076 2,476 K 6,708 K

dllhost.exe 3484 2,020 K 5,512 K COM Surrogate Microsoft Corporation

nvvsvc.exe 748 1,344 K 3,604 K NVIDIA Driver Helper Service, Version 190.38 NVIDIA Corporation

nvvsvc.exe 1188 2,632 K 7,248 K

svchost.exe 788 4,100 K 7,608 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

MsMpEng.exe 864 152,220 K 80,864 K AntiMalware Service Executable Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 944 21,392 K 23,272 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

audiodg.exe 1824 16,796 K 16,384 K

svchost.exe 1004 63,544 K 68,624 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

dwm.exe 2824 0.77 27,528 K 35,576 K Desktop Window Manager Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 332 0.77 28,692 K 43,064 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

wuauclt.exe 2592 1,908 K 6,208 K Windows Update Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 1108 9,040 K 15,968 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 1292 12,012 K 14,804 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

spoolsv.exe 1432 7,420 K 13,068 K Spooler SubSystem App Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 1472 20,680 K 23,564 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

AppleMobileDeviceService.exe 1568 1,452 K 4,476 K Apple Mobile Device Service Apple Inc.

mDNSResponder.exe 1640 1,816 K 5,408 K Bonjour Service Apple Inc.

svchost.exe 1684 7,588 K 14,440 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

hamachi-2.exe 1716 3,292 K 8,980 K Hamachi2 Client Tunneling Engine LogMeIn Inc.

svchost.exe 1736 2,572 K 7,252 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

PnkBstrA.exe 1776 1,148 K 3,972 K

nvSCPAPISvr.exe 1812 2,408 K 14,640 K Stereo Vision Control Panel API Server NVIDIA Corporation

svchost.exe 1888 1,756 K 5,152 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

WLIDSVC.EXE 1948 4,520 K 12,280 K

WLIDSVCM.EXE 2572 1,144 K 2,980 K

SDWinSec.exe 1040 4,104 K 8,260 K Spybot-S&D Security Center integration Safer Networking Ltd.

SearchIndexer.exe 2332 41,528 K 30,116 K Microsoft Windows Search Indexer Microsoft Corporation

SearchProtocolHost.exe 2504 2,584 K 7,868 K

SearchFilterHost.exe 3876 3,796 K 7,060 K

svchost.exe 2680 2,412 K 5,744 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

taskhost.exe 2552 11,396 K 14,052 K Host Process for Windows Tasks Microsoft Corporation

wmpnetwk.exe 3492 13,676 K 12,144 K Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service Microsoft Corporation

svchost.exe 3560 10,064 K 13,240 K Host Process for Windows Services Microsoft Corporation

sppsvc.exe 1964 2,344 K 7,884 K Microsoft Software Protection Platform Service Microsoft Corporation

lsass.exe 552 4,388 K 11,388 K Local Security Authority Process Microsoft Corporation

lsm.exe 560 2,352 K 3,960 K

csrss.exe 504 10,312 K 13,564 K

winlogon.exe 812 2,896 K 6,952 K

taskmgr.exe 1044 0.77 2,648 K 9,252 K Windows Task Manager Microsoft Corporation

explorer.exe 2812 31,664 K 49,344 K Windows Explorer Microsoft Corporation

msseces.exe 3000 4,208 K 12,036 K Microsoft Security Essentials User Interface Microsoft Corporation

RAVCpl64.exe 2044 8,948 K 10,508 K Realtek HD Audio Manager Realtek Semiconductor

firefox.exe 616 0.77 92,968 K 109,712 K Firefox Mozilla Corporation

uTorrent.exe 2172 4.61 41,992 K 47,684 K µTorrent BitTorrent, Inc.

mpc-hc.exe 3772 12.30 152,252 K 80,820 K Media Player Classic - Home Cinema MPC-HC Team

procexp.exe 3144 1,768 K 8,376 K Sysinternals Process Explorer Sysinternals - www.sysinternals.com

procexp64.exe 4060 3.07 20,660 K 40,212 K Sysinternals Process Explorer Sysinternals - www.sysinternals.com

Process: mpc-hc.exe Pid: 3772

Name Description Company Name Version

{AFBF9F1A-8EE8-4C77-AF34-C647E37CA0D9}.1.ver0x0000000000000087.db

ADVAPI32.dll Advanced Windows 32 Base API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

AUDIOSES.DLL Audio Session Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

AVRT.dll Multimedia Realtime Runtime Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

bcrypt.dll Windows Cryptographic Primitives Library (Wow64) Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

bcryptprimitives.dll Windows Cryptographic Primitives Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

CFGMGR32.dll Configuration Manager DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

CLBCatQ.DLL COM+ Configuration Catalog Microsoft Corporation 2001.12.8530.16385

COMCTL32.dll User Experience Controls Library Microsoft Corporation 6.10.7600.16385

COMDLG32.dll Common Dialogs DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

CRYPT32.dll Crypto API32 Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

CRYPTBASE.dll Base cryptographic API DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

CRYPTSP.dll Cryptographic Service Provider API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

d3d8thk.dll Microsoft Direct3D OS Thunk Layer Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

d3d9.dll Direct3D 9 Runtime Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

d3dx9_41.dll Direct3D 9 Extensions Microsoft Corporation 9.26.952.2844

DCIMAN32.dll DCI Manager Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

DDRAW.dll Microsoft DirectDraw Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

devenum.dll Device enumeration. Microsoft Corporation 6.6.7600.16385

DEVOBJ.dll Device Information Set DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

DINPUT.dll Microsoft DirectInput Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

DShowRdpFilter.dll RDP Renderer Filter (redirector) Microsoft 1.0.0.0

DSOUND.dll DirectSound Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

DUI70.dll Windows DirectUI Engine Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

DUser.dll Windows DirectUser Engine Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

dwmapi.dll Microsoft Desktop Window Manager API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

dxva2.dll DirectX Video Acceleration 2.0 DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

evr.dll Enhanced Video Renderer DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

explorerframe.dll ExplorerFrame Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

ff_liba52.dll

ffdshow.ax DirectShow and VFW video and audio decoding/encoding/processing filter 1.0.7.3135

GDI32.dll GDI Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

gdiplus.dll Microsoft GDI+ Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

iertutil.dll Run time utility for Internet Explorer Microsoft Corporation 8.0.7600.16385

IMM32.DLL Multi-User Windows IMM32 API Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

kernel32.dll Windows NT BASE API Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

KERNELBASE.dll Windows NT BASE API Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

ksuser.dll User CSA Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

locale.nls

LPK.dll Language Pack Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

MFPlat.DLL Media Foundation Platform DLL Microsoft Corporation 12.0.7600.16385

midimap.dll Microsoft MIDI Mapper Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

mkunicode.dll

mkx.dll

mkzlib.dll

MMDevAPI.DLL MMDevice API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

mpc-hc.exe Media Player Classic - Home Cinema MPC-HC Team 1.3.1458.0

MSACM32.dll Microsoft ACM Audio Filter Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

msacm32.drv Microsoft Sound Mapper Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

MSASN1.dll ASN.1 Runtime APIs Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16415

MSCTF.dll MSCTF Server DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

msdmo.dll DMO Runtime Microsoft Corporation 6.6.7600.16385

msvcrt.dll Windows NT CRT DLL Microsoft Corporation 7.0.7600.16385

ncrypt.dll Windows cryptographic library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

Normaliz.dll Unicode Normalization DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

NSI.dll NSI User-mode interface DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

ntdll.dll NT Layer DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

ntdll.dll NT Layer DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

ntmarta.dll Windows NT MARTA provider Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

nvapi.dll NVIDIA NVAPI Library, Version 190.38 NVIDIA Corporation 8.15.11.9038

nvd3dum.dll NVIDIA Compatible Vista WDDM D3D Driver, Version 190.38 NVIDIA Corporation 8.15.11.9038

ole32.dll Microsoft OLE for Windows Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

OLEAUT32.dll Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

oledlg.dll OLE User Interface Support Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

POWRPROF.dll Power Profile Helper DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

profapi.dll User Profile Basic API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

PROPSYS.dll Microsoft Property System Microsoft Corporation 7.0.7600.16385

PSAPI.DLL Process Status Helper Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

quartz.dll DirectShow Runtime. Microsoft Corporation 6.6.7600.16490

RPCRT4.dll Remote Procedure Call Runtime Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

RpcRtRemote.dll Remote RPC Extension Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

rsaenh.dll Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

sechost.dll Host for SCM/SDDL/LSA Lookup APIs Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

SETUPAPI.dll Windows Setup API Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

SHELL32.dll Windows Shell Common Dll Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

SHLWAPI.dll Shell Light-weight Utility Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

slc.dll Software Licensing Client Dll Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

SortDefault.nls

splitter.ax Haali Media Splitter 1.9.42.1

SspiCli.dll Security Support Provider Interface Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

StaticCache.dat

urlmon.dll OLE32 Extensions for Win32 Microsoft Corporation 8.0.7600.16490

USER32.dll Multi-User Windows USER API Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

user32.dll.mui Multi-User Windows USER API Client DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

USP10.dll Uniscribe Unicode script processor Microsoft Corporation 1.626.7600.16385

uxtheme.dll Microsoft UxTheme Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

VERSION.dll Version Checking and File Installation Libraries Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

wdmaud.drv Winmm audio system driver Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WindowsCodecs.dll Microsoft Windows Codecs Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WININET.dll Internet Extensions for Win32 Microsoft Corporation 8.0.7600.16490

WINMM.dll MCI API DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WINSPOOL.DRV Windows Spooler Driver Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WINSTA.dll Winstation Library Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WINTRUST.dll Microsoft Trust Verification APIs Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WLDAP32.dll Win32 LDAP API DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

wow64.dll Win32 Emulation on NT64 Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16491

wow64cpu.dll AMD64 Wow64 CPU Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

wow64win.dll Wow64 Console and Win32 API Logging Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WS2_32.dll Windows Socket 2.0 32-Bit DLL Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

WTSAPI32.dll Windows Remote Desktop Session Host Server SDK APIs Microsoft Corporation 6.1.7600.16385

[DreadWingKnight]

uTorrent.exe 2172 4.61 41,992 K 47,684 K µTorrent BitTorrent, Inc.

It is not the utorrent.exe process eating your ram. It is the windows disk cache being stupid.

[Merkwurdigliebe]

I respectfully disagree.

It's not that the system cache is being stupid, it's that it is not getting flushed.

I had to look into this today when my XP 64 machine with 6 GB of RAM started swapping and nearly locked up. I did a quick check of RAM and found that there was only about 20 MB out of 6144 MB remaining.

I did some testing and found that utorrent is driving the System Cache Resident Bytes counter upwards as a function of time and disk I/O rate and that it does not release that RAM until the torrent is deleted.

I agree that the leak is in the system cache, but I don't agree that the cache itself is to blame. I have database servers that use the system cache much more intensively then utorrent and they can run for months without depleting all available RAM. They flush their I/O handles, keeping their resource usage under control.

Virtually every process running on a given Windows machine uses the system cache. If this was normal behavior you could expect your system to lock up every couple of minutes on registry accesses alone.

The biggest downside of this bug is that you can't seed without locking up the machine, which pretty much kills the whole concept of file sharing.

[DreadWingKnight]

Then bypass the windows disk cache in the preferences.

[Merkwurdigliebe]

I did.

Thrashes the disks a bit more than I like, but it's better than swapping in that regard.

Would calling fflush() on those file handles periodically free up the committed cache and let us keep Windows caching turned on for increased performance and hard drive longevity?

[BigBrown]

Hello, I just registered to say I got the exact same problem while seeding using:

utorrent 2.0 build 18620

Win 7 x64

AMD Phenom II 4x 3.4GHz

4GB RAM

It took about 15 minutes of seeding before an 8GB torrent shot my mem usage up from 16 to 78%. The RAM usage continues to rise until either the torrent is stopped or utorrent is shut down. Pausing the torrent doesn't change anything despite the speed going down to 0. In the task manager utorrent is only using about 50 MB. Checking the "Disable Windows caching of disk reads" seems to do the trick though. I just thought I'd let you know there are more with this problem and I guess not everyone will find this forum to help them.

Thanks!