computer help? random freezes

copy pasted from skype

....questing for computer help if anyone knows stuff?

my computer is like four years old, lenovo, windows 10, and has just recently started doing this thing where it will just Freeze. sometimes it returns to not-freezing, but sometimes I have to restart it. it will do this while running chrome, while running krita, and while running neither. I did a memory check and a disk check and they are both reported as no problems

.......I am hoping this is an easy thing but I don't have the money for a new laptop and I, like, use it to draw.

uh, this is a new recent thing, and some internet sites have told me to disable the cstate in bios but I have No Idea what that means

also I'm trying to avoid the thing where I worry a little so I freak out, do too many things to it, and then fuck it up.



.........if I can't figure this out then I can't draw or do stuff for my job, and I don't have the money for a new computer so I guess I could boost my "plz give me money" pleas, but I feel kind of like a heel asking for money around the holidays, ya dig?

 

/basically solved by @albedo because he is the best

 

tl;dr for the peanut gallery: Probably got too much open and running out of memory. Short-term: Have fewer tabs open at once. Medium-term: Upgrade RAM from 4gb to 8gb. :D

 

Chrome (and Firefox) has memory management issues because it spawns each tab as a new process so it doesn't even know how much memory it is using. Each tab is like "okay, I'm only using a few megs, I'm fine" and doesn't check with the parent window to see how much Chrome as a total package is using.

 

until i get new RAM i plan on being hella solicitous of my computer

mostly because i was super freaked out it was going to explode or something, as i tend to use my computers until they give up entirely

 

You can use task manager to keep track of mem usage. Under Windows 10 it will show that 3G is already in use before you even start doing anything. Win 7 will show about 2.5, Vista will show 4, XP will show about 2.5.
Basically - Windows itself (64bit versions) wants 4G. Programs need to add their own :)

 

Oh - in Windows 10 task manager is not a taskbar option.
http://www.isunshare.com/windows-10/9-ways-to-open-task-manager-in-windows-10.html

 

oh, windows ten, why are you like this

I figure I'll just open it every time i use my computer

 

I always have task manager open. I abuse the heck out of my puter and need to know which things I'm abusing it with the most.