Zenbook browsing taking up a lot of memory

[ptohver]

Hello

I recently bought an ASUS Zenbook Flip UX360UAK with a 7th gen Intel i7 and 8gb of RAM and Windows 10 home OS. One thing I have noticed is that my browsers all take up a lot of memory and I don't understand why. For example a simple facebook tab on Firefox takes up more than 600 mb of memory whereas my Lenovo Thinkpad x260 (6th gen i5, 8gb RAM and Windows 10 Pro) takes up only 100 mb of memory when opening Facebook. Right now, with 5 tabs open, my Firefox is using up 1,3 gb of memory, whereas it hardly ever goes over 500 on the Thinkpad. If anything, my Thinkpad browser has more apps installed, so that can't be the cause. What could be causing this? I recently updated my Windows 10 to the fall creators version but that didn't change anything.

edit: My asus has a QHD+ screen whereas my Thinkpad does not. Could this be the defining factor?

Thanks ahead
Priit

 

[webworkings]

Newer version of Firefox? That newest one takes up way more space. Also, if you don't clear out the cache and history, often, then each place you visit is going to be accumulating stuff on the device.

 

[ptohver]

Hey, webworkings

Thank you for your ideas! Unfortunately I have the same issue with Chrome as well, so I'm not sure if the version of Firefox is the cause. Regarding cache, I've only had this computer for a week and I've never cleared the cache on my thinkpad in 6 months so I'd rule that out as well.

Best
Priit

 

[webworkings]

That is extremely odd. Are you sure it is those files themselves that are taking up that much room? Or could there be something else on the computer?

 

[ptohver]

That is extremely odd. Are you sure it is those files themselves that are taking up that much room? Or could there be something else on the computer?

Yup. This is with 5 tabs open:

 

[webworkings]

AH I see. This isn't the files this is the usage when you are on it. Well that is different. Where you go and what you do is a large factor in this. I would try looking at what is running with Firefox. Any add-ons, etc. Just remember some things, games, and sites with video, etc., will seriously raise this number.

 

[ptohver]

Hey, webworkings

Thanks for all your help. That's just the thing though: my browsing is about as vanilla as it can be right now Out of those five tabs, one was gmail, one was facebook, one was tomshardware and 2 were news articles. I can have all those open on my thinkpad and much, much more and I won't come anywhere close to that number. The only add-on I have on Firefox is AdBlock, whereas my Thinkpad has both AdBlock and AdBlock Plus and a bunch of other stuff. So it is very strange that I'm using all this RAM on my ASUS.

Best
Priit

 

[webworkings]

Are both of your devices uses the same OS? I find it odd, as well, as I have Firefox open right now, typing this, and have a program open in a tab and weather in another, I am using just a tad more memory than you, and that is after it has been running for hours, and gone through hundreds of tabs. Very odd. But I am not running Windows 10.

 

[dudeman509]

Look for pre-installed bloatware ASUS put on there. Browser extensions, etc.

chrome://extensions will take you there in Chrome.

That said, my 8 GB RAM laptop gobbles quite a bit of memory when opening tons of tabs. I primarily use Chrome.

 

[webworkings]

Here are some suggestions from Mozilla about Firefox and using to much resources... https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-uses-too-much-memory-ram

 

[ptohver]

Thanks for the suggestions, both of you! I really appreciate the help. My Thinkpad has Windows 10 Enterprise and my ASUS, which has the problem, has Windows 10 Home. Is there any reason why that might make the difference?

I can assure you I have no browser extensions installed beyond AdBlock. I even followed a guide to remove Asus bloatware from my computer and was pleased to find that none of them were actually installed on my computer to begin with. I can also assure you that I do not have a lot of tabs open: the picture I posted was with 5 tabs open.

I looked through Firefox's own suggestions and unfortunately none of them apply in my case either. I essentially have the same problem with Chrome and Edge.

Best
Priit

 

[webworkings]

If it is happening with all browsers, then I would start to look at the system as a whole. What is running that is causing the over usage of resources. Wouldn't surprise me if something is running in the background that you don't even know is there.

 

[ptohver]

If it is happening with all browsers, then I would start to look at the system as a whole. What is running that is causing the over usage of resources. Wouldn't surprise me if something is running in the background that you don't even know is there.

Thanks for the idea! How would you suggest I go about doing that? If I just have a look at my task manager, nothing really pops out as a massive resource spender except for the browser:

 

[webworkings]

Yeah that is a large amount. However when you clear out the browser cache and history, and restart, it should restore those.

What version of Firefox are you using?

 

[dudeman509]

I've seen Chrome/FF gobble up to 3-4 GB of RAM on my systems with a handful of tabs open. 1.5 doesn't look abnormal to me these days.

 

[webworkings]

Agreed. Especially the newer versions of those browsers. However, once the data is cleared and the browser and computer restarted, it should remove all that and start fresh. The only other thing I can think of is how if you are running the system and have had any problems with the browser having shut down. Sometimes (at least with Firefox) it will wind up with more than one version running, until you reboot the computer.

 

[ptohver]

Hi

I've had this computer for little over a week, the other one for 8 months. I've never cleared the cache or browser history on either of them, so I don't see how that can be a contributing factor. Nor have I experienced any crashes I'm afraid. I pretty much had these issues out of the box

Best
Priit

 

[webworkings]

I can, depending on where you have gone on the device, and what version of the browser it is.

In the end, if it is causing this only with the browser, I would contact Mozilla as they may have more info/answers.

 

[ptohver]

I can, depending on where you have gone on the device, and what version of the browser it is.

In the end, if it is causing this only with the browser, I would contact Mozilla as they may have more info/answers.

I ran CCleaner to remove all cookies, cache, temp files etc but unfortunately it made little difference. I also ran another check for Bloatware and can confirm that my PC is bloatware free

I'll consider contacting Mozilla, thanks!