Chrome Crashing, Using too much memory

[mjslakeridge]

Windows 8, 32 bit. AMD FX6300.
I built this computer about a year and a half ago and it has been Rock Solid, until recently. I have not made any hardware changes or added any new programs for months.

My problem is with the Google Chrome browser. Even with only one tab open, the amount of memory used by Chrome slowly but steadily rises, and then Chrome crashes and asks if I want to reload the web pages. If yes, it reloads and the behavior repeats. (I monitor the memory usage using both the Windows task manager and the Chrome task manager which is accessed by hitting shift + esc.)

Normally this computer is on all day, with 5 or 6 tabs open in Chrome. Until a couple of weeks ago, it was rock solid. In Task Manager, I right clicked Chrome, selected properties, then selected details and noticed that under "Date Modified" it says 8/6/2014, which is probably when the problems started.

I opened up the same web pages in Explorer as a test, and memory usage is reasonable and fairly constant, so that probably rules out hardware issues. I did a full scan on my hard drive this morning and Windows Defender did find a virus entitled "Exploit:Java/Anogre.E", which I then removed, but the problem with Chrome persists.
Also, recently I have been getting the message that Shockware Flash has crashed (on the iheart radio tab for instance) and I have to reload that. May or not be related.

Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[mjslakeridge]

Update:
The problem also is occurring using Windows Explorer. I haven't tried Firefox. After doing some research on the Anogre.E virus, it looks like Windows Defender does not effectively remove it. I did scans on 3 consecutive days and each time the virus was present. Each time I let Windows Defender remove it, but it is still there.

So I removed my Operating System hard drive, put in a new one and restored everything from a drive image created back in April. I also ran Memtest 86 version 3.4, and the memory all checked out. I am still experiencing the problem of the memory used by Chrome tabs slowly creeping up until it eventually crashes Chrome.

I opened up the same webpages in Chrome on a Windows 7 computer also on my home network, and not only do the individual websites use less memory, but the memory usage does not creep up.

I ran a full scan on the new hard drive with the restored operating system and it came up clean, so at least the virus is gone. Also, clicking on the Chrome tools and selecting "Run Chrome in Windows 8 mode" helps some (web pages initially use far less memory, but slowly creeps up).

Long story short, I still need help solving this problem.

 

[volcanoscout]

In the Chrome advanced settings, try disabling the graphic enhancement feature. I can't remember the exact name of it - will post in a few minutes.

 

[mjslakeridge]

In the Chrome advanced settings, try disabling the graphic enhancement feature. I can't remember the exact name of it - will post in a few minutes.

I am guessing you are referring to Hardware Acceleration under System in the Advanced Settings tab. I turned that feature off, rebooted, and still am having the issue, but it appears that it is only happening on certain websites. Could it be a problem with the website? I started up the same websites on my Windows 7 and Windows 8 computers at the same time a couple of hours ago, both using Chrome. On the Windows 7 machine, one site has crept up to around 200,000k memory usage in that time, but on the Windows 8 machine it is over 600,000k. They both started out at around 30,000k memory usage.
Maybe someone with a Windows 8 32 bit system could test the website and see if their memory use creeps up. (Hit Shift + Esc to bring up the Chrome task manager so you can see each websites memory usage). The site I am looking at is PGATour.com/leaderboard.