[SOLVED] OT: Google Chrome Eating 9GB RAM with one tab open and NO extensions

[nazareneisrael]

Hi. I hope I am posting in the right area of the forum.
My daily driver and Zoom partner is my old video capture rig, which is a Core i7-6700 CPU on an MSI Z170A MB with 32 GB RAM.
I reformated C:\ about 3 months ago (which is like pulling teeth because of all the programs I have to reinstall. It takes maybe 2 days to finish reinstalling programs).
A fresh install of Chrome uses 8-9 GB RAM with seven tabs open, and no extensions.
A fresh install of Chrome uses maybe 7GB RAM with one tab open, and no extensions.
When I reboot and open Chrome, I can watch RAM usage climb slowly from about 1GB all the way up to 7-8-9GB.
When Chrome is closed, the system uses maybe 12% memory at idle. (There are no issues with Edge.)
With Chrome open, with one tab, memory usage climbs to 40+%. With seven tabs open (and no extensions), I have seen it climb as high as 96%.
I ran MS Offline Virus Scanner, no hits.
I ran Malwarebytes Scanner, no hits.
I ran Avast Scanner, no hits.
I uninstalled and reinstalled Chrome, no change.
With Chrome closed, there are no issues.
I like Chrome, mostly because of the password manager, but also because of the Google Translate extension (which I used to use all the time, before I began troubleshooting).
I can perhaps change to Edge (or maybe Firefox) and get a password manager, but it would be nice to solution Chrome, if it does not take too long.
Does anyone have any ideas?
Thank you very much.

 

[nazareneisrael]

Ok, I think I got it. I had to uninstall Chrome and remove/delete browsing history.
I am not sure what it was about removing/deleting the browsing history, but after that I reinstalled, and the problem is gone.
Now it is 400 MB RAM usage for Chrome with 4 tabs and Google Translate extension installed.
I hope this helps someone.

 

[TommyTwoTone66]

Sounds like you had some pretty meaty cookies with arms and legs...

 

[nazareneisrael]

Sounds like you had some pretty meaty cookies with arms and legs...

Tommy, thanks for that! That was a good laugh. Only, now that I think about it, how could that be? I did a complete reformat some months ago. (Actually, I just looked it up, and it was November 13th). Can cookies grow that much, that quickly?

Is there a possibility this was malware that was living inside the Chrome cookie jar?

 

[TommyTwoTone66]

Tommy, thanks for that! That was a good laugh. Only, now that I think about it, how could that be? I did a complete reformat some months ago. (Actually, I just looked it up, and it was November 13th). Can cookies grow that much, that quickly?

Is there a possibility this was malware that was living inside the Chrome cookie jar?

I mean who knows. Now you deleted it we will probably never know. But not beyond the realms of possibility that you picked up some advanced malware that was sitting in there undetected...

I'd certainly nuke the PC to the ground and reinstall to be certain.

 

[nazareneisrael]

Ok, I nuked it to the ground. Chrome is no longer an issue. Thank you! Now I have an issue with some kind of missing driver. Any idea where I should look (or post) to find out which driver I am missing? Thanks.
I took a screen shot of the missing driver in Device Manager. I uploaded it to a sharing site. How do I get the image to display? I could only post a link. Thanks.
Image of missing driver in Device Manager
https://ibb.co/bRHxLP0

 

[lvt]

There are other excellent browser like Firefox, Edge.

They do use a lot RAM too, but nothing excessive.

 

[nazareneisrael]

Ivt, thanks. Do they support the Google Translate plugin? Because I use it all the time (maybe 50 times a day).

 

[lvt]

Ivt, thanks. Do they support the Google Translate plugin? Because I use it all the time (maybe 50 times a day).

Yes Firefox has some add-ons to translate the web pages in real time.

I rarely use Edge so can't speak for it.

 

[nazareneisrael]

Thanks, I looked in Firefox, and found some similar things, but they all open in different tabs, instead of opening a pop-up on the same page. Anyway, I think what I had was a bad install of Chrome. The solution was to uninstall as if I was not going to reinstall (and then format C:\). All's fine now...

 

[lvt]

A good read on RAM usage (if you didn't read)

https://www.tomsguide.com/news/chrome-firefox-edge-ram-comparison

 

[TommyTwoTone66]

The missing driver is your motherboard chipset. You need to find the correct chipset and management engine drivers for your motherboard. You’ll find them on the “support” page for your motherboard model.

Motherboard models all have really dumb names like “P560-XVA” or something, but on the plus side this makes them easy to google.

 

[nazareneisrael]

Hi Tommy. Thanks for your help.
Actually I installed the chipset drivers already.
I learned that the missing drivers pertain to a High Point USB3 expansion card. They no longer offer a driver because W10 now includes some limited support, but apparently the W10 does not cover all of the functionality.
I removed the card, and --viola!-- no more ! Yellow Exclamation Mark under Device Manager.

So, if MS is going to replace the drivers, why don't they replace the whole driver???? Because now I can no longer use my card...

 

[TommyTwoTone66]

To be honest if the manufacturer no longer offers a driver for W10 it sounds like you are better off with the card removed. I've never used any "High Point" hardware before but they don't have a good reputation.