Here are the results of my experiment this week.
Rosetta 2.6 gigs
NFS 2.9 gigs
Milkway 2.1 gigs
SETI 2.9 gigs
GPUGRID 2.9 gigs
Primegrid 2.4 gigs

This is total committed memory after I shutdown the Boinc program after running 12 hours.

Garry, you've listed how much memory did your system need at some points this week, when you've excluded BOINC's memory usage. Seems pretty steady, levelled memory usage. Apparently no problem at all.

But I must admit I do not have the slightest idea, what are you trying to point on with your tests. (You could as well take the wohole committed memory usage of your system and subtract the sum of memory requirements of all your BOINC processes, you should have got the same numbers without the need to stop BOINC crunching.)

It seems to be across the board problem with the Boinc software itself since when I run all the projects simultaneous the memory leak increases as more processes are completed by each project.It really came to my attention when I received a low memory message from windows and when I checked the task manager it showed that I was using more than 6.5 gigs.

If you want to point on some memory leak problem, them please leave the leaking process(es) running (if it does not threat the stability of your system) and note, which suspicious process consumes how much memory.

A telepathy attempt: do you possibly mean that if you enable all 6 projects, then many partially crunched and unfinished tasks are left in memory and a lot of others are being started? I.e. that the sum of all BOINC processes required around 4 gigs of memory? You wrote that your paging file size is 6.4 gigs and your RAM is 4 additional gigs... Or was your paging file in fact just 2.4 gigs?

Peter

My pc virtual memory file 6.4 gigs.

On Windows XP? The maximum page file you can set there on any one disk is 4096MB, as that's the maximum memory address you can fill under any 32bit operating system. [...]

I beg to disagree... The 2 to 3.5 GB address space limit is for a single process. The pagefile is used for all processes and its size is possibly limited to 4GB on a Fat32 file system. But definitely not on NTFS, because I've been using larger pagefiles on it.

Jord, you were partially right. I've possibly been using the /PAE switch in the Boot.ini file (and/or I'm often using multiple page files on different HDDs). Without it, Win XP's pagefile is indeed limited to 4095 MB (but you can have a multiple of them - in different folders or partitions or disks). With it, "32-bit Windows has a maximum paging file size of 16TB".

Peter

I look at the programs that are open in task manager.The problem I see is that after the tasks are completed they no longer show up in the task manager but BOINC does not tell windows to release the memory so the memory is still committed but does not show a program attached to the memory.If I add all the processes and programs listed in the task manager after BOINC is run for some time it does not add up to what is showing as total committed memory.For example tonight after running BOINC for 12 hours task manager showed 3 gigs committed with no BOINC or it projects running in memory.

I look at the programs that are open in task manager.The problem I see is that after the tasks are completed they no longer show up in the task manager but BOINC does not tell windows to release the memory so the memory is still committed but does not show a program attached to the memory.

Now I understand your concerns. Just actually it happens vice-versa: the tasks tell BOINC that they are about to finish, they terminate shortly afterwards and after they disappear from memory (from this point on, they no longer show up in the task manager), the OS tells BOINC that they were gone.

If I add all the processes and programs listed in the task manager after BOINC is run for some time it does not add up to what is showing as total committed memory.

What's the column name you are summing the values from?
Are you displaying processes "For all users" in the Task Manager? Take a look for such switch there.

For example tonight after running BOINC for 12 hours task manager showed 3 gigs committed with no BOINC or it projects running in memory.

3 gigs committed even with no BOINC in memory can be just fine... My Commit Charge (with no BOINC processes) is nearly exactly 5 gigs just now...
I admit there are processes, which are able to hide from showing up in the Task Manager and similar tools, but they belong rather to the "rootkits etc." sack. If you do not see BOINC tasks in Task Manager, you can believe they already vanished from memory.

Try to sum up the BOINC processes' Virtual Memory usage (IIRC this is the value in WinXP's Task Manager column, which counts into the Commit Charge) and note the system's Commit Charge value ATM, then exit the complete BOINC and note the system's Commit Charge value again. These three values are what you had to note upon your experiments....

Peter