pagefile

Murdock · Mar 1, 2004, 06:35 AM

What' the smallest pagefile setting for 1 Gb,so games who use it will not chrash or running slow,or choppy?

I'm curious about this issue ,i've tried indead no paging file and some programs, or games will not run,without paging file?

Can i make a Ram drive and use that ramdrive, and how can i set this drive to acces this Ram paging file?
I have Tweak Xp Pro 3.02 to create a Ramdrive.

Does it matter if the pagefile has a higher value, like mine 1024 - 4096 is set?
does it slowdown the machine this settings?

a lot of questions, but i want it clear for my self(and others who read the reply)

Plz Reply

Thanks in advanced.

PangingJr · Mar 1, 2004, 07:39 AM

dont put your pagefile in ramdrive if you only have 1gig RAM,
but if you like to use the ramdrive (ramdisk), you can create a very small ramdrive for TEMP/Internet temp files. but this'll load an additional drivers to the windows startups and sometimes causing prob.

your pagefile settings is okay at 1024/4096 or you can lower the min to 512 (512/4096) and keep the max at 3-4 times of your RAM for now. and it does/will not slowdown your system.
you can optimize your pagefile better when you have 2nd HDD.

Murdock · Mar 1, 2004, 07:42 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by panging
dont put your pagefile in ramdrive if you only have 1gig RAM,
but if you like to use the ramdrive (ramdisk), you can create a very small ramdrive for TEMP/Internet temp files. but this'll load an additional drivers to the windows startups and sometimes causing prob.

your pagefile settings is okay at 1024/4096 or you can lower the min to 512 (512/4096) and keep the max at 3-4 times of your RAM for now. and it does/will not slowdown your system.
you can optimize your pagefile better when you have 2nd HDD.

Thanks for replying i understand now.

PangingJr · Mar 1, 2004, 09:18 AM

You're welcome.

astrolabos · Mar 1, 2004, 11:39 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by panging
dont put your pagefile in ramdrive if you only have 1gig RAM,
but if you like to use the ramdrive (ramdisk), you can create a very small ramdrive for TEMP/Internet temp files. but this'll load an additional drivers to the windows startups and sometimes causing prob.

your pagefile settings is okay at 1024/4096 or you can lower the min to 512 (512/4096) and keep the max at 3-4 times of your RAM for now. and it does/will not slowdown your system.
you can optimize your pagefile better when you have 2nd HDD.

Why don't you use a constand amount for the page file? (I mean something like 1024-1024) It will slow down the defragmentation of your hard drive.

PangingJr · Mar 2, 2004, 02:15 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by astrolabos
Why don't you use a constand amount for the page file? (I mean something like 1024-1024)

as for the max pagefile size at the 1024..
you probably never run a real resource hogging programs,
or maybe you didnt know or never check. why? you want to block the prospect of the pagefile expanding how about if there happens to be need.

for the min size at 1024,
the initial size on really large RAM machine do not need to be that high actually,
but in order to lower this number down properly you'll need to have tools for checking/monitoring the actual usage of the pagefile during the course of your normal computer usage...

Judas · Mar 2, 2004, 04:12 PM

actually.. you should be able to successfully run any program...game... with 1024mb of ram.... and no page file... i did for a few months and not a single problem EXCEPT for Adobe Photoshop which... when working with large high res images.... it would give me a Program Error... but would let me continue on...

Warpy · Mar 2, 2004, 04:32 PM

I presume you are speaking with regards to Windows XP?

PangingJr · Mar 2, 2004, 04:50 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Judas
actually.. you should be able to successfully run any program...game... with 1024mb of ram.... and no page file...

yes, and you can also do very the same on the 512MB machine as well, but it would have the effect of locking out a lot of ram. the reason is that most of programs ask for allocations of virtual address space far bigger than they actually use, this may easily add up to hundreds of MB. these have to be associated with some physical device. if there is a pagefile they can go with that resulting in a pagefile on which there is no traffic. if you do not have a pagefile, then they have to be assigned to RAM, and that part of RAM becomes effectively useless, it can't be used for anything else.

**dj_stick** · Mar 19, 2004, 05:53 AM

i think the recommended page/swap file size is twice the physical ram… if you can afford to have 2GB eaten up

D@VID · May 26, 2004, 05:39 PM

"...you can optimize your pagefile better when you have 2nd HDD"

How can i set the paging file optimaly/better on my system with two HD-s?

dipstick · May 26, 2004, 06:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by D@VID
"...you can optimize your pagefile better when you have 2nd HDD"

How can i set the paging file optimaly/better on my system with two HD-s?

Put it on the drive you don't have the OS installed..

Jalle64 · May 26, 2004, 06:36 PM

Well my system runs very good on 512MB memory and a static 512MB pagefile (same min and max) on the second partition!
And I play some games ut2k4, C&C ZH and BF1942 etc... No probs what so ever! I even run Photoshop without no probs!

You dont get the pagefile defragged either, thats sweet

D@VID · May 26, 2004, 06:46 PM

Thanx!
O.K. i've already done that - put the pagefile on the second HD. But, is it optimal to have the page file on the HD where you do Video Capture? On which HD to set the page file to get no or the smallest number of Droped Frames while Capturing Video material (from VHS with my R9200 ViVo card)?

Jalle64 · May 27, 2004, 04:02 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by D@VID
Thanx!
O.K. i've already done that - put the pagefile on the second HD. But, is it optimal to have the page file on the HD where you do Video Capture? On which HD to set the page file to get no or the smallest number of Droped Frames while Capturing Video material (from VHS with my R9200 ViVo card)?

If you set the pagefile to same max as min there should´nt be a problem!

D@VID · May 27, 2004, 03:22 PM

Yeah, the min. and max. size of the Pagefile is already set to the same value.
Decided to buy a NF-7S and two S-ATA Hard drives (7200rpm, 8MB cache) and run them in stripe (RAID 0) config. That should give me the desired "boost"...

Cheers!

SaberZ · May 28, 2004, 08:58 AM

I run a static 256 meg page file with my 1gig of ram. A few others do the same on the futuremark forums. Some even run only 128meg page file. 256 static is a safe bet. Havent had any problems loading up games or editing software like photoshop with it at that setting.

studbagel9 · May 28, 2004, 09:08 AM

I disabled my pagefile with 1 gig of ram, with no problems at all in any application.

PangingJr · May 29, 2004, 03:25 PM

Quote:

There are very few performance related issues with respect to the size of the page file.

The only one that readily comes to mind would be the circumstance where the page file is too small, or where it has been disabled.

In these cases RAM will be tied up unnecessarily in order to meet the address space requirements for the unused portion of memory allocations requested by Windows components and open applications.

Normally these unused portions are mapped to the page file, allowing the RAM to be assigned to the portions that are actually used, for disk caching, etc.

A too small or non-existant page file can therefore affect performance because disk cache will be reduced.

However the "1,5 times RAM" default setting in Windows XP seems to be at least in part an obsolete carry-over from the days of much smaller memory amounts in PCs. It is also at least in part in order to provide for the default setting of a total memory dump in the event of a system failure error. The page file is used for this dump and therefore must be large
enough to hold the entire contents of RAM if the "Complete memory dump" setting is retained.

OpusP.Gladiator · Jun 20, 2004, 01:41 PM

My roommate and I have gone round n round on this before.... Because from what I've seen...seems like you want a stice pagefile like 1024-1024 on the second hard drive or non-os drive...

My question is this.... Since my os drive is Raided Raptors (10k) sata and my 2nd drive is a 120g Hitachi/IBM eide
wouldn't the sata drves with faster acces/throughput be better overall even tho winxp is on the partition...
I usually have at least 10-20 gigs free on the 74gig partition...

Or would it be better to span both drives???

I've turned off all unneeded services like indexing, remote, etc...

I'm generally stable however I do expreience the usual and occasional pc or windows hiccups wether they be blue screens, applications, or hardware related I just really don't give a crap! I want it to work flawlessly no matter what settings or preferences I change... If the changes screw something up, they shouldn't allow you access then!!! just venting a bit because reality is according to anandtech the new intel chipsets have yet to truly show any worth over the 875's haha more subterfuge for the masses!!!!

dipstick · Jun 20, 2004, 02:02 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by OpusP.Gladiator
My roommate and I have gone round n round on this before.... Because from what I've seen...seems like you want a stice pagefile like 1024-1024 on the second hard drive or non-os drive...

My question is this.... Since my os drive is Raided Raptors (10k) sata and my 2nd drive is a 120g Hitachi/IBM eide
wouldn't the sata drves with faster acces/throughput be better overall even tho winxp is on the partition...
I usually have at least 10-20 gigs free on the 74gig partition...

Or would it be better to span both drives???

I've turned off all unneeded services like indexing, remote, etc...

I'm generally stable however I do expreience the usual and occasional pc or windows hiccups wether they be blue screens, applications, or hardware related I just really don't give a crap! I want it to work flawlessly no matter what settings or preferences I change... If the changes screw something up, they shouldn't allow you access then!!! just venting a bit because reality is according to anandtech the new intel chipsets have yet to truly show any worth over the 875's haha more subterfuge for the masses!!!!

I would keep it on the raptors myself. But you shouldn't be getting any BSODs becuase of the pagefile, well unless you have it disabled.
Maybe the BSODs are becuase of your OC? Does it do at stock speeds?