How much ram do you need to disable Xp's pagefile ??

[Paul P Mathews]

have 512 now, if i have 1 gig do i need a pagefile ??

Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my D:\ drive
at the momment.

To make some room on my C:\ Drive its only 6 gig (:

Its got 1.6 gig to play arround with, though i do have to install most
of my programs to other Partitions, which is fine with me thats what
their for, not just storage.

Thanks

[Nicholas]

Moving XP's Page File to another partition on the same drive will
cause a decrease an overall performance due to the increase in disk
seek time. It would be best to move it to a partition on a second
hard drive.

Windows XP is designed to make use of a Page File. You should not
attempt to run without one. Learn more about Virtual Memory in XP:

Virtual Memory in Windows XP
http://aumha.org/a/xpvm.php

(Courtesy of Alex Nichol, MS-MVP)


--=20
Nicholas

-------------------------------------------------------------------------=
-----------------

"Paul P Mathews" > wrote in message: =20
...

|=20
|=20
| have 512 now, if i have 1 gig do i need a pagefile ??
|=20
| Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my D:\ drive
| at the momment.
|=20
| To make some room on my C:\ Drive its only 6 gig (:
|=20
| Its got 1.6 gig to play arround with, though i do have to install most
| of my programs to other Partitions, which is fine with me thats what
| their for, not just storage.
|=20
| Thanks
|

[Ken Blake]

In , Paul P Mathews
wrote:

> have 512 now, if i have 1 gig do i need a pagefile ??


Two points:

1. If you don't have a page file, you can't use all the RAM you
have. That's because Windows preallocates virtual memory in
anticipation of a possible need for it, even though that
allocated virtual memory may never be used. Without a page file,
that allocation has to be made in real memory, thus tying up that
memory and preventing it from being used for any purpose.

2. There is never a benefit in not having a page file. If it
isn't needed, it won't be used. Don't confuse allocated memory
with used memory.


> Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my
D:\ drive
> at the momment.


If D: is a second physical drive, that's good. If it's a second
partition on the same physical drive as C: that has the potential
for slowing you down, since the drive heads have to travel
farther to get back and forth between the two partitions.

However, in your case, with 1GB of RAM, unless you run very
highly demanding applications (like photographic editing of large
images) you're highly unlikely to ever use the page file. So go
ahead and keep it on D: to save disk space on C:

--
Ken Blake
Please reply to the newsgroup



> To make some room on my C:\ Drive its only 6 gig (:
>
> Its got 1.6 gig to play arround with, though i do have to
install most
> of my programs to other Partitions, which is fine with me thats
what
> their for, not just storage.
>
> Thanks

[Bill Martin]

> > Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my
> > D:\ drive at the momment.
>
>
> If D: is a second physical drive, that's good. If it's a second
> partition on the same physical drive as C: that has the potential
> for slowing you down, since the drive heads have to travel
> farther to get back and forth between the two partitions.

This may or may not be true depending on one's hard drive. Some of them have
multiple head arms on the disk surface and may result in faster performance
using "D". Or not. You can't really tell for sure without either knowing
more than any sane person wants to know about the particular disk set up and
where the files locate on the disk.

My suggestion would be to simply go ahead and take speed measurements while
trying the page file in both locations if you want. If you're unable to find
a way to measure a significant difference then it doesn't matter anyhow which
is what I suspect the case to be in all but a few extreme applications.

Good luck...

Bill

[Walter Clayton]

"Bill Martin" > wrote in message
om...
> > > Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my
> > > D:\ drive at the momment.
> >
> >
> > If D: is a second physical drive, that's good. If it's a second
> > partition on the same physical drive as C: that has the potential
> > for slowing you down, since the drive heads have to travel
> > farther to get back and forth between the two partitions.
>
> This may or may not be true depending on one's hard drive. Some of them
have
> multiple head arms on the disk surface and may result in faster
performance
> using "D". Or not. You can't really tell for sure without either knowing

Those multiple heads are controlled by a single actuator. They do not move
independantly of each other. However there was an attempt quite a few years
ago to install multiple actuators in a single physical drive, but that
design was dropped due to complexity and reliability issues. At that it was
only a pair of independantly operated acutuators. ;-)


> more than any sane person wants to know about the particular disk set up
and
> where the files locate on the disk.

>
> My suggestion would be to simply go ahead and take speed measurements
while
> trying the page file in both locations if you want. If you're unable to
find
> a way to measure a significant difference then it doesn't matter anyhow
which
> is what I suspect the case to be in all but a few extreme applications.
>

BINGO! To extend that a bit further, if in fact playing with the pagefile
results in noticable difference in performance, then either the pagefile was
incorrectly constrained to begin with, forcing premature system throttle, or
more physical memory is called for.

> Good luck...
>
> Bill

--
Walter Clayton - MS MVP(WinXP)
Associate Expert
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
http://www.dts-l.org
http://support.microsoft.com/servicedesks/fileversion/default.asp

[Saverio Mercurio]

You should always have a pagefile, regardless of how much RAM you have.
Consider the following: You have a program that has a memory leak. Over time
it chews up memory. With no pagefile it chews up your main memory to the
point where you run out of memory and your computer crashes with little to
no warning. With a pagefile the computer would slow to a crawl, but you'd be
able to attempt to gracefully quit the aberrant program, and if you had to,
save your work and reboot.

--
Saverio Mercurio

NOTE: My email address has been purposefully altered to thwart mailing list
harvesters.


"Paul P Mathews" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> have 512 now, if i have 1 gig do i need a pagefile ??
>
> Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my D:\ drive
> at the momment.
>
> To make some room on my C:\ Drive its only 6 gig (:
>
> Its got 1.6 gig to play arround with, though i do have to install most
> of my programs to other Partitions, which is fine with me thats what
> their for, not just storage.
>
> Thanks
>

[Alex Nichol]

Paul P Mathews wrote:

>
>have 512 now, if i have 1 gig do i need a pagefile ??
>
>Also weres the best place to put the page file have it on my D:\ drive
>at the momment.
>
>To make some room on my C:\ Drive its only 6 gig (:

Never disable the page file. It would result in locking out a lot of
RAM. The reason is that many programs ask for allocations of virtual
address space far bigger than they actually use, These have to be
associated with some physical device. If there is a page file they can
go with that - resulting in a page file on which there is no traffic.
If you do not have a page file, then they have to be assigned to RAM,
and that part of RAM becomes effectively useless - it can't be used for
anything else.

See in more detail at www.aumha.org/a/xpvm.htm



--
Alex Nichol MS MVP (Windows - File Systems)
Bournemouth, U.K.