page file and SSD life question

s|b wrote:

Should the pagefile be placed on SSDs?

Yes. Most pagefile operations are small random reads or larger
sequential writes, both of which are types of operations that SSDs
handle well.

Though in the scenario the O/P described (plenty of RAM free) there will
be very little paging in or out.

Paul wrote:

In Win10, the Memory Conpressor will interfere with your best
attempts to "burn up" your pagefile device.

Are there scenarios where the memory compressor does useful work?
On this machine with 8GB physical + 1GB pagefile

2.3GB in use (of which 8.6MB is compressed)
5.5GB available (of which 3.3GB cached)

is 8MB/8GB really worthwhile?

Ant wrote:
In alt.comp.os.windows-10 Andy Burns wrote:
T wrote:

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by
turning off the page file?

I have run Win7, 8 and 10, with 8 or 16GB of memory, an SSD and no page
file, without any issues.

I do have a 1GB pagefile on SSD at the moment, this frees up about 1GB
of memory by paging-out inactive processes, but before I created the
pagefile I generally had 3-4 GB free anyway, so it doesn't feel much
different.

Mine uses 2 GB out of 11 GB on an old box with 6 GB of RAM. I am just
using the Internet. :P

When the system is under memory pressure, the amount used
by the OS will drop. You can get it down to 320-350MB or so.

Windows 10 will run in 256MB of RAM. You can try it in a
VM and torture test it. I wouldn't say it's "happy" at
256MB - the memory compressor runs constantly, and the
RAM usage bounces around from second to second like it
is struggling. But - you can actually launch programs
and they work. I could start Notepad for example,
and it didn't whine at all.

You can write yourself a little program in C to
malloc() memory, then write to that memory, and see the impact
that has on paging activity or total system memory usage.
But, only if you're bored.

Paul

On 01/19/2017 10:41 AM, Z wrote:
T wrote:

Hi All,

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by turning off
the page file?

Most W-7 and W-Nein, oops W-10 computers I come across use
about 2 to 3 GB of RAM and have a minimum of 8 GB installed.
Doesn't seem to be an issue, but I have never put it to the
test.

-T

I just upped my RAM to 32 GB.

Do you use a page file? And are you using an SSD?

With 32 GB RAM, the page file is so lonesome. Yes, an SSD. You did,
I trust, run the CD that came with your SSD, right?

I haven't seen a CD come for a while with Inetl SSD drives.

I do download Intel's SSD Toolkit, and set a schedule for trim, and
run the optimizer.



I use Samsung and it comes with a CD.

Intel's use to. Keep in mind that both W7 and W-Nein state
that they support (watch the "weasel" word) trim natively

On 01/19/2017 01:10 PM, s|b wrote:


https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/e7/2009/05/05/support-and-qa-for-solid-state-drives/

Thank you!

On 01/19/2017 03:20 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote:
On 1/19/2017 12:06 PM, T wrote:
Hi All,

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by
turning off the page file?

I wouldn't turn the pagefile off, nor would I worry about prolonging the
SSD life. The pagefile is still required even if you have tons of RAM,
because it is used during core dump saves when the computer has random
problems that you may want to fix.

As for an SSD lifecycle, it'll last nearly 300 years in normal use
scenarios (which includes pagefile operations). An SSD is much more
reliable than a hard drive these days.

Yousuf Khan

Hi Yousuf,

Yesterday I replaced an Intel SSD (5 year warranty) at a
customer's site. It was only a year and a half old. It
started out withe SMART errors. I told him to leave it off
till I got there so I could recover data from it. He didn't
and his SSD permanently died. He should have listened.

Since he was one of the victims of a forced upgrade to W-Nein,
I put him back on W-7 with a W-Nein blocker. And I set
his page file to none. He is zipping right along.

The SMART errors where basically "EVERYTHING". So it is
hard to tell what went wrong.

Thank you for the feedback!

-T

On 1/20/2017 2:16 PM, T wrote:
Yesterday I replaced an Intel SSD (5 year warranty) at a
customer's site. It was only a year and a half old. It
started out withe SMART errors. I told him to leave it off
till I got there so I could recover data from it. He didn't
and his SSD permanently died. He should have listened.

Well, if it had errors right from the beginning, it must've been
defective right from the beginning.

Since he was one of the victims of a forced upgrade to W-Nein,
I put him back on W-7 with a W-Nein blocker. And I set
his page file to none. He is zipping right along.

The upgrade blocker isn't necessary anymore. The free upgrade period is
over.

The SMART errors where basically "EVERYTHING". So it is
hard to tell what went wrong.

Thank you for the feedback!

Sounds like it was a bad drive from the beginning.

Yousuf Khan

On 01/20/2017 01:25 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote:
On 1/20/2017 2:16 PM, T wrote:
Yesterday I replaced an Intel SSD (5 year warranty) at a
customer's site. It was only a year and a half old. It
started out withe SMART errors. I told him to leave it off
till I got there so I could recover data from it. He didn't
and his SSD permanently died. He should have listened.

Well, if it had errors right from the beginning, it must've been
defective right from the beginning.

Probably. It did go for a year and a half without issue.


Since he was one of the victims of a forced upgrade to W-Nein,
I put him back on W-7 with a W-Nein blocker. And I set
his page file to none. He is zipping right along.

The upgrade blocker isn't necessary anymore. The free upgrade period is
over.

I still put it on. It still removed tons of W-Nein
download garbage. So, who knows what M$ is up to.


The SMART errors where basically "EVERYTHING". So it is
hard to tell what went wrong.

Thank you for the feedback!

Sounds like it was a bad drive from the beginning.

Yousuf Khan


Thank you for the help!
-T

Andy Burns wrote:
Paul wrote:

In Win10, the Memory Conpressor will interfere with your best
attempts to "burn up" your pagefile device.

Are there scenarios where the memory compressor does useful work?
On this machine with 8GB physical + 1GB pagefile

2.3GB in use (of which 8.6MB is compressed)
5.5GB available (of which 3.3GB cached)

is 8MB/8GB really worthwhile?


It's possible the number you're seeing, is the
working set of the memory compressor caching area.

In this picture, Win10 runs in 256MB, and the Memory Compressor
can be using 30% of the CPU while you're trying to do stuff.
The Hard Fault level charged against it, suggests it would be
beating the **** out of the SSD if you actually ran Win10
this way on real hardware.

https://s27.postimg.org/coufcvtcz/memory_compressor.gif

Paul

T wrote:
On 01/19/2017 03:20 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote:
On 1/19/2017 12:06 PM, T wrote:
Hi All,

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by
turning off the page file?

I wouldn't turn the pagefile off, nor would I worry about prolonging the
SSD life. The pagefile is still required even if you have tons of RAM,
because it is used during core dump saves when the computer has random
problems that you may want to fix.

As for an SSD lifecycle, it'll last nearly 300 years in normal use
scenarios (which includes pagefile operations). An SSD is much more
reliable than a hard drive these days.

Yousuf Khan

Hi Yousuf,

Yesterday I replaced an Intel SSD (5 year warranty) at a
customer's site. It was only a year and a half old. It
started out withe SMART errors. I told him to leave it off
till I got there so I could recover data from it. He didn't
and his SSD permanently died.

Just so you know, some Intel SSD products disable both
read and write when the wear life of the Flash chips
is exceeded. You make it sound like "permanently died" is
only a function of a firmware defect, or a failure in
a critical area of a flash chip. The Intel policy is
implemented in an effort to "protect customers". What
does that mean exactly ? Well, if you're approaching the
wear life limit of an Intel SSD, you should make
*frequent backups* until you buy a new one.

So while the symptoms could have been the usual kind
of SSD failure, don't forget that Intel policy on SSDs
also means SSDs will "disappear" on you, even when they
are fully functional. Simply surpassing the "artificial"
wear life limit, can cause an Intel SSD to "wink out".

Each manufacturer of SSDs, has their own policy as to
what to do when wear life is exceeded. Some, leave the
drive in read-only mode. This helps guys like you, who
do data recovery and "put customers upright" again.
The Intel policy is "not good" for naive customers,
or customers who "just want to use their computer
and not worry about anything". The Intel product concept
is bad for them. The Intel product concept is "acceptable"
for customers with a responsive IT department. For
example, my old employer, had a backup system that got
*everything*. The only computers that missed a backup,
would be sales staff on the road. And only if they were out
of Wifi range, and no secure connection could be made to
home office. That's the kind of IT department you need, to
successfully be buying Intel-branded SSD drives.

As far as I'm concerned, there should be a regulatory
requirement, that this "wear life policy" is printed like a
Surgeon General label on the SSD drive housing. So there
is some inkling of why the drive "disappeared". "In
the event you exceed the wear life limit of this product,
it will stop both reading and writing."

In a Windows environment, just slipping into read-only
mode is sufficient to get your attention, as Windows
hates it if the storage subsystem is read-only. I just
don't see the "benefits" of the harsh "no read, no write"
policy. At least if it's read-only, you can do data
recovery. And the job could be done in 10 minutes,
like an oil change.

Paul

T wrote on 1/19/2017 10:06 AM:
Hi All,

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by
turning off the page file?

Most W-7 and W-Nein, oops W-10 computers I come
across use about 2 to 3 GB of RAM and have a minimum
of 8 GB installed. Doesn't seem to be an issue, but
I have never put it to the test.

I didn't want a page file on my SSD (C drive). So I made Windows use one
of my conventional hard drives for paging. I have 64GB memory so I don't
believe the page file is used much at all but I wanted it there for
emergencies.

What is unfortunate is that the hibernation save file cannot be moved to
another disk. My computers are desk tops but the APC UPS software uses
hibernation for emergency shutdowns.

The hibernation file is about 50GB (Windows' choice) and the swap file
is 64GB (why not?). The 50GB is a large hit on my 256GB SSD but at least
the page file doesn't further erode available memory.
--
Jeff Barnett

Jeff Barnett wrote:

What is unfortunate is that the hibernation save file cannot be moved to
another disk. My computers are desk tops but the APC UPS software uses
hibernation for emergency shutdowns

Then disable hibernate!

In administrator command window:
powercfg.exe /hibernate off

http://forums.apc.com/spaces/7/ups-management-devices-powerchute-software/forums/general/3076/is-there-a-way-to-use-pcpe-to-shutdown-the-computer-instead-of-hibernate


--
Take care,

Jonathan
-------------------
LITTLE WORKS STUDIO
http://www.LittleWorksStudio.com

Jonathan N. Little wrote on 1/21/2017 1:33 PM:
Jeff Barnett wrote:

What is unfortunate is that the hibernation save file cannot be moved to
another disk. My computers are desk tops but the APC UPS software uses
hibernation for emergency shutdowns

Then disable hibernate!

Bad suggestion. Hibernation is part of the UPS protection scheme.
Disabling would lead to software spewing warnings that it could not
provide promised protection.

The issue is that the specs for BIOS (new and old) demand that the
recovery image be on the same disk (and volume I believe) as the boot
record. It's a vestigial requirement left over from the days when
different technologies and very constrained firmware and OS roamed the
world.

Time to terminate this discussion branch since it's rather off the
original topic.
--
Jeff Barnett

Paul wrote:

Andy Burns wrote:

Are there scenarios where the memory compressor does useful work?

It's possible the number you're seeing, is the
working set of the memory compressor caching area.

The numbers were just from Task Manager, the "In Use (Compressed)" figure

In this picture, Win10 runs in 256MB
and the Memory Compressor
can be using 30% of the CPU

I never see that process running, it must have a threshold above which
it decides it's not worth running.

On 20/1/2017 1:06 AM, T wrote:
Hi All,

What is you guys take of prolonging SSD life by
turning off the page file?

The price of SSD is falling, especially those using TLC NAND.

So in the future, it might be dirt cheap to buy a new, small SSD to just
carry the pagefile.


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