Paging File memory

xTc

Baseband Member
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Hi, I'm just wondering if it would be appropriate to up the paging file instead of buying more ram? As it says that paging acts as RAM memory. Would anyone be able to explain to me what paging file is and if i should up the paging file or not?

Thanks in advanced.
 
paging file or virtual memory is an area of the hard disk that acts as ram. this area is used as ram when your system ram becomes full. however it is really slow compared to normal ram and seriously affects the speed of your pc. without knowing the spec of your pc, what o/s your running, or what your using your pc for it is hard to make a decision as to whether you need more ram or not. under windows xp goto system properties (windows key + pause/break) select advanced tab then performance settings, advanced tab again. from here you can alter the paging file size.
 
my computer specs are:
P4 2.6Ghz
80G HD
256bm ram,

i usually use my computer for surfing the net, listening to music and plaing games once in a while. But i usually tend of open alot of program at a time, such as Photoshop, WIndows media player and P2P file sharing programs n shtuff.

Would i need more physical ram?
 
A good rule of thumb is to set the minimum and maximum value of your pagefile on another hard drive that has your operating system (if you have another one) equal to 1.5 the amount of RAM you have.
From what I see of your system definition, you could definitively buy more RAM. Note Photoshop uses consistantly the pagefile for its' image conversion etc. and it is important to have it efficiently set.
 
your mobo will also probably support dual ddr so by 2 sticks of ram the same size and spec to take advantage of this feature
 
jimbo54321 said:
paging file or virtual memory is an area of the hard disk that acts as ram. this area is used as ram when your system ram becomes full. however it is really slow compared to normal ram and seriously affects the speed of your pc. without knowing the spec of your pc, what o/s your running, or what your using your pc for it is hard to make a decision as to whether you need more ram or not. under windows xp goto system properties (windows key + pause/break) select advanced tab then performance settings, advanced tab again. from here you can alter the paging file size.

the system cache is always being used, it does not matter how mush or how little ram is being used. To have windows stored on ram to make the system run alot faster, and not have to go the harddrive heres a hack for you.

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While Windows2k and WInXP manage its memory much better then the Win9x based operating systems, you can make both the actual Win2k or XP OS run more efficiently by keeping all of its code in system memory (since it's the most used program) rather than in a HDD swap file.

Go to Start -> Run and type regedit. From there follow this path. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -> SYSTEM -> CurrentControlSet -> Control -> Session Manager -> Memory Management. Right click on the DisablePagingExecutive DWORD value, change its value to 1, save and reboot.

Now Win2k and WinXP will stay in your system memory instead of going into the HDD swap file. Please note, you must have at least 512MB of system memory otherwise you'll notice a slowdown in performance!
 
zero4zero, would it work if i have 1 physical hard drive but partitioned it into 2 HD?

and also i think i'll prolly buy another 256 stick of ram.
 
It would work no problems.
Experts on the subject recomment to have a minimum/maximum 2 Meg pagefile on the drive that holds the operating system. If it does not, windows may figure that there are no swapfile and create one! so you may end up with two which would slow your system.
Speed wise, you wouldn't have any appreciable gain except if you make a partition that would only be used by your partition. This way the pagefile is not getting mixed up with any other data, so it can quickly be defragmented.
If the swapfile would be on a physically different hard drive (preferably of same or faster speed), then the pagefile is more efficiently used.
Note: for windows to be able to efficiently debug your system after a crash, it requires a minimum swapfile size. Set your pagefile size at zero and you will get the warning from your operating system and consequence explained.
 
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