Optimize Windows virtual memory management
When your system is running low on RAM then Windows uses hard drive space to simulate the system RAM. This is known as virtual memory, and is known as a paging file. Its purpose is to extend the amount of physical RAM and make it available to the system. The default size of the Windows virtual memory paging file (named pagefile.sys) created during installation is 1.5 times the amount of RAM on your computer.
This trick requires at least two separate hard disks. This trick is not reccomended if you have a single hard disk or the hard disk has multiple partitions.
Tweaking the paging file boosts performance by speeding access to the virtual memory. The idea to boost the system performance is to run the paging file (pagefile.sys) on a separate physical hard drive from the main operating system. For example, if you Windows is running on drive C: (first physical hard drive) then place the paging file on the second physical hard drive D: That way, Windows can handle multiple I/O requests more quickly. Otherwise, when the paging file is on the boot partition, Windows must perform disk reading and writing requests on both the system folder and the paging file. WinXP, by accessing both of the drives at the same time to read/write information, will considerably improve system performance. It is not recommend that you disable or remove the paging file because the system will experience a degradation of system performance without it.
The separation of paging file optimizes the virtual memory use by dividing the space between multiple drives and removing it from slow or heavily accessed drives. When you select drives, keep the following guidelines in mind:
- Try to avoid having a paging file on the same drive as the system files.
- Avoid putting a paging file on a fault-tolerant drive, such as a mirrored volume or a RAID volume. Paging files do not need fault-tolerance, and some fault-tolerant systems suffer from slow data writes because they write data to multiple locations.
- Do not place multiple paging files on different partitions on the same physical disk drive.
The following steps describe how to change the size of the Virtual Memory Paging File:
· Click Start, click Control Panel, and then click System.
· Click the Advanced tab, and then click Settings under Performance.
· Click the Advanced tab, and then click Settings under Performance. You will get the following dialog.
· Click the Advanced tab, and then click Change under Virtual memory. You will get the following dialog.
· Under Drive [Volume Label], click the drive that contains the paging file you want to change.
Under Paging file size for selected drive, click Custom size, type a new paging file size in megabytes (MB) in the Initial size (MB) or Maximum size (MB) box, and then click Set. Any changes you make won’t take effect until you reboot the machine.
To have Windows choose the best paging file size, click System managed size. The recommended minimum size is equivalent to 1.5 times the amount of RAM on your system, and 3 times that figure for the maximum size. Example, if you have 256 MB of RAM, the minimum size would be 384, the maximum size would be 1152.
For best performance, do not set the initial size to less than the minimum allowed size under Total paging file size for all drives. The recommended size is equivalent to 1.5 times the amount of RAM on your system. Usually, you should leave the paging file at its recommended size, although you might increase its size if you routinely use programs that require a lot of memory.
To delete a paging file:
· Set both initial size and maximum size to zero, or click No paging file. Microsoft strongly recommends that you do not disable or delete the paging file.
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