virtual ram

Ok I have been reading around and heard people saying that if you have enough ram that you can turn of the windows virtual ram. First of all how much do you need to do that? And second how do you do it? I'm pretty sure I have enough. I have a gig. But I figured I would ask for those wondering the same thing as well
Duck

well 1GB seems like an awful lot, so if you were to enable Virtual Memory I dont think you would need much of it. Personally If I were you I would run wihtout it, and if any problems arise that seem to directly relate to it, which still could happen if you have things running in the background whilst playing a RAM hungry game...and then I would assign say 128-256MB of it.

To do it go to control panel/system on a 9x system then end tab is called performance I believe, there you will see a command button near the bottom relating to it, it will ask you for a high and low value which I recommend you make the same to save on fragmentation.

On XP goto the control panel/system again - now go to the advanced tab, the performance settings, the advanced tab within that and you will see a virtual memory setting near the bottom.

1GB should be okay for games. It's going to be office applications (huge databases and graphics programs) that will need more than that. At least for the next year or two. If you have a problem with a brand new game you might want to try turning it back on.

Well i'm debating on whether to get 512mb or over a gig of ram.
I'm running 1 gig of 2100 but am upgrading to 2700 and am wondering what the real advantage of 1 gig over 512 would be.
Duck

So by dissabling this virtual ram(my system had 3gigs set asside for it). Does that mean that I am going to see a bigger increase in my actual memory usage?
Duck

I don't think i would turn it off. Virtual memory is used for page swapping for programs. Even if you do ahve a Gig of ram think of it like this.

WITH VIRTUAL MEMORY

Your programs all need a place to go when you load them up. The Files you need( like say the main code to run Word) go to main memory, the other files go to Virtual memory( like spell check in word). It's done this way so that you can have programs loaded up in main memory and have access to them fast(main memory is faster then Virtual memory).

WITHOUT VIRTUAL MEMORY

Now imagine you have say 3 programs running( not includeing whats running in the back ground or in the taskbar) now lets say with all of that running you decide you want to run another program. you go to load it up , but now you have no more memory because you only have 1 gig in your machine.

This is why you need Virtual memory, when you load up that 4th program the memory management in windows will remove unnecessary stuff from the memory and place it into virtual memory so you can keep running all the programs with out shutting any off. You also have to remember that Windows is running in you memory as well, and it uses Virtaul memoey big time for it's own files.

So if you take into account all the thing running in the background, the task bar and programs you have running that you launched , PLUS the operating system, I don't think it would be a good idea to turn off virtual memeory.

I know a great deal more about this, but only wanted to scratch the surface. If you need more info let me know and I'll post more detailed stuff about virtual memory.

Goodie, the thing is, Windows will run fine with 256 and I've never heard anybody say you need more than 3 times physical ram for virtual memory. That's why people are saying it's okay to run with no virtual memory when you have a gig of physical ram.

windows will remove unnecessary stuff from the memory and place it into virtual memory so you can keep running all the programs with out shutting any off.

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if you have it disabled it wont do this as it wont be able to - but thats because it expects you to have a hell load of memory - so it will simply keep everything there.

You also have to remember that Windows is running in you memory as well, and it uses Virtaul memoey big time for it's own files.

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well as a personal observation I have noticed that the more memory you have the more memory windows seems take up - as if it dynamically loads more of the core into memory - but I doubt it uses virtual memory big time as it would be unbearably slow, my guess is that my 120MB of RAM that is used from start up with XP will hold everything it needs - if it needs some other OS level operation it will then either see what memory is free or go to the swap file if there is none - which if you had it disabled but 1GB + RAM I doubt there will be a problem.

Goodie, the thing is, Windows will run fine with 256 and I've never heard anybody say you need more than 3 times physical ram for virtual memory.

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yeah, when I had 256MB and XP I used a 512MB swap file giving me 768MB total, it never once gave out of memory or page file filling messages - so 1GB is overkill

If I have 768mb of physical ram, how big should my page file be?

You should never disable virtual memory.

First off most likely you are not going to use a gig of RAM, but yet windows still uses the page file. Windows is not stupid, there are probably very specific reasons for the page file being used. It is not just a back up for physical RAM.

then create a ram drive and set your page file there

Well now I have read people saying that your computer woule be faster by turning virtual ram of and now some that say that by leaving the ram on. If there is no real advantage then why have over say 512mb ram in the first place? I've used over 800mb of ram. Does windows free the ram back up once programs aren't using it? Also where can I see how much ram is being used?
Duck

windows has a resource monitor. in system tools in the start menu.

If you have Windows 98/98se or ME, try this. It will minimize the swap file usage, and in many cases, it won't use the swap file at all. But it will be there if needed.

http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/620

With win2k and a gig of ram my page file usage always sits at 3 - 4mb. I have tried disabling it and i get low on virtual memory errors. I just leave it set to 512mb.

ninthebin said:

then create a ram drive and set your page file there

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What's a ram drive? (sorry for my newbie quesiton) And its benifits?

gravitywell said:

What's a ram drive? (sorry for my newbie quesiton) And its benifits?

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In short its a bunch of RAM thats acts like a harddrive. You get very fast transfer rates, except its volitile.

volitile? what do you mean? So a ram drive is like... if i wanted to I could partition my ram. set aside like 500mb for files and store files on there to be transfered?

Yes you could. Volitile means that when the power is shut off you will loose all info. So anything you store will not stay once you shut down. There are other options such as when the system shuts down info from the RAM is then stored on the HDD and then trasfered back to the Ram when you boot up. But I don't really think it is worth the trouble.