Page File with 32GB Ram

[INeedSomeAdvice]

I'm sure this has been talked about scores of times, but I would like to ask quickly for myself.

I have 32gb of ram, paired with a 128gb ocz ssd. I've heard about disabling page file or reducing the amount. Currently I've reduced it to 512 - 2048 and regained a lot of space on my ssd, which I'm very happy about. Any suggestions or fine how I have it?

Also, should i disable write caching?

 

[kajabla]

You might as well remove it. You're never going to run out of RAM (right? What are you doing with your PC?). Alternately, move it onto an HDD if you have one.
The Internet seems to think it's fine to leave write caching on.

 

[zander1983]

When I disabled my page file my PC crashed playing BF3 (only 8GB RAM)

For reason's I can't explain I'd recommend not to disable the page file, but move it to a HDD (like kajabla said), even if it is only 2 or 3GB in size.

 

[vitornob]

You shouldn't disable at all page file due to software code. Sometimes write bytes in page file is mandatory, not optional.

 

[INeedSomeAdvice]

You might as well remove it. You're never going to run out of RAM (right? What are you doing with your PC?). Alternately, move it onto an HDD if you have one.
The Internet seems to think it's fine to leave write caching on.

For now I'm not doing anything too RAM intensive. Heavy gaming, school work, and a multi-monitor setup. The ram is just overkill, kind of an obsession. Any thoughts on what I should do wih that much ram? lol.

 

[jldevoy]

disable the hibernate as well.

 

[kajabla]

^yep. Sleep uses only about 1W more than hibernate anyway.

 

[Hawkeye22]

Some programs require a page file, others don't. With that much ram, i'd disable the page file. Only enable it if a program gives you problems... and as others said, disable hibernate. That should clear up a 32gig hiberfil.sys file since a hibernation file is the size of the amount of ram you have installed.

 

[gamerk316]

Understand that whether or not a Page File exists is irrelevant as far as the Virtual Memory subsystem is concerned. All memory addressing done by the OS is done in terms of Virtual Memory. The only difference is behavior is that when no Page File exists, physical RAM addresses must be mapped EXACTLY at a 1:1 rate with the corresponding Virtual Memory Address.

This causes slightly MORE RAM to be used overall. Here's why: When using a page file, if some data is created [say, some blank structure that hasn't been filled with data yet], it is given a Virtual Memory Address, but isn't mapped into Physical RAM until it is needed. But without a pagefile, this structure must be mapped into RAM upon creation. As a result, you use more RAM without a pagefile because data must be stored in RAM, even if not needed yet.

This can cause another problem: If I have a 64MB data structure, I need 64MB of CONTIGUOUS space in RAM to store it. I could have 10x that amount of total space free in RAM, but if no contiguous 64MB space exists, BOOM, out of memory error.

Besides, theres almost no negative impact of using a page file, given how the CPU has specilized HW to read/write to it [TLB, etc]. I recommend always leaving it on.

 

[greenrider02]

As mentioned, there can be issues with getting rid of your PageFile entirely, but since you have so much RAM, perhaps consider making a small 1GB RAMDisk and putting the page file on there?

I have 16GB, and I make my RAMDisk 4GB so it holds the PageFile, Windows temp, Firefox temp, and other temp files in the speediest possible storage I can use.

 

[mauller07]

Just make a small 512MB pagefile, you should never need it but some programs look for it that are coded for it

 

[centaurius]

512mb minimum 1024mb max.

 

[RussK1]

As mentioned, there can be issues with getting rid of your PageFile entirely, but since you have so much RAM, perhaps consider making a small 1GB RAMDisk and putting the page file on there?

I have 16GB, and I make my RAMDisk 4GB so it holds the PageFile, Windows temp, Firefox temp, and other temp files in the speediest possible storage I can use.

That's a good idea but some programs require pagefile to be on C:\. I've run across a few games that expect a pagefile on C:\ (MW3, BF3) and cause BSOD if it's not - ie; "PAGE_FAULT_IN_NON-PAGED_AREA". Even went so far to create pagefile on a different drive to no avail. Only solution was to create a small 2GB pagefile.

 

[MidnightDistort]

I have 3GB of RAM (upgraded from 1GB), and i haven't changed from 5GB with the paging file. IMO it's just there on the OS disk and 5 GB out of 20+GB of disk space it doesn't really matter about whether i have 5GB taken up. In the settings it says the minimum is 4413MB. Not sure if that's the same for every system setup but i don't see why it couldn't hurt. I remember having system instabilities with Windows 98 for having an insufficient amount of RAM. I don't remember what the settings were on it but now i just prefer to have a good extra for whatever reason.

 

[Earnie]

16G of ram,disabled page file,even playing BF3,no issues whatsoever.

 

[mikrev007]

This can cause another problem: If I have a 64MB data structure, I need 64MB of CONTIGUOUS space in RAM to store it. I could have 10x that amount of total space free in RAM, but if no contiguous 64MB space exists, BOOM, out of memory error.

The page file cannot fix problems you might have with non-contiguous memory. The memory manager cannot begin to change where data is stored at (virtual addresses). That would break things.

 

[INeedSomeAdvice]

Best answer selected by INeedSomeAdvice.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

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