Question Pagefile.sys size

[ekno]

I have a pc build. The pagefile or vram after a while keeps increasing, even when I'm not doing anything on the machine. The pagefile keeps increasing till i get an error and the computer freezes or there's no functionality. It happens all the time. So i have to restart the machine when i feel i've used it for a while. I don't know what started it but it is really annoying. Already the paging file has taken 24gb of ssd space. Sometimes i have to hard restart the machine or force shutdown.

 

[lvt]

You can manually delete the file then change the setting and let Windows manage the Virtual Memory itself.

 

[SkyNetRising]

You can manually delete the file then change the setting and let Windows manage the Virtual Memory itself.

No, you can not delete pagefile.

 

[SkyNetRising]

The pagefile or vram after a while keeps increasing, even when I'm not doing anything on the machine.
The pagefile keeps increasing till i get an error and the computer freezes or there's no functionality. It happens all the time.

Can you show screenshot from virtual memory settings? (upload to imgur.com and post link)
(Settings\System\About\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change)

What are specs of your system? How much ram installed?

 

[lvt]

No, you can not delete pagefile.

Not by the Del button from the keyboard, but you can do it by some mouse clicks.

 

[ekno]

Can you show screenshot from virtual memory settings? (upload to imgur.com and post link)
(Settings\System\About\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change)

What are specs of your system? How much ram installed?

https://imgur.com/s1UIzrc

View: https://imgur.com/s1UIzrc

With the image it says 2gb, thats because, i set it to no pagingfile and set it back to automatically, so its going to build up again to 24gb


12gb RAM installed, GTX 980 4gb, intel core i5-3470 CPU @ 3.20GHz.
On windows 10 21H2

 

[CountMike]

No, you can not delete pagefile.

Yes you can, it's enough to set it to No page file and reboot.

 

[ekno]

Yes you can, it's enough to set it to No page file and reboot.

But after setting to no pagefile, after a while the machine started freezing a little

 

[CountMike]

But after setting to no pagefile, after a while the machine started freezing a little

Just set it again to what you want and it will make a new one. Overfilling or overuse of page file, when you have decent size RAM is usually a sign of memory leak from a program or a driver.

 

[Colif]

what are specs of PC?

messing with page file size won't help if you have a memory leak. Nor would adding more ram, it just puts it off further. A restart occasionally can help as it flushes ram at startup, but really need to figure out whats chewing memory

restricting page file if you have a leak just means you get an out of memory error sooner. Its not the answer.

You probably need to run poolmon, it shows what is using memory on the system
video shows how to run it,

the top line of description has command you use to identify the tag, I can't copy it here as forums will play with its formating
you need to download the windows Driver toolkit - link - as it includes poolmon

You want to find the tag that is using the biggest difference between Allocs & Frees as these are the processes keeping memory and not giving it back. Leaks are caused by software requesting memory and not giving it back when its finished.

Many of the processes are actually parts of windows as you can see the processes that manage memory here, so some will always have a lot. This is normal. You want to look at non Microsoft tags

this is a list of the most common tags - https://github.com/zodiacon/PoolMonXv2/blob/master/PoolMonX/res/pooltag.txt

I would run program just after boot, to get a baseline for usage and something to compare to when page file is massive
screenshots can help. uploading to an image sharing website and show links heree for any you want help with.

 

[ekno]

what are specs of PC?

messing with page file size won't help if you have a memory leak. Nor would adding more ram, it just puts it off further. A restart occasionally can help as it flushes ram at startup, but really need to figure out whats chewing memory

restricting page file if you have a leak just means you get an out of memory error sooner. Its not the answer.

You probably need to run poolmon, it shows what is using memory on the system
video shows how to run it,

the top line of description has command you use to identify the tag, I can't copy it here as forums will play with its formating
you need to download the windows Driver toolkit - link - as it includes poolmon

You want to find the tag that is using the biggest difference between Allocs & Frees as these are the processes keeping memory and not giving it back. Leaks are caused by software requesting memory and not giving it back when its finished.

Many of the processes are actually parts of windows as you can see the processes that manage memory here, so some will always have a lot. This is normal. You want to look at non Microsoft tags

this is a list of the most common tags - https://github.com/zodiacon/PoolMonXv2/blob/master/PoolMonX/res/pooltag.txt

I would run program just after boot, to get a baseline for usage and something to compare to when page file is massive
screenshots can help. uploading to an image sharing website and show links heree for any you want help with.

I'll try your process and send a feedback, thank you.

my pc specs
12gb RAM installed, GTX 980 4gb, intel core i5-3470 CPU @ 3.20GHz.
On windows 10 21H2

 

[Colif]

how do you have 12gb of ram? i mean, what size sticks? how many?

what motherboard do you have as its likely source of most of the drivers.

 

[ekno]

how do you have 12gb of ram? i mean, what size sticks? how many?

what motherboard do you have as its likely source of most of the drivers.

sorry for the late reply, its a MSI BaseBoard Product H61M-P31 (G3) (MS-7788)

 

[SkyNetRising]

With the image it says 2gb, thats because, i set it to no pagingfile and set it back to automatically, so its going to build up again to 24gb

Set it to custom size.

1GB initial,​

8GB max.​

 

[SkyNetRising]

Yes you can, it's enough to set it to No page file and reboot.

You should never do that.
This breaks virtual memory subsystem.

 

[Colif]

its fine to set page file to no paging file if all you do is restart and then recreate it again.
that may move it to another part of drive.

setting page file to max 8gb when he has a memory leak is only going to cause errors to occur sooner.

 

[CountMike]

You should never do that.
This breaks virtual memory subsystem.

No, it doesn't, with enough RAM you can run with no virtual memory. There are only few applications like Adobe set that require at least some as they use it as scratch. Besides, it's recreated as soon as you set it again, auto or manual.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

NO, you cannot run with virtual memory set to 0, no matter how much RAM you have. Windows requires that a paging file be present at all times. Always has. Just because you personally haven't had issues doesn't mean that it's fine to tell others that they can do it.

 

[ekno]

what are specs of PC?

messing with page file size won't help if you have a memory leak. Nor would adding more ram, it just puts it off further. A restart occasionally can help as it flushes ram at startup, but really need to figure out whats chewing memory

restricting page file if you have a leak just means you get an out of memory error sooner. Its not the answer.

You probably need to run poolmon, it shows what is using memory on the system
video shows how to run it,

the top line of description has command you use to identify the tag, I can't copy it here as forums will play with its formating
you need to download the windows Driver toolkit - link - as it includes poolmon

You want to find the tag that is using the biggest difference between Allocs & Frees as these are the processes keeping memory and not giving it back. Leaks are caused by software requesting memory and not giving it back when its finished.

Many of the processes are actually parts of windows as you can see the processes that manage memory here, so some will always have a lot. This is normal. You want to look at non Microsoft tags

this is a list of the most common tags - https://github.com/zodiacon/PoolMonXv2/blob/master/PoolMonX/res/pooltag.txt

I would run program just after boot, to get a baseline for usage and something to compare to when page file is massive
screenshots can help. uploading to an image sharing website and show links heree for any you want help with.

After running poolmon, this was the result

https://imgur.com/0kiyy2B

View: https://imgur.com/0kiyy2B

 

[Colif]

Is that when its using lots of memory or at boot? appear to only be using 8gb
so that might be normal usage. you need to compare that to abnormal.

paged = on page file
nonp= in ram

MMst = windows
Fmfv = fltmgr - file manager
NVRM - Nvidia drivers

 

[Bob.B]

NO, you cannot run with virtual memory set to 0, no matter how much RAM you have. Windows requires that a paging file be present at all times. Always has. Just because you personally haven't had issues doesn't mean that it's fine to tell others that they can do it.

I won't tell others to do it but I run w10 without a page file.
I suppose it depends on what you do with the machine.

 

[ekno]

Is that when its using lots of memory or at boot? appear to only be using 8gb
so that might be normal usage. you need to compare that to abnormal.

paged = on page file
nonp= in ram

MMst = windows
Fmfv = fltmgr - file manager
NVRM - Nvidia drivers

Yeah this was after i restarted the machine, paging file says allocated is 24576

 

[Colif]

your paged total on poolmon is 243748k which isn't that big
your commitments (Memory promised to processes) is only 7434344k
your commit total (Max you can use) is about 37709868k so you miles away from that.

on the memory tab of Task manager/Performances tab, how much is showing against paged and no paged?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Yeah this was after i restarted the machine, paging file says allocated is 24576

Did you try setting virtual memory to custom size (as suggested in post #14) ?

 

[ekno]

Did you try setting virtual memory to custom size (as suggested in post #14) ?

Yes I did, what happened was, if I set it to that, after a while, the paging file starts increasing and when it gets to the maximum size set, i start getting errors, and freezes