What is pagefile.sys ? Can i delete it

[waris007]

I got 16 Gb Ram
If i delete it what happens? Any stability issues?
I used a software called TreeSize.
Any other ways to view this hidden file through windows? Or i need any third part softwares?
Please Help
http://prntscr.com/djpa7l

 

[SkyNetRising]

You can't delete it even if you tried.
But you can reduce it's size.
Go to

• 
  Control Panel\System\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change

and change paging file size to custom: 512mb initial, 4096mb max.
Reboot will be required after that.

 

[13thmonkey]

^ if it is a HDD i'd go 512 - 512 or 4096 - 4096 or similar so it doesn't fragment as it grows and shrinks, SSD doesn't matter but yet limit the size, or better move it to a hdd.

 

[Shaun o]

The page file of windows can be turned off if you have 16Gb or more of system memory fitted.

All it basically is, or does is when windows is running low on free memory, and for example you run another program within windows it temporary stores the data held in a section of system memory to a section of your hard disk drive making enough system memory free to run the other program launched.

Once you close the program, the data for the other program running is taken from the hard drive of the system and dumped back into system memory.

The windows page file can be turned off as said if you have lots of system memory such as 16 or 32Gb.
And also have a SSD drive as the boot drive with the working os on it.

The swap file is disabled because it is rare that unless you run multiple programs at one windows session you will need use of the page file system.

It also helps in respect to the SSD and it`s nand flash to reduce any extra read and writing tasks the page file wearing the Nand flash memory even quicker.

 

[13thmonkey]

some (badly coded, typically older) programs will throw a fit if they see no PF, but are quite happy if there is anything, even a tiny one.

 

[VincentP]

Far better than removing the pagefile is just to move it to a drive with more space.
Windows makes use of this file, even if you have available RAM.
Go to "Advanced system settings" -> "Performance" -> "Advanced" -> "Virtual Memory" -> "Change..."
Set "No paging file" for drives where space is a problem.
Choose one drive where you can spare the space, and set "Initial size" and "Maximum size" to 16384 MB.

 

[waris007]

You can't delete it even if you tried.
But you can reduce it's size.
Go to

• 
  Control Panel\System\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change

and change paging file size to custom: 512mb initial, 4096mb max.
Reboot will be required after that.

The page file of windows can be turned off if you have 16Gb or more of system memory fitted.

All it basically is, or does is when windows is running low on free memory, and for example you run another program within windows it temporary stores the data held in a section of system memory to a section of your hard disk drive making enough system memory free to run the other program launched.

Once you close the program, the data for the other program running is taken from the hard drive of the system and dumped back into system memory.

The windows page file can be turned off as said if you have lots of system memory such as 16 or 32Gb.
And also have a SSD drive as the boot drive with the working os on it.

The swap file is disabled because it is rare that unless you run multiple programs at one windows session you will need use of the page file system.

It also helps in respect to the SSD and it`s nand flash to reduce any extra read and writing tasks the page file wearing the Nand flash memory even quicker.

Far better than removing the pagefile is just to move it to a drive with more space.
Windows makes use of this file, even if you have available RAM.
Go to "Advanced system settings" -> "Performance" -> "Advanced" -> "Virtual Memory" -> "Change..."
Set "No paging file" for drives where space is a problem.
Choose one drive where you can spare the space, and set "Initial size" and "Maximum size" to 16384 MB.

Guys
i made initial 16 MB and Max 4096, is it okay?
and i had another 4gb PF on another partition drive but it is not showing on system setting so i thought it was old PF so tried to delete and it got deleted.

 

[VincentP]

You can't delete it even if you tried.
But you can reduce it's size.
Go to

• 
  Control Panel\System\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change

and change paging file size to custom: 512mb initial, 4096mb max.
Reboot will be required after that.

The page file of windows can be turned off if you have 16Gb or more of system memory fitted.

All it basically is, or does is when windows is running low on free memory, and for example you run another program within windows it temporary stores the data held in a section of system memory to a section of your hard disk drive making enough system memory free to run the other program launched.

Once you close the program, the data for the other program running is taken from the hard drive of the system and dumped back into system memory.

The windows page file can be turned off as said if you have lots of system memory such as 16 or 32Gb.
And also have a SSD drive as the boot drive with the working os on it.

The swap file is disabled because it is rare that unless you run multiple programs at one windows session you will need use of the page file system.

It also helps in respect to the SSD and it`s nand flash to reduce any extra read and writing tasks the page file wearing the Nand flash memory even quicker.

Far better than removing the pagefile is just to move it to a drive with more space.
Windows makes use of this file, even if you have available RAM.
Go to "Advanced system settings" -> "Performance" -> "Advanced" -> "Virtual Memory" -> "Change..."
Set "No paging file" for drives where space is a problem.
Choose one drive where you can spare the space, and set "Initial size" and "Maximum size" to 16384 MB.

Guys
i made initial 16 MB and Max 4096, is it okay?
and i had another 4gb PF on another partition drive but it is not showing on system setting so i thought it was old PF so tried to delete and it got deleted.

I would suggest making the pagefile larger than this.
By specifying such a small minimum, the file will constantly be resized which will cause fragmentation and reduce performance.
If you want to know curent pagefile settings, look at the location I mentioned above rather than searching for system files on the drives.

 

[waris007]

You can't delete it even if you tried.
But you can reduce it's size.
Go to

• 
  Control Panel\System\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change

and change paging file size to custom: 512mb initial, 4096mb max.
Reboot will be required after that.

The page file of windows can be turned off if you have 16Gb or more of system memory fitted.

All it basically is, or does is when windows is running low on free memory, and for example you run another program within windows it temporary stores the data held in a section of system memory to a section of your hard disk drive making enough system memory free to run the other program launched.

Once you close the program, the data for the other program running is taken from the hard drive of the system and dumped back into system memory.

The windows page file can be turned off as said if you have lots of system memory such as 16 or 32Gb.
And also have a SSD drive as the boot drive with the working os on it.

The swap file is disabled because it is rare that unless you run multiple programs at one windows session you will need use of the page file system.

It also helps in respect to the SSD and it`s nand flash to reduce any extra read and writing tasks the page file wearing the Nand flash memory even quicker.

Far better than removing the pagefile is just to move it to a drive with more space.
Windows makes use of this file, even if you have available RAM.
Go to "Advanced system settings" -> "Performance" -> "Advanced" -> "Virtual Memory" -> "Change..."
Set "No paging file" for drives where space is a problem.
Choose one drive where you can spare the space, and set "Initial size" and "Maximum size" to 16384 MB.

Guys
i made initial 16 MB and Max 4096, is it okay?
and i had another 4gb PF on another partition drive but it is not showing on system setting so i thought it was old PF so tried to delete and it got deleted.

I would suggest making the pagefile larger than this.
By specifying such a small minimum, the file will constantly be resized which will cause fragmentation and reduce performance.
If you want to know curent pagefile settings, look at the location I mentioned above rather than searching for system files on the drives.

i did the same way as u said. Now initial 512 MB and how max should i set?

 

[SkyNetRising]

i did the same way as u said. Now initial 512 MB and how max should i set?

With 16GB of ram pagefile will be used minimally. You can monitor pagefile usage with perfmon.msc
I set max to 4GB, but it never grows past initial size.

 

[VincentP]

You can't delete it even if you tried.
But you can reduce it's size.
Go to

• 
  Control Panel\System\Advanced System Settings\Advanced\Performance\Settings\Advanced\Virtual Memory\Change

and change paging file size to custom: 512mb initial, 4096mb max.
Reboot will be required after that.

The page file of windows can be turned off if you have 16Gb or more of system memory fitted.

All it basically is, or does is when windows is running low on free memory, and for example you run another program within windows it temporary stores the data held in a section of system memory to a section of your hard disk drive making enough system memory free to run the other program launched.

Once you close the program, the data for the other program running is taken from the hard drive of the system and dumped back into system memory.

The windows page file can be turned off as said if you have lots of system memory such as 16 or 32Gb.
And also have a SSD drive as the boot drive with the working os on it.

The swap file is disabled because it is rare that unless you run multiple programs at one windows session you will need use of the page file system.

It also helps in respect to the SSD and it`s nand flash to reduce any extra read and writing tasks the page file wearing the Nand flash memory even quicker.

Far better than removing the pagefile is just to move it to a drive with more space.
Windows makes use of this file, even if you have available RAM.
Go to "Advanced system settings" -> "Performance" -> "Advanced" -> "Virtual Memory" -> "Change..."
Set "No paging file" for drives where space is a problem.
Choose one drive where you can spare the space, and set "Initial size" and "Maximum size" to 16384 MB.

Guys
i made initial 16 MB and Max 4096, is it okay?
and i had another 4gb PF on another partition drive but it is not showing on system setting so i thought it was old PF so tried to delete and it got deleted.

I would suggest making the pagefile larger than this.
By specifying such a small minimum, the file will constantly be resized which will cause fragmentation and reduce performance.
If you want to know curent pagefile settings, look at the location I mentioned above rather than searching for system files on the drives.

i did the same way as u said. Now initial 512 MB and how max should i set?

I would typically set minimum and maximum to the same size as your RAM (16384 MB).
People will try and tell you that more RAM means you need a smaller pagefile, or none at all, but this is ignoring Windows use of the pagefile when creating a crash dump.
Here is a Microsoft knowledge base article on the topic:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/kb/2860880

 

[SkyNetRising]

Big pagefile impacts performance in a negative way. Especially if pagefile is located on HDD.
No need to set it to extremely large size, if it never grows to that.

As I said before, you can monitor pagefile usage, to find right values for your PC software/hardware configuration.

 

[VincentP]

Big pagefile impacts performance in a negative way. Especially if pagefile is located on HDD.
No need to set it to extremely large size, if it never grows to that.

As I said before, you can monitor pagefile usage, to find right values for your PC software/hardware configuration.

A large pagefile will never "impacts performance in a negative way" unless you are running low on disk space.
The pagefile won't "grow" at all if the minimum and maximum sizes are the same.
The pagefile will typically have very low usage during normal use on a desktop machine. If usage is typically high, then you would benefit from more RAM. The pagefile size recommendations come from the way Windows dumps memory in the event of a crash.

 

[SkyNetRising]

A large pagefile will never "impacts performance in a negative way" unless you are running low on disk space.

Yes it does. Try it.
Place pagefile on HDD and set size to 16MB min/4GB max. Reboot and use your PC for a while with memory intensive software so that pagefile usage is above 0%.
Then resize pagefile to 16GB min/16GB max (still located on HDD). Reboot and use your PC with memory intensive software again.
After that compare your PC experience in both cases.

With big pagefile it takes more time to read/write to it even if only small portion of it is being used. If there are a lot of paging operations, then difference is rather significant.

And there is no need to worry about crash dumps if you set memory dump to small (256kb).

 

[USAFRet]

16GB RAM
Set the pagefile to 1GB min/max.
Leave it on the SSD

Then leave it alone and never worry about it.

I've had mine set thusly for almost 5 years.
Zero issues.

 

[VincentP]

A large pagefile will never "impacts performance in a negative way" unless you are running low on disk space.

Yes it does. Try it.
Place pagefile on HDD and set size to 16MB min/4GB max. Reboot and use your PC for a while with memory intensive software so that pagefile usage is above 0%.
Then resize pagefile to 16GB min/16GB max (still located on HDD). Reboot and use your PC with memory intensive software again.
After that compare your PC experience in both cases.

With big pagefile it takes more time to read/write to it even if only small portion of it is being used. If there are a lot of paging operations, then difference is rather significant.

And there is no need to worry about crash dumps if you set memory dump to small (256kb).

What a load of rubbish.
If any "memory intensive software" is having to use the pagefile, it is already going to be vastly slower than using RAM.
Free space in the pagefile will have zero effect.

 

[SkyNetRising]

What a load of rubbish.

Come back, when you have tried it. 😉