8GB RAM and virtual memory?

By freeza
in Microsoft (Windows)

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Grand Master

Southern Patriot

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Yes, it appears that Windows still follows the RAM x 1.5 formula for virtual memory that has existed since Windows 3.1! You'd think they would have revised that a little in the last decade or so. A similar crazy thing happens with the Recycle Bin as well, it still defaults to 10% of the hard drive (or of each hard drive if you have more than one), as it has since Windows 95 was released. The first thing I do when installing Windows is drop it down to around 1 or 2%. Even then I sometimes feel that it is wasteful.

I'm sure these crazy formulas probably have something to do with backwards compatibility, but I can't for the life of me understand what that might be. Maybe that is the reason that we still have the same font dialog box in Vista as in Windows 3.1 as well.

Grand Master

Southern Patriot

Posted
Posted
I doubt you have 12.2GB of virtual memory... You probably have 12.2GB total (physical plus virtual). Doesn't really matter, nothing goes there unless needed.

Brandon, I'm quite surprised that you would doubt that he was telling the truth about the virtual memory size, since you work for Microsoft. I'd think you would be well aware of the defaults that Windows ships with. 12GB of virtual memory would be the default setting for a system with 8GB of RAM (8 x 1.5 = 12).

Grand Master

freeza

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I agree Conan, i've disabled virtual memory but it seems as though the sims 2 doesn't like that much, so i enabled it and up until today i followed the 1.5x rule, but i find it ridiculous to have 12gb of virtual memory.....so i dropped it. hopefully all is well.

I wonder if i should turn on readyboost too! lol

Grand Master

Brandon Live Veteran

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Brandon, I'm quite surprised that you would doubt that he was telling the truth about the virtual memory size, since you work for Microsoft. I'd think you would be well aware of the defaults that Windows ships with. 12GB of virtual memory would be the default setting for a system with 8GB of RAM (8 x 1.5 = 12).

I thought perhaps he was going by the "Page File" readout in Task Manager, which is actually physical RAM + virtual. On my machine it is 4GB + 4GB, so I don't know where the 1.5x thing comes from.

Grand Master

Southern Patriot

Posted
Posted
On my machine it is 4GB + 4GB, so I don't know where the 1.5x thing comes from.

Then you must have changed it from the default setting. Windows has used the RAM x 1.5 formula for virtual memory since it first had virtual memory. I remember it using up 1/4 of the 50MB hard drive in my first Windows machine (running 3.1) after I upgraded the machine to 8MB of RAM (huge at the time).

Grand Master

Raa

Posted
Posted

You cannot disable the page file without experiencing errors.

This might sound strange, but some things are FORCED into the paging file (Some kernel libraries are prime examples) even though they are cached back to normal ram, often they can be kept in page file just for refernce.

Blame windows, but having a "small" page file is the best way to go, i've often stuck with a 384-512mb one myself, right from the 1gb ram days. ;)

Grand Master

soldier1st

Posted
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if you have that ammount of real memory then a pagefile size of 256mb or less will be best but dont turn it off,the more memory you got the less pagefile you need but it all depends on what you do with ur pc.

Apprentice

thehodown

Posted
Posted

If I had 8 gig of ram I would sack the page file off completely to be honest. 8 gig should be more than plenty for most day to day stuff. If you are doing something seriously memory intensive I would consider buying more ram rather than paging (and increasing disk I/O) as the chances are the machine is critical and the cost for the extra ram would far outweigh the performance hit you get when using the page file. Why utilise your hard disk as slow memory when you can use fast RAM?

Grand Master

Brandon Live Veteran

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If I had 8 gig of ram I would sack the page file off completely to be honest. 8 gig should be more than plenty for most day to day stuff. If you are doing something seriously memory intensive I would consider buying more ram rather than paging (and increasing disk I/O) as the chances are the machine is critical and the cost for the extra ram would far outweigh the performance hit you get when using the page file. Why utilise your hard disk as slow memory when you can use fast RAM?

That shows a lot of ignorance of OS design. Regardless of how much RAM you have, you shouldn't completely disable your pagefile. Make it small, sure, if you care about the disk space it's taking up. But don't turn it off.

You CAN turn it off, it's just not a good idea.

Grand Master

Brandon Live Veteran

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Then you must have changed it from the default setting. Windows has used the RAM x 1.5 formula for virtual memory since it first had virtual memory. I remember it using up 1/4 of the 50MB hard drive in my first Windows machine (running 3.1) after I upgraded the machine to 8MB of RAM (huge at the time).

Nope, it's using purely default settings - set to "Let windows manage my pagefile" or whatever. The size is actually variable, not fixed though.

Rising Star

Morpheus Phreak

Posted
Posted
I thought perhaps he was going by the "Page File" readout in Task Manager, which is actually physical RAM + virtual. On my machine it is 4GB + 4GB, so I don't know where the 1.5x thing comes from.

You've most likely set your Pagefile to a custom or constant size Brandon.

Windows default pagefile formula since Win95 has been Physical Mem x 1.5 =pagefile.sys size.

Also soldier1st 8GB of RAM sounds about right for Crysis or any game that uses large or streaming textures.

Instead of having the videocard texture swapping to the HD you could have it done in the RAM and just shut off the pagefile.

Rising Star

Morpheus Phreak

Posted
Posted
Any amount of RAM, 1gig or 8gig - I would still allow the OS to allocate it and work with a pagefile. It's a feature that the OS expects, and so denying it would be derogatory to the OS.

How so? The pagefile exists as a file on the HD. Max transfer speeds on an HD are around 1% of RAM speeds at best.

By disabling the pagefile you're forcing that information to travel at around 100+ times the speed.

How would that be derogatory? (BTW I'm assuming you meant detrimental, not derogatory)

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