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Pagefile.. stuff.. Memory usage.. ??

Much easier just to do it in control panel system performance
 
Don't know if it's been mentioned but heard talk of pagefile.sys .. it is in c:\ and is supperhiddenfile. Read first section below on moving page file.. it explains how to view supperhiddernfiles then you can delete and move pagefile.sys to any drive easy. Not sure what would happen completely deleting it, in theory would completely disable page file - might gives windows a headache though!!

Good way is to to have drive for storage and page file only and separate partition for both, then another drive for OS and programs again separate partition for both..

http://users.telenet.be/danny-website/Tweaks Engels.htm
 
Hi trog100,
I think your experiment reinforces further that windows OS neither has a sound Resource Management policy nor a clean structured implementation of any policy that does not result in absurd or dead-lock resource situations. The most annoying and often experienced "not responding" is a clinching testimony of its quality. Software Engineering used to be - once upon a time (15-20 yrs) - a "subject" for study and lay foundations for implementing a robust software, but not today it is out-the-windows!! and Windows OS is a leader of sort!
 
1) Windows does know the difference between a harddisk pagefile and a page in RAM. A soft fault is when a page is needed from main memory (RAM) and a hard fault is when a page is needed from Main Storage (disk).

2) First in first out. Is the term for how windows decides what will be kept in page on main system memory or be paged back to the disk. If you had Firefox open and shut it down and loaded enough files to use the memory that it occupied in physical RAM it would be paged back to the disk in order to load faster than out of the file system, but slower than in physical ram. If not, it stays resident untill one of two things happens. The system is shut down or put into suspention-hibernation, or a call is made to the memory location it is resident in.

3) Windows tries to keep a copy of the page resident in memory on the disk pagefile, so if the file fails to be called due to a write from another program to the memory location or if the data is corrupt. I believe that this only applies to key system files, thus your disk usage with pagefile turned off.

4) Windows records any changes made to system or other files by comparing them at shutdown and making the adjustments as needed, and yes it is much slower by default to do this from a harddrive.

5) Windows actually manages memory and resources quite well for how many applications get thrown at it as a OS on a daily basis. Gaming and server apps and office, etc...
 
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Hi trog100,
I think your experiment reinforces further that windows OS, neither has a sound policy of Resource Management, nor a clean-structured-implementation of a policy that doesn't result in absurd or dead-lock resource situations. The most famous and annoying thing of "not responding" is a clear testimony of this. Software Enginnering used to be - once upon a time 15-20 yrs ago! - a computer science subject, principles for implementing a robust software, but not today - it has gone out-the-window!! Windows xxxx OS is a leader of sort!
 
Robust is now a term for bloated.

A simple performance test or FPS during gameplay or during everyday use would result in.....nothing. As I stated Windows will not page anything out of memory unless it has to or if the system is being shut down to prevent a loss of work in progress.

http://www.osnn.net/articles.php?action=show&showarticle=99
 
When 4GB of Ram becomes mainstream, if it hasn't already, then how about setting up a 'virtual ram drive', of let's say 1GB, so you're left with 3Gb of Chip Ram, with the last 1GB as your assigned 'virtual page file' on the 'virtual drive letter'. This way, shutdowns will be faster, and who cares if anything becomes fragmented or expands, because when the power is out, 'it's' out! lol.
 
i agree with the windows will not in essence use the hardrive part of its virtual memory unless it has to theories..

the test i ran to see if it used it was to set a very small pagefile.sys.. its set at a minimum of 200 meg and maximum of 500 meg on my 2 gig physical memory system..

u could set a smaller minimum one.. say 10 megs.. if windows uses its pagefile.sys it expands it to whatever size it needs.. it never resets it back smaller untill the next time the system is rebooted..

my 200 meg pagfile.sys never alters in size unless i force it to.. from this i recon its reasonable to asume its not being used..

i can force it to be used by loading two large games both at once.. fear and quake 4 for example take up nearly 2.5 gig of virtual memory.. this causes the pagefile.sys to expand to its max of 500 meg in my case.. if i try throwing another big game in there it just tells me politely i have run out of virtual memory and simple refuses to load the third big game.. it dosnt crash or bluescreeen as i assumed it would when it runs out of memory.. memories of the past this one i think.. he he

i think the theory that windows uses its hardrive memory as a matter of course on a day to day basis is quite simply wrong..

it seems to only use it when it runs out of the real stuff.. which when windows was designed would have been quite often.. now in the days of oodles of cheap memory it dosnt get used at all in an ideal situation..

for most people with reasonable amounts of system memory.. swopfiling should be a thing of the past.. apart from its habit of creating huge unused pagfile.sys files if u have lots of real memory which causes a long shutdown period.. 50 seconds longer in my case.. it can be ignored i recon..

if u have lots of real memory the answer does seem to be to set a small minimum size one.. the max can be as big as u like if it never gets used it stays at the minimum size.. if it does get used its a sign u need more real memory..

telling windows not to clear its pagefile at shutdown dosnt seem to alter the long shutdown times.. windows never deletes its huge swopfiles.. but it does seem to spend lots of time doing something with them when the system is shutdpwn..

also u cant delete an active one while in windows.. it wont let u.. it also dosnt delete inactive ones if u have moved them about.. u can get rid of the inactive ones manually thow..

trog
 
just discovered another interesting memory thing..

its assumed fear for example needs more than 1 gig of physical memory to run the maximim size textures..

someone.. adcam i think ask if i gig of system memory would work okay with a grfx card that has 512 onboard.. i said i didnt think it would make any difference.. ??

but with fear it seems it does.. i now have a 512 card and put it to the test.. with the 256 card task manager recorded about 1.3 gig of pagefile usage.. with a 512 card it records only 800 meg.. ??

so it seems xxx amount of junk gets loaded into memory.. some goes to the card.. the rest gets left in the system memory..

with quake 4 it dosnt make any difference what memory the card has.. task manager still records the same pagefile usage with 512 as with 256..

this must be about how the game uses card memory.. fear must use all the 512 and quake 4 dosnt.. just 256 of it.. i have also read that oblivion only uses 256 of card memory..

if my thinking is correct.. the little stutters u get in fear as textures are being shifted from system memory to card memory should be improved by having a 512 card and u can get away with less system memory and for any other game having a 512 card is just waste of space.. he he he

trog
 
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All in how the program is designed. The program decides how much memory to use, lets say it allocates 512Mb of the 4Gb total of physical address space available. 256 on card and 256main memory. It is then up to the kernel to handle that request, if there is enough available main memory then that becomes tagged as in use. There is a point here as to how the program is written, if it was written with a NT kernel compliance in mind, it should never try to read or write out of it's allocated address range. If not there is the possiblity during gameplay to have a BSOD due to the process trying to read or write to address block that it doesn't own.

Back to the allocated memory, if that is all the game made a request for and was allocated then that is it, more RAM will not change anything. If it uses only 100Mb of the 256Mb allocated during gameplay the other 156Mb block is still shown as being used, as it is locked from other proccesses.

If a system has less available main memory then it is up to windows as to what to page in and out of main memory to the disk to increase performance. FIFO kicks in, and starts offloading unused process modules and remapping their address space. This applies anytime the the system memory manager runs out of main memory. If a file shows recent enough use and the memory is still needed it will be paged back to the disk in sequential order for a faster load then out of the file system hiarchy.

So draw a pie and quarter it, one quarter is Firefox, one quarter is WMP, one is Messenger, and one is MS Word. Here we have all the system resources tied up. Now we quit everythign and go to do a little video editing that will use all the resources again. We have one of two possibilities.

1) The information in main memory is written to the pagefile on the disk as we have a high chance of using it again shortly, based on history useage, and how recently it was used.

2) There is no pagefile and to reflect last access time and date, as well as any changes made windows must rewrite all the active files to the disk in the file system, and depending on the level of fragmentation, as well as number of files this could take some time. If we had a pagefile all these changes would be taken care of at shutdown or when the memory manager offloaded the files from the active list.

So in all reality there is no scenerio where it is faster to not have a pagefile for the whole system to use. There might be one or two apps that run a bit quicker, and shutdowns may take less time, but the whole system will not be magicly faster.
 
And as for a Solid State Drive, I keep thinking that I would love for some company to come along and build a IDE or SATA interface box that you can plug some cheapo PC3200 into and have a pagefile that rivals the main memory for speed.
 
yes the solid state drive does exist.. up to eight gigs or so u bung on it.. i have a small operating partition of about 20 megs.. its has about 6 megs of windows XP plus what i consider essential apps on it.. the rest is left empty..

one of these solid state drive things would hold all that.. operating system plus basic apps.. just a bit pricey when u factor in the 8 gigs of basic ram and the unit itseelf.. praps £500 in UK money all in.. cheap ram would do..

super fast bootup plus browsng and basic stuff.. no good for games or anything of any size thow.. one day when ram gets cheaper praps.. he he he

trog
 
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