how smart is XP with multiple pagefiles?

[tart666]

Let's say the system has three physical HD's, and I enable pagefile on all three...

is windows smart enough to allocate new paged memory on the one being used the least at the moment ?

any info on pagefile allocation in multiple disk situation at all would be greatly appreciated, thx

 

[Nothinman]

I believe so, but you'd probably be better off searching msdn.microsoft.com

 

[Haden]

AFAIK, yes

 

[thegorx]

I doubt it
I tried multiple pagefiles, and wasn't impressed
granted I didn't do that much testing but one of two never even seem to be used.

I like to use an old SOF map editor program to max out swap and pagefiles

 

[Algere]

Yes

"Split the page file over two or more physical drives. If you have two or more physical drives (not just two or more partitions on a single physical drive), splitting the page file over each drive can improve performance because it means Windows XP can extract data from each drive's page file simultaneously. For example, if your current initial page file size is 384 MB, then you'd set up a page file on drive with a 192-MB initial size, and another page file on a second drive with a 192-MB initial size."

Source: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/columns/mcfedries/03june16.asp

 

[tart666]

[...]because it means Windows XP can extract data from each drive's page file simultaneously.

that's exactly what it shouldn't do, when one of the three hard drives is already operating at 100% capacity...

I guess I just have to plan manually which two of the three drives to use for paging, to avoid sumultaneous loading and paging.

 

[ntrights]

Originally posted by: Algere
Yes

"Split the page file over two or more physical drives. If you have two or more physical drives (not just two or more partitions on a single physical drive), splitting the page file over each drive can improve performance because it means Windows XP can extract data from each drive's page file simultaneously. For example, if your current initial page file size is 384 MB, then you'd set up a page file on drive with a 192-MB initial size, and another page file on a second drive with a 192-MB initial size."

Source: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/columns/mcfedries/03june16.asp

Yep, thats the way my 2k3 box is setup 🙂

 

[NogginBoink]

Originally posted by: tart666

[...]because it means Windows XP can extract data from each drive's page file simultaneously.

that's exactly what it shouldn't do, when one of the three hard drives is already operating at 100% capacity...

I guess I just have to plan manually which two of the three drives to use for paging, to avoid sumultaneous loading and paging.

IF one of the drives is constantly busy, I suppose that's true.

But if, like most of the time, the drives are mostly idle, spanning data across two drives will make things a lot smarter.

The guys who wrote the NT memory manager are very, very smart folk who have spent lots and lots of time analyzing the issues. I'm sure they did metrics and studies and research that you haven't done.

I'd trust them to do it better than I could, that's for sure.

 

[kamper]

If you're that concerned about differences in page file usage may I suggest buying a little more ram?

 

[tart666]

Originally posted by: kamper
If you're that concerned about differences in page file usage may I suggest buying a little more ram?

everybody always says no matter how much you have, the pagefile will always be present and used...

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: tart666

Originally posted by: kamper
If you're that concerned about differences in page file usage may I suggest buying a little more ram?

everybody always says no matter how much you have, the pagefile will always be present and used...

Maybe so, but it won't be a bottleneck if you have enough ram. You can tell when paging is slowing you down (especially if you have a hd that has loud seeks). When you have enough ram you rarely ever feel it.