Minimizing Virtual Mem Use w/ W2k?

[jtzou]

I was wondering if there was anyway to virtually eliminate the use of VM in W2K. I have a gig of RAM so I have no need for the use of VM. All it does is make my computer run a little bit slower than the max it can run at... I've tried stuff like Disabling the Pagign Executive, minimizing the page file (which has no apparent affect on the VM), and some program tweaks that did nothing. Any one know of any other way to make the most out of my physical RAM and use less VM?

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

No, I'm sure kernel developers are better at this stuff than you, don't worry about it so much.

 

[stevewm]

Please do not follow all the various "tweaking" guides that exist for 2k and XP. More than half of the registry settings all those guides show are not even looked at by the OS anymore. Meaning they do absolutely nothing.

2k/XP work alot differently then old 9x does. You will get absolutely NO performance benefit whatsoever by disabling the page file. In fact in many cases it could cause problems.

If you want that RAM to actually be used you're gonna have to open enough applications running, files open, etc... to fill it up 1GB of RAM is a bit of a overkill right now unless you have applications that need to actually load that much into RAM and use it (Like video editing/production or editing very very large, very high resolution photos.)

Think about this... If the page file/virtual memory system reduced OS performance as many claim it does (with no proof), why does every modern OS out there use such a system? Every Linux distro does, Mac OS X does, 2k/XP require it, and both the new up and coming MS OSes; Win2003 Server and "Longhorn" use it as well.....


In short, leave the page file at its default settings and stop worrying over nothing

 

[Nothinman]

Win2K is a Virtual Memory OS, you can't disable it. Getting rid of Virtual Memory would make the entire system behave like DOS, one big address space with no address virtualization between processes and would basically make the OS useless.

If you just mean pagefile usage, that's a different (although very related) subject. How do you know it's pagefile access that's causing your performance problems? There's a ton of things in Win2K that cause disk access, most of which aren't even close to being related to the pagefile.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: jtzou
I was wondering if there was anyway to virtually eliminate the use of VM in W2K. I have a gig of RAM so I have no need for the use of VM. All it does is make my computer run a little bit slower than the max it can run at... I've tried stuff like Disabling the Pagign Executive, minimizing the page file (which has no apparent affect on the VM), and some program tweaks that did nothing. Any one know of any other way to make the most out of my physical RAM and use less VM?

WIth a gig of memory, it's most likely your not paging (although you might think you are based on all the disinformation on this subject). Generally those tweaks are useless. What actualy problem are you trying to solve?
Bill

 

[jtzou]

Well, I figured that using Physical Memory would be much quicker than Virtual Memory, so I was hoping that everything could be done without the use of Virtual Memory. I think with older Windows OSes, this could be done and it would improve performance by not using Virtual Memory, but it seems as if even if I could disable it, it wouldn't provide any benefits.

 

[Nothinman]

Well, I figured that using Physical Memory would be much quicker than Virtual Memory, so I was hoping that everything could be done without the use of Virtual Memory. I think with older Windows OSes, this could be done and it would improve performance by not using Virtual Memory, but it seems as if even if I could disable it, it wouldn't provide any benefits.

Virtual Memory and pagefile use aren't the same thing, although MS is to blame here because they use the terms incorrectly interchangably.

Windows does use physical memory before the pagefile, there's not much you can do to change it's policies.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: jtzou
Well, I figured that using Physical Memory would be much quicker than Virtual Memory, so I was hoping that everything could be done without the use of Virtual Memory. I think with older Windows OSes, this could be done and it would improve performance by not using Virtual Memory, but it seems as if even if I could disable it, it wouldn't provide any benefits.

Your using the term virtual memory to apparently mean swap file usage. As Nothinman points out, they are not the same thing. Your system is already doing what you want, you just haven't realized it yet
Bill

 

[isaacmacdonald]

yep. just set the page file to 0.

as far as tangible gains, there are certainly many to be found.

If you do a lot of parrallel downloading, your drives will most likely be fragmented like a mofo (unless you defrag excessively). Paging on a fragged up drive, esp one that's constantly being written to, can be a very slow thing. Even with 1 gig of ram, XP constantly wants to page (don't know why). Everytime I run JK2 w/pagefile, I get very noticeable lag between stages (noticeable once the stage is loaded, but hasn't yet begun updating). As soon as I disable the pagefile, the lag is gone. It's very noticeable and reproducable. I'm not sure what contributes the most to the lag, but I'm sure the fact that the p2p app wants to write a 700KB/sec, The paging file wants to alternatively read/write, and the App wants to read the specifc map info/textures doesn't bode well for my poor wd1200jb.

Of course you could use a different HD on a different IDE channel, dedicated specifically to paging, but realistically ram is so cheap it makes very little sense to waste a channel.

 

[Nothinman]

yep. just set the page file to 0.

Don't do that, you'll end up causing more problems.

Paging on a fragged up drive, esp one that's constantly being written to, can be a very slow thing

Depends. The pagefile is created at bootup unless it's already there, so unless you delete it every shutdown it'll already be created and mostly contiguous. If you're paging to a drive you're doing other heavy read/writes to then it'll slow down, but you should fix that by moving the pagefile to a different disk or getting more memory.

 

[isaacmacdonald]

you'll certainly get problems *if* you have insufficient memory (eg: 512mb), but I haven't had any problems with a gig. (incidentally I'm running lots of mem intensive applications, so perhaps 512mb is fine for some users.)

I don't undestand why XP needs to write to a pagefile when excessive amounts of physical memory are unused + no mission critical apps are running. It's inefficient.

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: isaacmacdonald
you'll certainly get problems *if* you have insufficient memory (eg: 512mb), but I haven't had any problems with a gig. (incidentally I'm running lots of mem intensive applications, so perhaps 512mb is fine for some users.) I don't undestand why XP needs to write to a pagefile when excessive amounts of physical memory are unused + no mission critical apps are running. It's inefficient.

Here we go again.

You will have problems with application that use certain system api's if you have no page file REGARDLESS OF THE AMOUNT OF MEMORY. This particular issue is using null memory mapped file which take their backing store from the paging file.

As to your second point 'why XP needs to write to a page file....', XP is most likely NOT writing to the paging file. Unless you show me otherwise, I will assume you've made this determination by looking at 'PF Usage' in the task manager. That number includes page file reservations and DOES NOT MEAN that amount of memory is being swapped in/out at that time. You should be concerned if the PF Usage number is near or greater than the physical memory on the box, if it is then you ARE paging.

Bill

 

[isaacmacdonald]

actually my assumption was based entirely on the aforementioned A/B test:

A - Jedi Knight 2 MP, 1 gig of ram, page file enabled on wd1200jb w P2P running + Heavy Fragmentation. Result: MP map loads, then there's a huge 2 minute lag between the map being loaded and the thing updating (or when I'm actually in the game)

B - Exact same scenario, same MP server (same number of players, etc.), same P2P usage + heavy fragmentation. Result: MP map loads at the same percieveable rate, 10 seconds later I'm playing.

I reproduced this effect a half dozen times before I concluded that I'd rather just turn the pagefile off.

As for the errors, which apps will have them? I run the standard array: Photoshop (usually 1-3 gig files), Direct Connect, FPS games, email/web clients, etc. I haven't sensed any additional instability since disabling the pagefile.